You wanna be president, you gotta pop at least one third-world country before you're parta the gang
That’s as good a reason as any. But the other suggestions are good, too. Check it out.
Meanwhile, dday at Digby's reminds us why Cokie Roberts is a blathering idiot. Honestly, I don’t know how lefty bloggers can bear to watch the Sunday morning gasbag shows anymore. They kill far more brain cells than a fifth of Jack Daniel’s, without the benefit of the buzz:
VANDEN HEUVEL: If we withdraw responsibly, the region would be more stable in the long term, America will be restored as a responsible global leader, and there are 42 challengers, you are absolutely right Cokie, who have a responsible plan to withdraw.
ROBERTS: Convincing the electorate of that I think would be very difficult, and I also agree that the notion that Sen. McCain and Sen. Graham you heard this morning putting forward, that Americans would prefer to win, is--
As Atrios says, the stoooopid it burrrns! There is no “win” for us in Iraq. Iraq is in a civil war. John McCain and his poodle, Huckleberry Graham, keep pretending this is some great military struggle between "us" and "them" but at its heart it's nothing more than a tawdry civil war, the inevitable result of us removing the dictator whose iron rule had held the pieces together. Iraq is in disarray, and we had to have seen that coming. I'm starting to wonder if this instability wasn't the point all along.
And here's something else I'm wondering. I think McCain keeps confusing “Sunni” and “Shia” and Al Qaeda and Iran because he really doesn’t care what’s happening in Iraq, or who's doing what, or which parties are fighting. He just wants a war--any war will do, thank you. He will be a war president, dammit, and he’ll do it far better than Junior ever did!
Which brings us back to where I started with this blog entry:
You wanna be president, you gotta pop at least one third-world country before you're parta the gang.
That’s really all it’s about: throwing our weight around. If it weren’t Iraq it would be some other disastrous third-world country, maybe a Central American one or Caribbean island like St. Ronnie did, or some poor imporverished place in Africa. The “where” doesn’t matter, what matters is that we remind the world that we’re still the biggest bastards in town, despite the looming threat from China, despite the economic crisis, despite the EU’s growing world influence. We’ve got the power, bay-bees, and don’t you forget it.
