Now We’re Supposed to be Happy? April 10
George Bush announced today that he’ll be taking his marching orders from Auxiliary President David Patraeus and will stop troop withdrawals this summer. At the same time, he’ll reduce deployment lengths to Iraq. But if you’re currently reading us in Baghdad, don’t get all excited. You’re already there and you’re going to stay for the full 15 months … and just so you know, that’ll leave about the same number of you stuck there as before the semi-permanent surge started. You can take solace in the fact that you’ve been getting your ass shot off for over a year to take us back to where we were before we started.
By golly, you can’t argue with results like that! Well done lads, your President - in some unrecognizable fashion - supports you! In fact, Kenneth Pollack, Chief Nutcase at the Brookings Institution’s Saban Center for Middle East Policy, thinks you should be downright giddy.
Is Everybody Happy Now?
“From the interests of the next president,” Ken says with all the certainty of a consultant hiding under his desk, “The best thing this president could do for the next is to keep all 15 brigades there and give Dave Petraeus and Ryan Crocker everything they need. It is likely to allow this president to put the next president in the position to do something that is likely to make everybody in the country happy - which is to withdraw troops in a responsible fashion.”
Well now Ken, it will put the next President in a “position”, but it’s one in which they’ll be bent over an empty Vaseline barrel during the annual Soap Drop Festival in Baghdad. And making the country happy? Not so much there Ken. So, spit out the Kool Aid and let’s review.
Since he kicked off for Baghdad University in the 2003 Asshat Bowl, our fearful leader has repeatedly withdrawn troops only to redeploy them soon after because, well, you know, there are people shooting at each other over there. Nothing…NOTHING this administration has planned has EVER minutely resembled anything that actually came about. I’m not sure what the previous 6,438 failed attempts taught you Ken, but it taught the rest of us that ANYTHING this President does will INVARIABLY put the next President in a worse position. There’s a reason for that Ken. When you’ve jumped out of an airplane wearing a Wyle E. Coyote Acme-brand parachute, there is no better position. There is only one certainty. You will turn into a small puff of dust at the bottom of an impossibly deep canyon…and a big rock will the fall on you just to make sure your ass is well and permanently flattened. Oh, and Osama bin Laden will dress in a roadrunner costume and stick his tongue out and “meep-meep” at you from atop the canyon wall just to complete the tableau.
There’s Something About Cowboy Hats
Our military is worn out. Even the Generals who our lame-ass quarterback famously “listens” to have been telling him that for years. You cannot keep sending people back for 15 OR 12-month deployments indefinitely. You cannot keep relying on equipment that ran out of service life years ago. You cannot alternate troops between Iraq and Afghanistan deployments and pretend that is somehow a better state of affairs. This is not a frickin’ glass half empty/glass half full moment, it is a Colorado River pumped dry and every water glass in the country laying in shards on the ground moment.
More than a few people think this is nothing more than another sick and cynical ploy to blame this crap-filled swamp on the next poor sucker who inherits the office, even in the unlikely event it is John McCain. “We all know it’s going to happen,” said Leslie Gelb, former president of the Council on Foreign Relations. “He is going to do what Lyndon Johnson did: make sure the war was not lost on his watch.”
It must be something about Presidents who wear cowboy hats.
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daveawayfromhome Apr 11
Sometimes I think the Dems are simply weak and ineffective.
Soemtimes I think that they are biding their time, appearing weak and ineffective until they hold the presidency, at which point they will suddenly rise and raze the Republican party, at which point they will have a lock on power (starting the whole stupid cycle over on the other side of the line).
And then there are times when I think that it’s all a Big Show, put on for the yokels, and directed from a single room by ruthless, shadowy tyrants.
Simple truth is, it’s not really them, it’s us. Until we learn to throw out more than 1 in 20 incumbents from office, they’re never going to have any improvement.
Until we learn to look at the issues instead of the pretty face (or familiar name), we’re never going to have any improvement.
Until we learn that politicians pay fealty to those with the power to put (and keep) them in office (and that power comes from money), and then either wrestle control of, or block, that power, we’re never going to have any improvement.
Anyway, Whoever gets into office next can simply repudiate the policies of the previous president, saying “The Bush Administration lost the Iraq War (by starting it), not America”. Make lots of apologies, offer money and lucritive trade deals, and get the hell out. Isnt that the beauty of changing governments?
And if that doesnt placate the world, how about some nice showy war-crimes trials?
Yeah. That’ll happen.
daveawayfromhome’s last blog post..how about now?
Omnipotent Poobah Apr 12
Unfortunately, I expect you’re right. Asshatery dies hard.
Omnipotent Poobah’s last blog post..Now We’re Supposed to be Happy?
distributorcap Apr 12
from the moment he realized this was unwinnable (whatever winning means) his plan has been to dump this on the next one.
and if it is a dem — they will spend the next few yuears avoiding the “who lost china label”
a giant clusterfuck
distributorcap’s last blog post..The garbage nobody wanted
Omnipotent Poobah Apr 12
I don’t know. They’re pretty fond of blaming Bill Clinton. They might just stay with a sure thing.
Blu Man Chu Apr 14
i agree with dave, until we scare the crap out of them , what incentive do they have for change? the problem is us, not them.
Omnipotent Poobah Apr 14
Rev,
You have a point, but it’s a point with no answer I’m afraid. If we were going rise up en masse, I’d think it would have already happened. Still, I have to agree with you.
daveawayfromhome Apr 14
We could rise up en masse, but things will have to get a lot worse. A lot worse.
daveawayfromhome’s last blog post..singled out