Kick ass Times editorial
The New York Times editorial board continues to admirably serve penance for The Gray Lady’s sins -- and there were many of them -- during the lead up to the war with this superb editorial:
No Exit, No Strategy
This was the week in which Americans hoped they would get straight talk and clear thinking on Iraq. What they got was two exhausting days of Congressional testimony by the American military commander, hours of news conferences and interviews, clouds of cut-to-order statistics and a speech from the Oval Office — and none of it either straight or clear. The White House insisted that President Bush had consulted intensively with his generals and adapted to changing circumstances. But no amount of smoke could obscure the truth: Mr. Bush has no strategy to end his disastrous war and no strategy for containing the chaos he unleashed. * * * After all, it seems the burden of ending the war will fall to the next president. Mr. Bush was clear last night — as he was when he addressed the nation in January, September of last year, the December before that and in April 2004 — that his only real plan is to confuse enough Americans and cow enough members of Congress to let him muddle along and saddle his successor with this war that should never have been started.Exactly the right point at the end: Iraq is no longer a war, it’s a cover up. All that matters now to Bush & Co. is to drag this mess out long enough to get them safely out of office, so that the rightwing sound machine can then go to work blaming his successor for losing the war. That’s what brave young American men and women are dying for -- to give the worst president in American history plausible deniability. Bastards.
September 15th, 2007 at 12:32 am
Bush’s strategy, the Republican strategy, the right-wing strategy is to keep buying time. It is a clearly defined strategy. Betraeus is willing to aid and abet it. Fools will deny it exists. Fools will vote billions more to fund it. That more Iraqis and more U.S. Servicemen and women will die because of it, matters not one whit to the strategists. They are without honor, without conscience, without courage. May they rot in a hell they themselves are bound by Karma to create.
September 15th, 2007 at 10:15 am
Yes, bastards.
I woke this morning to the local (Indianapolis)news show on NBC. The woman was saying, “president Bush announced troops withdrawals in light of the success of the surge.”
Bastards. They treat us like idiots, fools.
We do nothing and the cowardly dems do nothing and the worst of the worst just keeps getting his way.
Bastard.
September 15th, 2007 at 10:45 am
I keep getting this nasty feeling that Mr. Bush doesn’t intend for there to be a different “President” in the Oval Office come 2008.
September 16th, 2007 at 10:44 pm
Wye Knot, anything is possible these days. That theory is out there, and I am not about to challenge it. Bush/Cheney are so dysfunctional, they are likely to do anything to maintain power. If they can steal 2 elections, they may indeed have designs on the third, one way or another. They are thugs, crooks and charlatans, capable of malfeasance beyond the imagination of decent human beings. Having misused power for the last 7 very long years, they may take such behavior to its lowest and most shocking level.It is definitely difficult to believe that these monsters will simply walk away from their power base come January 2009. Of course, I fervently hope they do; and that the door hits them hard on the butt as they go out.
September 17th, 2007 at 7:02 am
Whom Does This Endless War Benefit?
By James Houle*
The appearance of General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker before House and Senate Committees this past week leaves us with the fundamental question concerning our continuing occupation of Iraq: Cui Bono? Whom does this endless war benefit? We have sorted through many explanations trying to unearth our President motivations and have come up with the following:
· Security of the US homeland: No
· Republican Party congressional prospects in 2008? No
· Continued Republican control of the White House in 2008? No
· Creating a positive Bush historical legacy: No
· Defeating terrorists abroad so they won’t come over here: No
· Maintain US military dominance in the Middle East: Yes
· Continued US control over the region’s oil: Yes
· Maintain Israeli dominance over its neighbors: Yes
So, why do Bush and Cheney insist upon staying the course in Iraq, even after the UK, our next to last remaining ally, signals its withdrawal? Congressional Republicans would line up to support a Bush reduction of force plan. The experience of our major international oil companies over the past 70 years is that military occupation is a most costly and unnecessary way to purchase oil in the Middle East. The real explanation for Bush’s unwillingness to withdraw from Iraq becomes more and more obvious each day:
To secure a military platform from which to launch an aerial attack upon Iran in the near term and to dominate militarily the entire oil producing region over the long term.
If we reduce out troop strength in Iraq significantly, the Pentagon fears we will be perceived as losing our dominant military posture. So, Petraeus and Crocker are sent back to Washington as shock troops to soften up the mainstream media and the Congress with a disarmingly simple plan: hold the course until next summer. The plan is supported with nice graphics showing how during the last 30 days the troops surge has triggered a big swing away from the kind of negative statistics the GAO report relied upon for their pessimistic assessment in July. Neither the Ambassador or the General are willing to define what they think of as victory in Iraq, nor will they even state that our occupation contributes to homeland security. But we never invaded Iraq to improve our security nor to reduce terrorism in the US anyway, so never mind. Petraeus generously allowed that a brigade or two could be shipped home by year-end, as was already planned, given the shortage of troops available to replace them.
Meanwhile, the news media are reporting incidents along the Iranian frontier. British troops are now asked reinforce these border even as they prepare to ship home from the Basra Airport where they retreated last month. More evidence of IEDs and small arms imported from Iran are presented by the Pentagon to justify our impending air attack. The fact that the small quantities of arms discovered and alleged infiltrators captured cannot have any significant impact upon the ground war within Iraq is never discussed. Iraq does not need an outside source of IEDs. They have plenty of guns, and no shortage of dedicated Shi’ite fighters in the south and eastern parts of Iraq. Why would Iran create any pretext for US air attacks?
We sit in front of our TVs and our Internet news sources as this Petraeus Congressional theater acts itself out on some planetary stage where our voices of concern seldom penetrate. Will we stumble passively into another Pentagon-manufactured war of aggression?
* James Houle, a resident of Redwood Valley, has worked and directed engineering and economic development projects throughout the Middle East for the State Department, the World Bank, and local governments for over 40 years.