Presidential flop, George W. Bush, has made a series of decisions recently that essentially dump the Iraq problem on the next President, hyper-extend the American Military and leave the citizens of the U.S. with a debt their Grandchildren will be paying, all the while, he’s on a PR blitz to paint himself as a great “war President†who honors the military.
Recent outrages made by the President are a tell tale sign of his failure to find any success in Iraq. With his continued use of political moves that endanger the lives of our soldiers while portraying himself as a great fighter for soldier’s rights is nothing new, it’s just part of the Bush pattern. While he plays with headlines and press releases, he let’s the killing and violence continue, all the while trading away American interests for the sake of profit and greed at the hands of greedy contractors, making our supposed enemies like Iran stronger in a nation WE occupy! His absolute incompetence in diplomacy, his abuse of the American Armed Forces and his stubborn tin-ear on all matters in which he is obviously wrong have made Iraq the chaotic mess that it is today. Now, not only is he indicating that he has no intention to even draw down the unjustified bloody war he started, he’s going to play politics that elevate his own reputation at the expense of the next President. In other words, he’s going to carry his lie right on down with him to hell, and leave the deceived nation with the shattered remnants of a government and military, not just in Iraq, here in the U.S. as well.
The Dynamic Duo
This has been a big month for Iraq. So far, we’ve seen the grim crossing of the 4,000 U.S. soldier death toll, the shattering of a peace treaty between al Sadr of the Mehdi Army, the failure of the Iraqi government to demonstrate its authority, Iran stepping in to demonstrate its greater influence over Iraq and of course, the infamous Petraeus report talking about Iraq as if it were an oil rig that will pay off if we can just “stay the course.â€
I’ve spent the week taking in all the hoopla about Iraq. I listened to Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker spread a very thin argument across a string of pundit shows, news programs, newspapers and in front of Congress itself. They had charts and graphs and cost-projections as if it were a board meeting at Disney. They talked down bloody attacks into “ethno-sectarian†conflict and diminished the loss and death of a single Iraqi civilian bleeding to death in a Baghdad market as a percentage.
The Bush picked duo talked up the success of the “Surge†as a great military victory. They took a majority of the credit leaving little mention of the actual reasons the Surge appeared to work. The treaty with al Sadr (now broken), the growth of neutral Sunni militias paid off not to fight the U.S. (which is wavering in its success), the militarization of Iraq leading to heavily polarized neighborhoods divided along ethnic and sectarian lines and lastly the bouncing ball effect of war, which in Iraq has seen lulls and spikes consistently for the entire duration of the war, each time leading to an overall increase in violence. There was little room for the appalling conditions Iraqis live with: little or no electricity, poor sanitation and sewage conditions, kidnappings, bombings, terror and military attacks that still continue but are “better†than they were a few months ago. Of course there was no mention of the massive brain-drain of the Iraq’s best and brightest leaving the nation with an uneducated workforce or the absolutely decimated economy.
Somehow, we can call this victory.
The more I heard Petraeus and Crocker ramble on in their dry and authoritative manner, I grew less confident. Their argument for continuing the war is basically:
We can’t stop the war because it’s going so well. Makes sense doesn’t it?
“We haven’t turned any corners, we haven’t seen any lights at the end of the tunnel,†says Petraeus, “the champagne bottle has been pushed to the back of the refrigerator. And the progress, while real, is fragile and is reversible.” We can leave when there is “fair certitude that Iraq is able to carry its own development forward.â€
Regardless of just how uncertain, unsuccessful and unrealistic the above statements sound, it was nice to know that Crocker and Petraeus can still remain upbeat about progress. It’s as if everything is just going great in Iraq and we’d be fools to walk away now. We’re finally, after a period of time greater than World War II, just now starting to see results! All because of a miracle pill called the “Surge.†However, we must be cautious warns the dynamic duo, “I think the ambassador and I are actually minimalists. We’re not looking for Jeffersonian Democracy,” but adding that “Iraq is not there yet right now, and there is certainly more work to be done.”
How pleasant. Just like adding on a family room to your parent’s house. Of course it’s over budget. It’s construction, don’t be naïve. You can’t build success without a little blood sweat and tears.
They continued to downplay the influence of Iran, specifically on Nightline Crocker cited that it’s not a proxy war: “It may be that the Iranians see it in that light, we certainly do not.” No of course not, we’re the Bush Administration, we don’t see reality. “We don’t want to have just what you describe as a proxy war with Iran inside Iraq, and that is why we are willing to sit down with Iran face to face for talks on Iraqi security at the invitation of the Iraqi government. We’ve had three rounds of those talks and we’ve told them we are ready to again.”
Are you buying this? No? What a surprise!
For some reason the media DID buy into it. They basically trumpeted the war message again, hardly at all asking the questions that needed to be asked. Only Jon Stewart and Steven Colbert have had the guts to call the Emperor naked. It is a sad day when a show on Comedy Central can achieve a higher standard in journalism than even the major networks.
The Dynamic Duo of destruction seemed to carry on their monotonous tone across the week with very little real challenge. They seemed to get used to everyone agreeing with them all the time, those like Senator Lindsey Graham who took the Senate committee’s time to declare his desire to make Petraeus a 5-star general. Terry Moran seemed to lob similar softballs on Nightlight, I mean Nightline (April 8th), his only mild challenge came when he asked the duo how they felt about 70% of the American people feeling Iraq was a mistake. Crocker on Nightline equated the American people’s justified concern that we’re ramming our military into the ground and killing lives with nothing to show for it as if it were the whininess of a selfish child. Oh yeah I want to have this guy over for dinner!
While the American people do display whininess, on just about every topic across the spectrum, Iraq is more a display of American insecurity than anything else. Why does the average American care about what happens half a world away? Seriously! Ask yourself this question enough and you will eventually get passed all the lame Bush arguments about terrorism and spreading democracy and get right down to the root cause: an insecure nation, afraid that it still couldn’t get it up anymore. Are we still tough, still MAN enough to handle a little blood and guts? Apparently not, because a true man knows when to be tough, a child bullies a nation to feel good about itself.
Sound like anyone we know? Hmmm, I’ll give you a hint, he’s someone who for some reason or another possess the highest office on the planet.
George W. Bush & the Reverse Midas Touch
While Petraeus and Cocker served as proxy knights from the mentally challenged chess captain, the king must also make moves from time to time. So yesterday, Bush declared there would be no withdrawals on his watch, and promised an open ended commitment to General Petraeus, based on the statements of his stooge duo. Apparently leaving his own Sec. of Defense out of the loop, Gates, who been talking about troop reductions.
Then, get this, the mighty King declares that he will be shortening the tour of duty length for combat troops from 15 months back to 12 month deployments, effective in August, just shy of some of the largest re-deployments which are scheduled to occur through out the summer. One angered military wife said it appeared that Bush wanted the credit for shortening deployments without actually doing anything about it. Yeah that will instill confidence in our soldiers. Deploy as many men as you can before the deadline who will get to watch other units sent in later, go home early. Gee, Thanks W!
What’s worse is that this war has put a remarkable burden on the volunteer army. They quality of soldier the Armed forces, in particular the Army and Navy has not been a good mix of America’s best and brightest, there are high concentrations of soldiers with criminal records, reports of ultra right wing white supremacy factions and an increased amount of Captains and other brass who have grown frustrated with the direction of the military. The use of the stop-loss backdoor draft and soldiers being redeployed, some serving 3 combat tours, has lead to high amounts of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, destroyed military families on the home front and a damaged overall morale. Plus the Armed Services have become dependent on these extended deployments and redeployments.
The same day, Bush was on Capital Hill talking up the need to fund our soldiers with the tools they need to do the job. Bush was talking about the 100+ Billion dollar emergency supplemental bill that pays for the war and a great deal of other things too. Emphasis on tools here, especially since so much of that money to fund our troops goes to big contractors who have even been caught selling defective gear like bullet proof vests to those same troops. It also funds Blackwater and other private corporations like Cheney’s Haliburton and their puppet KBR. It’s a money grab with both fists sold to the American taxpayer under the patriotic shlock of “Support our Troops”. Meanwhile, top Pentagon officials and John McCain are aligning against raising the Montgomery GI bill to realistically pay for the rising cost of tuition. Since Bush tried to cut soldiers health care benefits, this is nothing new. Those who say “Support our Troops” the loudest are the ones taking the fullest advantage of every sacrifice these men and women have given. It’s not only shameful, it borders on treason.
Bush was too chicken to talk about what the U.S. really needed to win the war, a draft. The Pentagon stands by the volunteer army, which most can agree is a more effective fighting force, however when you’re overwhelmed, your overwhelmed. We shouldn’t feel bad, occupation is a very difficult thing to do. It usually ends in failure even in the best case imperial situations.
What we SHOULD feel bad about is that we did not stop Bush from screwing things up. While some of us DID stand in the streets and fight, many did not, many said nothing, many even supported, some even colluded. We as a people were allowed to be fooled by an absolute band of criminals that essentially started a war for a multitude of reasons, none of them moral, most of them financial, all of them wrong. Now this nation will be cleaning up the mess from Bush’s party for decades.
So effectively Bush has badly damaged the military and set the next President up, whoever they are for failure in Iraq, and a great deal of other areas. The next President will NEED the draft to win in Iraq, and a war chest of proportions not found currently in the U.S. treasury, especially since Bush screwed that one up too. Bush is so bad, his negative legacy will long outlive his presence, maybe even the buffoon himself.
The American economy, the American treasury, the American Military, American Diplomacy, American resolve, American confidence, the American Dream, all have suffered under the madness of King George, hell he even destroyed FEMA. It’s as if they took a complete 180 from their trajectory just 7 years ago.
It’s as if everything he’s touched turned to dust.