You may have been so disheartened by yesterday's article in the New
York Times about the Bush "strategy" in Iraq being "overtaken" by the
insurgency that you didn't finish it, but I bravely soldiered to the
very end, where I came upon the following mind blowing paragraph:
"Mr. Bush still insists on talking about victory, even if his own
advisers differ about how to define it. "It's a word the American
people understand," he told members of the Iraq Study Group who came to
see him at the White House in November, according to two commission
members who attended. "And if I start to change it, it will look like
I'm beginning to change my policy."
I feel like pasting that again, just so you can get the full flavor of
it:
"It's a word the American people understand," he told members of the
Iraq Study Group who came to see him at the White House in November,
according to two commission members who attended. "And if I start to
change it, it will look like I'm beginning to change my policy."
Remember, when he said this, he wasn't giving a speech to an audience
falling asleep in their seats. He was talking to people who put him in
office and who WANT HIM TO WIN. Can he really think like this? Can
people take someone who thinks like this seriously?
One thing I appreciated about the Times article, the only thing, is
the house-of-mirrors quality it portrays of administration discussions
of what is going on in Iraq. Fact is, they don't know what is going on,
have never known it, but have constantly talked about it without
getting anywhere or learning anything. Their every discussion about
Iraq has been ass-backwards--"this is the result we want, and so this
is what we are going to do" rather than "this is the situation, and
this is what we have to do in order to make something of the
situation". Always the first priority is to give George Bush what he
wants. And George Bush thinks the American people are so effing stupid
that they can only comprehend one word. Here's a couple of words the
American people understand: "complete screw-up". Here's a few more,
"Run for your life!"
I have one question for the Bush administration. If the destruction of
Fallujah, which will go down in the history books as a brutal war
crime, took place in November of 2004, how is it that it took you
another year to realize that the insurgency was getting out of control?
If the insurgency was not getting out of control in 2004, then why did
you commit the crimes you committed in Fallujah? Did anyone bother to
tell George Bush about Fallujah? About the bombs and the civilian
deaths and the white phosphorus and the leveling of whole neighborhoods?
About the alleged use of new and improved napalm? Or did he just go to
bed early and ignore the whole thing?
James Baker and George H.W. Bush, you owe me at least $100,000 plus
interest and penalties for having installed your puppet in the White
House. He's made a mess that can't be cleaned up, and you're to blame.
My lawyers will be calling you.