IRAQ: Paying The Price For Idiocy

The main reason Iraq is such a mess now is that Bush has put the US military into an impossibly conflicted situation.

They are now fighting to defeat the very people Bush claimed to have invaded to liberate.

The "insurgency" IS Iraq. It is Iraqis.

By arming Sunnis to ostensibly help fight al-Qaeda (who was NOT in Iraq before the invasion and is such a small minority the Iraqis will slit all their throats the moment they are not distracted by throwing the US out) but who will use the help to fight Shias Bush is now taking sides in a civil war with people who composed Saddam's Ba'ath Party, against the very Shia backed puppet government Bush set up in the first place.

As Bill Arnett showed two days ago, the lies get more idiotic as Bush and the GOP (with complicity from the Democratic Leadership now) flail blindly trying to save their own political asses:

With the four-month-old increase in American troops showing only modest success in curbing insurgent attacks, American commanders are turning to another strategy that they acknowledge is fraught with risk: arming Sunni Arab groups that have promised to fight militants linked with Al Qaeda who have been their allies in the past.

11 days later:

The number two US military commander in Iraq on Friday denied that US forces were arming insurgents willing to fight forces of the Al-Qaeda network, but said the military was "reaching out."

       "I want to make one thing very clear: we are not arming these groups," Lieutenant General Raymond Odierno told reporters via teleconference from Baghdad.

It was "lost" more than fours years ago.

It was a lost cause the day the invasion began.

It  is a lost cause now.

It will be a lost cause until the last US Soldier leaves Iraq.

The only question remaining is how many (besides their own, of course) American and Iraqi lives are the morons arguing to go on supplying Bush with funding for continuance of this debacle willing to sacrifice to be able to remain in their denial?

It is US Soldiers and Iraqi civilians who are paying the price with their lives for this idiocy.

Remember that when they come begging for your votes next year, from either side.

It is long past time for Congress to stop funding this idiocy and force an end to the Iraq Debacle.

The entire debate about NOT funding the occupation of Iraq and George W. Bush's Iraq and Mid-East Debacle revolves around one piece of propaganda that has been sold to the public in one of the most heinous aggregations of misperceptions, disinformation, and outright lies ever foisted on a public that cares for the lives of the American troops sent into Iraq, of which there are huge mis-perceptions and an incredible amount of disinformation, i.e. lies, spread by republicans and democrats and trolls.

The Bush Administration, and Republicans and Democrats in Congress alike, repeat almost daily that they will not defund the troops, with both sides vying for public support with the same bullshit.

It's the biggest load of crap there is.

The Democratic Leadership apparently is afraid of not funding the Iraq occupation either because they are afraid of being attacked by Bush and the GOP for not funding the troops, or because they want to continue the occupation.

The continuous whine that "we don't have the votes" is also part of the big lie.

If the Democrats stand up NOW and announce that they will no longer fund the occupation and that there will be no more emergency supplementals introduced when the current one runs out, the situation will become one of NO votes needed to NOT pass a bill. The ball will be in Bush's court.

The Democrats have absolute power in this debate. What good is it and why should voters let them retain it next year if they are too weak kneed to use it to end the Debacle? If they will not, then by default they proclaim their complicity with Bush.

The argument that 'defunding endangers the troops' is utter bullshit and is completely and irrefutably debunked. Let the rethugs try to accuse Democrats of it. Democrats will win that political argument, but ONLY if they have the cohones to do what they know is the right thing.

As John Freelund wrote on May 27 at TPMCafe:

Pin Bush and Gates Down

At the next presidential press conference, I'd suggest question 1-5 be the following:

"Are you Mr. President, and Mr. Secretary, prepared to leave troops in Iraq without adequate supplies?"

Watch them squirm, watch them dance. They will not be able to say "yes." This is what the media and the Democrats should have been asking, over and over again, to frame this debate properly.

If the Democrats don't want to do the right thing... it becomes obvious that they want to continue the occupation.

For what? Cheap gasoline? Or the neocon vision of world domination?

What has been needed all along and is needed now is for the Democrats to show that they have some balls and display A Measure of Morality in Congress:

If you could secretly tell a magic genie "Yes" and suffer horribly and die but save the lives of a million people you've never met, would you say No? This one they don't even ask in philosophy school, much less Congress. But let's think about it for a minute. What's the worst fate a Congress Member could face as a result of voting against funding the war? For most it must be the loss of their seat. How horrible is that? Some of these congress members are freshmen, first elected last November campaigning on promises to end the war. Now they're prepared to vote $100 billion for the war in hopes of getting elected again in 2008. What in the hell did they want to get elected for in the first place? What district is going to receive less money if we end the war and redirect our spending to useful projects than if we continue the war but fund special pieces of pork here and there?

The updated story is here and with 96% In Favor: Polling Continues....

Would you support the Congress' setting a binding withdrawal date of March 31, 2008 by announcing that after March 31, 2008 (or an earlier date), it will not fund the Iraq War?

>>> GO VOTE THE POLL.