Reciprocating SOFAs, or the logic of Iraqi troops in the US

George Bush says that Iraq is a sovereign, free and democratic country, just like the United States, and says that he is negotiating with Iraq about SOFA, Status of Forces Agreement, but is actually negotiating with the newest and one of the smallest countries in the world, the country of The Green Zone, located in the middle of Baghdad, Iraq. At four square miles, it's three times larger than Central park, five times larger than Monaco and fifteen times smaller than Lichtenstein.

Bush wants the US military to continue its occupation of Iraq indefinitely. He already occupies and controls the much smaller country of The Green Zone, and pretends that he has control of the much larger country of Iraq where his occupation is resisted in the extreme.

Let's pretend along with Bush that he is actually negotiating with the country of Iraq and that Iraq is as Bush says, a sovereign country. The United States is also a sovereign country. From that equal footing as sovereign countries, if there are to be however many US troops occupying Iraq indefinitely, then reason and logic dictate that an equal number of Iraqi troops occupy the United States indefinitely. Reciprocity in action. Seems only fair and equitable.

Of course, we'd have the same right, as insurgents, to resist the Iraqi occupation as extremely as the Iraqis resist the US occupation. Could make for some exciting times, making George Bush happy by bringing home the chaos, death and destruction that he loves so much. Concentrated around Crawford, Texas, hopefully, so he could watch it from his front porch while resting from cutting brush. It'd keep the Secret Service busy clearing off body parts from the front lawn. IEDs and such, you know.

There are about 90,000 people in Iraq who hope fervently that Bush will be allowed to occupy Iraq indefinitely. They are being paid by the US government to not fight the US government. The English did the same thing prior to the year 1000 by paying off the Viking Danes to not fight the English, and gave them the area north of London as a bribe, called the Danelaw. The French did the same thing for the Danes, giving the Northmen the area of northeast France for the same reason. That's why it's called Normandy.

We can only hope that the idea of getting paid for not doing something will take hold with guys like Fred Hiatt, David Broder and George Will. These guys haven't realized that all they'd have to do is to threaten to write another nonsensical column in defense of the established order that is transparent hogwash to any reasoning person, let it be know that for a sum of money, they can be persuaded to not write a column, and people would pay them not to do it. They could make a lot more money by taking money for not writing than they ever got for writing.

Once a week, all they'd have to do is say, "Be warned, I'm thinking of writing another column," and the money would pour in, with notes attached saying, "Don't do it, please don't do it."

It would be well worth it.