RandomGuy
03-22-2006, 09:39 PM
An original essay by R.G.
This week I saw Bush stoop to the level of lying that was formerly reserved for Bill Clinton's evasion about the the definition of "is".
President Bush doesn't want to see the situation in Iraq as a "civil war", despite what anybody with common sense could tell you. Killings, revenge killings, killings-that-revenge-the-revenge-killings, revenge-for-the-killing-of-my-cat-killings, death squads, armed & organized rebellions. Call it for what it is, civil war.
In the build up to the the Mother of All Grab-ass-ery, we were told that we would be welcomed as liberators and our troops expected to be home for Christmas.
I KNEW otherwise. Iraq was not going to be France in 1945, but rather Yugoslavia in 1994. I could see it coming like a horrible train-wreck that I couldn't stop. Bush got all the right people riled up and everybody scared to question him for not being patriotic enough. His supporters parroted this message at every opportunity, and we went off to a part of the world our Commander-in-Chief knew very little about, and his administration didn't know much more than he did.
Ever since then, I have given this whole mis-adventure about a 50-50 chance of coming off without sliding into a civil war.
Well ,that coin has landed and, unsurprisingly, the Iraqi people have lost. The same administration that didn't think our troops needed body armor, armored humvees, or enough troops to do the job, has cut the rug out from under its ground commanders yet again, by freezing funds for reconstruction.
The commanders on the ground have been putting in place a new strategy called "clear-hold-build". Clear an area, hold it, and build it up. Kind of hard to build when you can't have any money, isn't it? The new strategy is kind of like Bush's response to Katrina. "Clear-hold-hope".
I can't do anything but shake my head that this guy's die-hard fans just can't realize how f***ed up things are over there. Bush may have deluded himself into thinking he did the right thing, but I kind of wonder if even he believes his spin anymore. Better that then to admit you were wrong and hurt the party, I guess.
I liked Clinton and still do. But even I had to shake my head at the tape in which he debates the definition of the word "is". The same feeling plays all over when I hear Bush swear up and down, wagging his finger at us that "this... is... not... a... civil... war..." starts sounding suspiciously like "I... did... not... have... sexual... relations...".
Only this time, we get tax hikes, thousands of our own dead soldiers and tens of thousands of dead Iraqis, who are genuinely starting to wonder if Saddam was really that bad. I would rather GW have gottena bj from an intern and gotten whatever-it-is out of his system, than to have given 2,000+ and counting of our troops to the altar of stupidity.
The really sad thing is that I don't have a better alternative to staying and trying to glue the peices back together. I would however get somebody with a clue in to do it. Rumsfeld isn't that guy. He got a little respect from me when he helped carry stretchers from the Pentagon on 9-11, but just because he might be a decent guy at heart doesn't mean he is competant enough to make life and death policy decisions. "Good job, Brownie..." ring a bell? Loyalty is one thing. Loyalty to idiots is another.
Well there it is.
I will predict a further escalation of the civil war in Iraq. This administration just has not demonstrated the competance that might avert it, so hold on to your hats, and say good-bye to your sons and an effective military. This war will continue to eat our military from the inside out, both in terms of using up people and equipment faster than those at the top will know or even admit to even if they did know.
We will let the Iraqis do more of the fighting, and that will eventually lead to a splintering of the military, and then not even Bush will be able to deny the reality of his failure and incompetance.
This administration COULD avert that escalation, and even roll back the tension. But, sadly, I know it won't. When the finger wagging starts, you know the bullshit is coming, and this administration has been wagging it's finger at us for a looong time.
This week I saw Bush stoop to the level of lying that was formerly reserved for Bill Clinton's evasion about the the definition of "is".
President Bush doesn't want to see the situation in Iraq as a "civil war", despite what anybody with common sense could tell you. Killings, revenge killings, killings-that-revenge-the-revenge-killings, revenge-for-the-killing-of-my-cat-killings, death squads, armed & organized rebellions. Call it for what it is, civil war.
In the build up to the the Mother of All Grab-ass-ery, we were told that we would be welcomed as liberators and our troops expected to be home for Christmas.
I KNEW otherwise. Iraq was not going to be France in 1945, but rather Yugoslavia in 1994. I could see it coming like a horrible train-wreck that I couldn't stop. Bush got all the right people riled up and everybody scared to question him for not being patriotic enough. His supporters parroted this message at every opportunity, and we went off to a part of the world our Commander-in-Chief knew very little about, and his administration didn't know much more than he did.
Ever since then, I have given this whole mis-adventure about a 50-50 chance of coming off without sliding into a civil war.
Well ,that coin has landed and, unsurprisingly, the Iraqi people have lost. The same administration that didn't think our troops needed body armor, armored humvees, or enough troops to do the job, has cut the rug out from under its ground commanders yet again, by freezing funds for reconstruction.
The commanders on the ground have been putting in place a new strategy called "clear-hold-build". Clear an area, hold it, and build it up. Kind of hard to build when you can't have any money, isn't it? The new strategy is kind of like Bush's response to Katrina. "Clear-hold-hope".
I can't do anything but shake my head that this guy's die-hard fans just can't realize how f***ed up things are over there. Bush may have deluded himself into thinking he did the right thing, but I kind of wonder if even he believes his spin anymore. Better that then to admit you were wrong and hurt the party, I guess.
I liked Clinton and still do. But even I had to shake my head at the tape in which he debates the definition of the word "is". The same feeling plays all over when I hear Bush swear up and down, wagging his finger at us that "this... is... not... a... civil... war..." starts sounding suspiciously like "I... did... not... have... sexual... relations...".
Only this time, we get tax hikes, thousands of our own dead soldiers and tens of thousands of dead Iraqis, who are genuinely starting to wonder if Saddam was really that bad. I would rather GW have gottena bj from an intern and gotten whatever-it-is out of his system, than to have given 2,000+ and counting of our troops to the altar of stupidity.
The really sad thing is that I don't have a better alternative to staying and trying to glue the peices back together. I would however get somebody with a clue in to do it. Rumsfeld isn't that guy. He got a little respect from me when he helped carry stretchers from the Pentagon on 9-11, but just because he might be a decent guy at heart doesn't mean he is competant enough to make life and death policy decisions. "Good job, Brownie..." ring a bell? Loyalty is one thing. Loyalty to idiots is another.
Well there it is.
I will predict a further escalation of the civil war in Iraq. This administration just has not demonstrated the competance that might avert it, so hold on to your hats, and say good-bye to your sons and an effective military. This war will continue to eat our military from the inside out, both in terms of using up people and equipment faster than those at the top will know or even admit to even if they did know.
We will let the Iraqis do more of the fighting, and that will eventually lead to a splintering of the military, and then not even Bush will be able to deny the reality of his failure and incompetance.
This administration COULD avert that escalation, and even roll back the tension. But, sadly, I know it won't. When the finger wagging starts, you know the bullshit is coming, and this administration has been wagging it's finger at us for a looong time.