>More specifically, the discrediting was caused by a combination of the deliberately dishonest or at best wildly inaccurate intel, the sense that pro-war elites

>More specifically, the discrediting was caused by a combination of the deliberately dishonest or at best wildly inaccurate intel, the sense that pro-war elites in government and media were manufacturing consent for the war, and wrong predictions about how the war would go. IMO, this is what people tell themselves now because they don't want to admit that they genuinely supported to the war to begin with. The Iraq War and the War on Terror were very much populist wars motivated by American's wanting to get revenge on brown people. That's why Bush's approval skyrocketed after 9/11 and the capture of Saddam. Yes, a nonzero amount of elites supported or benefited from these wars, but you can say that about anything. You're not going to convince the government to spend trillions of dollars without a few experts on your side and others who profit off of it.