Rusted Sky

And if it means massive deaths and a country in chaos... who cares? It's on the other side of the world, and it's not too early to prep for the '08 elections! Hey, we KNOW who the enemy is, and it ain't Al Quaeda!

House OKs Plan to Withdraw US Troops

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Iraqi government is achieving only spotty military and political progress, the Bush administration conceded Thursday in an assessment that war critics quickly seized on as confirmation of their dire warnings. Within hours, the House voted to withdraw U.S. troops by spring.

That'll show those Iraqis who believe the US will stand by them!

Printable words fail me.

Here's the first comparision I thought of. In the American West, there was a modest, pretty much tacit guarantee of a rule of law. That some order would be kept in the towns, that there would be designated people to go out and hunt lawbreakers and investigate crimes. With that promise of stability, people moved out and communities flourished. Those who broke the law ended up in jail or dead - they didn't end up in control of the towns, imposing their brand of law on the area... at least, not for long.

We have been attempting to buck up the government and people of Iraq, hunting down those would would try to take over the country and trying to buy the people of Iraq enough time that they could stabilize and create a government of and by the people, and bulk up enough to fight those who would take over. With even a modest guarantee that the 'sherrif' will be there, they can do this. There's plenty of indication that the surge is working, and the Iraqi people are getting their shit together. So NOW is the time to hamstring the effort, bring the troops home, and watch Iraq go up in a lovely bonfire to hopefully light the way for the Democrats to take the Presidency in '08.

The 25-page administration report was issued in the fifth year of a war that has claimed the lives of more than 3,600 U.S. troops and is costing U.S. taxpayers an estimated $10 billion a month.

Bush announced last winter he was ordering thousands of additional troops to the war zone, but the full complement has only arrived in recent weeks. "The full surge in this respect has only just begun," the report said.

It warned of "tough fighting" during the summer as U.S. and Iraqi forces "seek to seize the initiative from early gains and shape conditions of longer-term stabilization."

The miltiary planners in WW2 would have been flabbergasted at such a LOW comparitive price for a war of the magnitude we fought... and won. Our economy isn't converted to a war footing, there no draft needed to replace the hundreds of men who died daily - and the cost of the war is a bare blip on our GDP. And it's too much? It's too hard? We can fight this war with essentially government pocket change and an all-volunteer force, and it's too difficult?

If we can't win when it's this EASY (and it IS easy by any historical sense) then we're going to have to do it again in a couple of decades, only the cost will be a hell of a lot higher. But that's after the '08 election, so IT DOESN'T MATTER!

What's the alternative? What can we expect if we pull out?

Hey, who really gives a rat's hindquarters? IT DOESN'T MATTER! After all, Iraq doesn't matter one bit, except as a weapon to hurt Bush. 25 million people we promised protection to... don't count one bit if it means that supporting them, supporting Bush, might lose support from the anti-war crowd. The folks voting today to pull out would quail at actually slaughtering any of the people in Iraq themselves, but they'll love every damn bit of the carnage when it comes because it can be used against Bush. (Who isn't running in '08, but that doesn't matter. It's beyond rationality now, it's the principle of the thing.)

And we will prove, for once and all, that there's not an ally on the planet that can trust us for aid or assistance in the fight against terrorism.

History will judge them harshly.... but then again, maybe not. They may well be looked upon as heros... by Al Quaeda.

I wish to hell I could persuade myself that it just doesn't matter.

You know, sometimes I wonder why I even bother. I'm sure there's got to be historians with democratic affiliations who are looking at the current stances of the Democratic party and are able to forecast what the results of the resulting policies will be, or even have enough sense to say to Pelosi "Um, you know that anything you say on the Floor will be on the web in about thirty seconds, and read in internet cafes throughout the ME moments later." Do they not care? Don't they see what the results are? My conclusion is that she doesn't care one bit about the long-term effects - being focused on the now is all, and the future can take care of itself (and be blamed on Bush, regardless.)

I'm sure there's a good number of people who can look at the whole picture and realize that although things aren't going really great that they aren't going badly and things ARE getting better. I'm aghast at what passes for complete reporting of the issues - and wonder if the media and Democratic Party realizes that their insane dislike of Bush is coming close to severe damage that will persist long after he's out of office.

And then I think of the little guy. I'd hoped he would grow up in a world free of nuclear war, and other types of warfare too... but it looks like that's not to be.

J.