From Balloon Juice, a
devastating list of attempts to evade responsibility and pass the buck on Iraq. There have been plenty of successful operations in Iraq, from the quick military takedown of their army to the capture (and now conviction) of Saddam to the elections. But there have been obvious
failures as well, and
recent events give little rational grounds for long-term optimism.
It's not as if the difficulties in stabilizing a complex mixture of religious and ethnic groups were
unforeseen, which makes the apparent decision to ground our strategy on
empty political
slogans all the more infuriating. This is not to say that those sniping from the sidelines may not have their
own agenda, but their criticisms are not easily dismissed. But introspection and self-correction do not come easily to this administration, which seems to make a habit of
rewarding incompetence rather than demanding results. There's
no reason to suppose this would change with two more years of rubberstamp Republicans in Congress. The Democrats aren't going to cut and run in Iraq, regardless of what the RNC scare-mongering ads claim; they are going to demand concrete benchmarks to evaluate progress, they are going to reduce waste and outright fraud in reconstruction, they are going to provide troops with the tools they need, and they are not going to look the other way while Iraqi militias seize increasing power. Republicans had their chance and at the end of the day all they can do is point fingers and try to evade blame for their mistakes. Really, why should we expect them to fix problems they can't even
see? The lack of responsibility and accountability with respect to Iraq is flatly unacceptable. Got integrity? Vote Democratic.
Cross posted from Swords Crossed