The mainstream media cannot trumpet enough praises for the Iraqi Study Group. You hear these three magical words bandied about like the dreams of gold prospectors. Everything will be alright when the Iraqi Study Group publishes its findings.
But what can we expect from the Iraqi Study Group besides more talk? It's a laundry list of suggestions that the president will almost entirely ignore. We'll analyze it all day and all weekend long. We'll have pundits talk it up and down.
And that's the extent of the impact it will have on reality because if five years is any indication this president simply will NEVER listen to anybody. The mission will only be complete when every last drop of Iraqi oil has been extracted from beneath a people who were cursed to be born on top of it.
In fact, the only impact this Iraqi Study Group will have is a continuing tranquilizer-effect on the American people who were once sure that they wanted us out of Iraq.
Now, with media outlets from NPR to the New York Times to CBS all giving this (cue magical music) bipartisan committee (end magical music) all the reverence generally reserved for living incarnations of God, the people have become still again.
"Ooh," everybody says, "suggestions for Iraq."
For three years, the Bush administration has purchased itself extensions from public rebuke simply by changing the semantic frame-work under which we live our lives.
For instance, when "weapons of mass destruction" can no longer work as a justification for the Iraq War, "Saddam was a threat" needs to suffice. When "mission accomplished" wears out, we admit it will be a long haul. When "stay the course" wears out, we trade it in for "changing strategies as often as the enemy."
It doesn't matter what myth the Republican corporation thinks up to keep us buying it, President Bush has never lost sight of his objectives. He wanted a war in Iraq and he got it. We've toppled Saddam and done our best to set up a democracy, and he's not satisfied. We're bleeding to death in Iraq from the hundreds of billions of dollars we're spending there in a gamble President Bush has taken with our now fragile democracy, and he doesn't care. Our government is being used as the tool Big Oil is using to extract oil from the Middle East.
You know what I would like to see? I would like President Bush simply level with us; to say, "We are in Iraq to pull out oil, okay? Okay, now that we're being honest, let's talk.
One of the questions we could raise: Is fattening the expense accounts of executives working for Big Oil worth throwing away the lives of 3000 American boys? Is it worth the billions we're losing every year?
President Bush will never change course in Iraq, and neither will the next Republican President. Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi need to realize that they will get a Democratic president if they wage an all out campaign to pull troops out of Iraq.
They don't have to worry about it actually happening. For two years they can portray Bush as the prototypical Republican--out of touch with Americans. They were given a mandate to pull us out of Iraq.
For two years they can promise the people that this is what they can continue to expect if they elect a Republican for president in '08. Endless war...a president who doesn't listen to the people.
Action speaks louder than words. To everybody who thinks that this study group will have any practical effect on the quagmire: I envy your mindset.
Dean Powers is on Facebook. Check it out on the link above and drop me a line.
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
Mr. Powers;
First Congrats for being on top of Google News where I found this today. Surprised? We shouldn't be. You're just saying what most Americans know whatever their stand on this " WAR". I would only add the 2 BILLION a month the DEF DEPT. is supposedly spending on replacing destroyed military equipment. Am I missing something or does that seem like a lot of equipment being destroyed by our troops when they are clearly not doing much of anything overthere anymore ? If ever. If they were to be real honest like you say, they might tell us,"Hey, America is a Capitalist democracy, You can make money off this too by making the right investments on Wall Street, quit your crying!"
Notice the GREEN for money and the RED for red ink budget deficits.
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"Hoss" David P. (51 articles, 5 quicklinks, 14 diaries, 338 comments [4 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Wednesday, Dec 6, 2006 at 12:01:47 PM
Of course the report of the ISG will have no affect on US policy. How could it? It would have to read and understood by people open to its criticisms and ready to implement its suggestions. America doesn't have that - at least, not where it counts, such as the White House and probably not in Congress either. Nor do its people have the necessary political intellect or maturity to insist that such matters be taken seriously and respond if they are not.
I don't know what it is about people like the colonial Americans that enabled them to recognize quality people - the best and the brightest amongst them and raise them to positions of authority. Whatever it is, the right stuff, we haven't got it here and now. The colonials followed Washington, Jefferson Madison and Adams. They read Paine and were moved to act. Lesser people would have happily taken charge, but these men were recognized by their peers as better choices and installed in positions of leadership.
Americans today are easily duped like children and follow the piper with the most Bibles and flags. Look at how the same process works today. They elevate a man like George Bush - a failure, a liar, ignorant of history and philosophy, a substance abuser and shirker - to the highest office of the land. Surely the equivalent of the founding fathers exist among us now, but the American people don't have whatever it is that gives more mature people the wisdom to identify and support quality leadership. Americans are like Jack who traded away their liberties for magic beans. And they will ignore the ISG's report just like a three year old would.
If the founding fathers walked the streets today and began to gather any following, they would be swift-boated into notoriety and the people would not think about them again. Think Cindy Sheehan and Michael Moore. Kerry and Gore. Rather and Olberman. Americans have been instructed to disbelieve them and view them as over-the-top radicals, and they dutifully obey.
No, Americans can't receive the benefit of intelligent criticism from the ISG or any other source. We are a million million miles from that kind of civic health. That requires informed, skeptical and courageous people. The American people have been the opposite. They are a frightened and woefully ignorant rabble that is easily fooled repeatedly.
All that this report will do is to further darken America's place in history and further delineate the degree of pathology in this polity - even with a step-by-step solution given to them, the American people absolutely, positively and for sure will fail to even understand it, let alone insist on its implementation.
You can't fix that. That is cultural senility, politically speaking, and it is a sure sign of impending demise. I would call them politically infantile, but that implies that they have the potential to grow and develop. No, senility is the condition that best describes the American people. Beyond arousal, beyond warning, beyond education. Here's a thought test to illustrate the point:
If we took the ISG report down to the local nursing home and passed it around to the demented residents, and then did the same thing in the average town hall or mall, would the report have more impact on the thoughts and actions of one group than the other, and what does that say?
Everyone keeps waiting for the American people to finally rise from their slumber. Whatever we once were when we were young and strong, now we are not free or brave. We are not smart or strong or kind, although we keep telling ourselves and others that we are. If you'll notice, everything good about America comes from people who are now dead. Everything that comes from the leadership and people of today is a failure, destructive, inefficient, based on error and deception. There's a clean line between the good, competent people who in the past built the political and economic juggernaut that powered America into greatness and abundance, and the big, stupid, clumsy dinosaur that lumbers through the world today.
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Yaybob (12 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 174 comments) on Saturday, Dec 9, 2006 at 2:16:41 PM
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