The Iraqi National Assembly decided to respond to U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad the way many of my classmates back at dear old Columbia did when he taught political science there:
cram for a few nights in a row, and declare the paper finished whether it is or not. In this case, its not finished, of course; the Iraqi politicians needed to say it was finished in order to buy three more days to make it look pretty (which right now it does not, what with an alliance of Kurds and Shia more or less cutting the Sunnis out, just to get it done).
Now, why you might ask, is it so God damned important that the Iraqis meet this particular artificial deadline imposed upon them by the heavy-hand of the occupying power? Because, friends, our President is facing… well… trouble, that starts with T for Tigris which rhymes with E which stands for Euphrates… our President desperately needs the interim Iraqi arbitrary deadline met, so that the
cutting and running strategic withdrawal and restoring command and control to the Iraqi people can begin ASAP.
Because that’s all the Iraq thing ever was. It was always about domestic American politics, period. It was essential to maintain the ongoing fiction that Republicans are he-men and Democrats are pussies (false: both parties have proven that they are opportunistic assholes, incapable of assessing facts beyond what they think will get themselves elected or reelected, and frequently, traitors.) It was essential to have an excuse to keep pumping up the defense budget (the agency responsible for generating the most impressive kickbacks.)
OBL is still out there, of course. Not to worry: he’s primarily out there because he’s a more valuable bogeyman at large; if we capture him, then it will be harder to justify the fearmongering that justifies our incursion into Iraq.
Ah, yes. Our incursion into Iraq, where the American death-toll begins slowly but surely to approach that of 9-11 itself, as we are within a couple of weeks of 9-11 Version 4.0… the President’s attempts to invoke 9-11 as a catch-all universal justification for (1) decimating our military’s reserve system, (2) killing nearly 2,000 Americans (3) wasting at least a quarter of a trillion dollars while (4) cutting taxes for the rich, (5) killing tens of thousands of foreigners, thereby (6) increasing the likelihood of future terrorist assaults on our allies and of course, ourselves…
Oh, f*** it. Good to see the Iraqis doing their best to complete Professor Khalilzad’s assignment. Good show, fellows. And good luck to you. Man, will you all need it.
tdog
Um, it may be rather quaint to ask this, but isn’t this whole charade illegal? The Iraqis are doing this under duress. In order to come up with a document to satisfy a deadline they are shoving things through, pro forma, and breaking their own rules.
Advise. Is this legal?
Diana, Interesting question. However, who gets to determine whether it is illegal? And if so, what is the remedy? I suspect the Iraqioneans aren’t too concerned about illegalities.