Sunday, June 17, 2007

Kicking the can

Here's a letter I wrote today to the editor of the SB News-Press.

Come September General Patraeus will report on the progress of Bush’s escalation of force in Iraq, and many mainstream pundits tell us the report will be definitive and will dictate America’s future course in that besieged nation. Don’t be fooled. Patraeus’ report will be similar to the scores official reports from Iraq that have preceded it: ambiguous, equivocal, essentially meaningless. It will contain enough “positives,” “negatives” and “needs improvements,” to give colorable support to the entire spectrum of decisions, from complete withdrawal, to redeployment to fixed bases, to continuing the surge.

As a result, any decision purportedly based on the report will be, as have been all previous decisions on Iraq, political, purely political. Indeed, many Americans recognize the report for what it really is: a cynical tactic that allows Bush to delay facing the reality that his invasion was wrong from inception and that the occupation is being monstrously maintained, and to buy time so he can hand off his disaster to the next president.

Meanwhile, our soldiers are being killed and maimed daily. John Kerry once asked, “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?” Now we should be asking, “How do you ask a man or woman to be the last soldier to die while a delusional president kicks the can down the road?”

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

How tragically sad that we are at the mercy of a lunatic determined to "win" !

Unknown said...

I don't understand the politics here. On what form of political motive is Bush's intransigence based? I understand the politics of things like leaving the hostages in Iran in 1980, so Reagan could benefit from their release. But where's the upside of any possible outcome for Bush? Nobody in his right mind can think Victory is still possible. And politics implies a motive of gaining favor or support from some group. Bush doesn't even have a group anymore, and he can't be stupid enough not to realize that. Can he?

Erik said...

I use the word "delusional" advisedly. I think the burden of the presidency--and the prospect that there's nobody to bail him out of his mistakes this time--have driven our fair leader mad. It's happened before--Nixon's a good example, but there are others--and it explains why even in the face of certain failure, Bush keeps doing the same thing. Kinda like the drunk who keeps running into traffic.