October 31, 2006, End-of-October surprise
That would be the unfortunate (all around) combination of American combat deaths of 103, making October the fourth bloodiest month of the Iraq occupation (the war part had comparatively fewer casualties) and the sudden need, as reported here by the Grey Lady, of the American protectorate government of Iraqi Premier Nuri al-Maliki, presumably for its own internal purposes, to push the American military around a bit, in this case, making American troops remove roadblocks and barriers set up around the Shiite enclave in Baghdad of Sadr City.
Reading the Times piece led to this interesting nugget:
Moktada al-Sadr, the powerful Shiite cleric who counts Sadr City as his greatest bastion of support and who wields considerable influence in Mr. Maliki’s ruling Shiite coalition, called for a general strike in the neighborhood on Tuesday to protest the cordon. In its search for the soldier, the American military has singled out the Mahdi Army militia, which has grown increasingly fractured but still answers in part to Mr. Sadr.
Presumably, someone who is capturing American soldiers is "the enemy", whatever that means in a situation as fluid as the Iraq occupation. But "the enemy" (in this case, Baby Sadr) is also, by no coincidence at all, highly influential in the ruling coalition that we propped up with those elections (the ones we held so that GOP members of Congress could wave around their purple thumbs.)
So... what the hell are we doing propping up a "government" whose principal influencers are kidnapping our troops?
It seems a small wonder that more and more Americans are convinced that the situation is unwinnable, and notwithstanding that Rahm Emanuel has apparently packed the roster of the likeliest new Democratic House members with the pro-war variety, seem to want out and are willing to reach in any direction to make it happen. But think about this: the Bush Administration cover story (to justify the complete lack of any connection between Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda or between Saddam Hussein and any likelihood of working WMDS) was that we were invading their country and killing Iraqis to "bring them democracy".
And "democracy", in a country in which we destroyed or dismantled pretty much all the stabilizing institutions, meant voting for parties that the people believed would most likely protect their own interests... which in this case, meant parties largely responsible for turning Iraqi police and army units into covers for ethnic death squads (you think we sent John Negroponte there as our first ambassador for nothing?); since Shiites were the majority, they won control of the government, and hence, the ability to incorporate their militias and death squads into the American-supported government apparatus, even as the American military realized... the problems with this.
And now the American people do too. And through no fault of the Democrats themselves (say, by running actual good campaigns, or standing for anything the American people actually want, such as, oh, perhaps, getting us the hell out of the impossible situation that the Bushmen have put our military into... as if Congress even could make the executive do that...), the Democrats remain still poised to take back control of at least one, and maybe both houses of Congress. And as unpromising as they are, at least they stand ready to be less of a rubber stamp to this President than his own party wouuld be, and hence, the perfect really is the enemy of the better-than-nothing-and-clearly-lesser-evil, so vote Democrat.
And that will, hopefully, be good enough to overcome the usually lethal (to Democrats) combination of Republican money buying late ads, get out the vote efforts among rural and suburban Whites and suppress the vote efforts among rural and urban Blacks, and poll-defying-chicanery in general. That's how you bet, at the moment (though with money you can clearly afford to lose).
Comments
We will stop at nothing to silence you, Liberal Bastards!!!! From forcing Air America into bankruptcy to pelting Barbara with ice, we will not rest. Hell, we'll even drag out the corpse known as John Kerry when it suits us. Ha ha ha!!!
Posted by Rabinous Right Wing f/k/a Neo Con at November 1, 2006 9:54 PM
Hey, I want to party with you, dude.
Posted by Larry Kroger at November 4, 2006 3:44 PM