October 15, 2006- By Degrees

   It seems that every day now brings a stronger hue and cry for the American troops in Iraq to be brought home right away. Opposition to the war has reached its highest point ever, and when you hear shit like a British General saying that he thinks that the British troops should be taken out of Iraq becasue their mission is unclear and they are doing more harm than good, that just stokes the fires here in America. Day in and day out, many more Americans join the chorus of bring the troops home now, and that has divided the nation like it has not been divided since Vietnam. Those that oppose bringing the troops home now accuse those of the other persuasion of being soft on war and cutting and running and all that shit, and those opposed to continued American presence in Iraq say that the others are warmongers and insane and the like, the debate goes back and forth more than a tennis ball during a match. Now  that elections are right around the corner, the debate heats up further, as this issue may very well be a make-or-break issue for many candidates next month, and they are turning to the White Hosue in ever increasing numbers to see what it is that they plan to do. Problem is, for those that are sweating this war issue out because their consitiuents oppose it, they do not like at all what they heard from the White House the other day concerning Iraq and American troops presence there. Washington said that they had crafetd a new plan and timetable for America's involvement in Iraq that had the troops stationed there until 2010 at the least. The pentagon said that this was not a hard and fast plan writen in stone or anything, that there were "offramps" included in the plan that gave the troops chances to leave Iraq before 2010.  However, that "offramp" talk did not settle many nerves, as this plan has been blasted from coast to coast, and once again, the White House is under fire for the way that it is conducting affairs in Iraq. The heated debate just got even hotter, and with the elections just a couple weeks away, the timing of it all could not have been worse for many politicans up fr re-election. It looks like no matter what the American people might say about it and how many say it, that Washington has its own plan on how they shall run shit in Iraq, and getting the troops home anytime soon is obviously not part of that plan. Many are saying that this is further proof that Washington is lying to everyone about the war in Iraq, that it is in dismal shape and that America is stuck in a hopeless quagmire of their own making there. Washington says no way to that, things are not that bad at all, and they point to those 'offramps' that they mentioned in their plan as proof of it, they claim to want to bring the troops home more than anyone, they just cannot do it yet, because the job is not yet done. They wil let the naysayers scream and cry otherwise and protest their every move, but they are not going to bring anyone home for a while, and on the surface, that looks positively suicidal, because that is going to torpedo most pro war politicans looking to get re-elected next month, and washington claims that it needs all the friends and allis that it can get, so why the fuck are they saying this right now?

   To begin with, they are not saying much of anything that is different than what they have said all along. they never set any kind of timetable for troop withdrawl, just that vague shit about "when the job is done properly", and they are repeating that mantra again. What they are telling everyone is that they do not feel that the job can be done successfully before 2010 unless there is some kind of major breakthrough, and none of those seem forthcoming. If you look at the situation in Iraq, that seems obvious, as current events are telling us all. There are suicide bombings like ever day, and innocent civilians are getting killed and maimed by the score, and those numbers are increasing instead of decreasing. Add to that the disturbing news that the Iraqi Police force that America was touting so highly as an answer to the problems there has largely been pulled off of the streets and de-certified, menaing that their Pig powers have been stripped from them. That was done becasue these fuckers were so corrupt and dishonest that they oput any corrupt pigs here in America to shame, these guys were into everything except the job that they had trained for, they were helping out the insurgents, passing information to them, using their positions to settle old personal scores with their enemies, stealing as much loot as they could find, hassling and beating and raping the populace, they were about as effective as that Pig from the old Krazy Kat cartoons, so Washington pulled them all off the streets and is supposedly re-educating them in what their jobs are supposed to be so that they can go back out there and do it right the next time. However, any fool can see that if these fuckers did no tlearn the first time, that they won't learn any subsequent times either, so these Iraqi Pigs are essentially a failure and that Iraq is nowher near ready to govern itself. Washington knows that if they were to listen to those that said bring the boys home now that Iraq would fall into anarchy and chaose about fifteen seconds after the last Americans left, so that clearly shows that the job is not yet done, so the troops have to stay put whether people like it or not. That is exactly what they have told us from the beginning, that you cannot put a timetable on war, and even though everyone wants it all wrapped up nicely right away, that is not possible most of the time. that's why they say that the 2010 date that was in the report was not set in stone, and why the "offramps' were put into there, to try and account for everything that can happen in a theater of war, which is basically anything. So according to Washington, people should just shut the fuck up already about when the troops are going to come home, because nothing has changed, and they'll be back when they have finished their mission ,and not before. That has been the way it has been since 2003, and that is the way that it is now, and if the elections are coming up next month, too bad, they and their attentant politics cannot play any role in this decision, after  all, this is war.

   However,  the critics of this policy are not about to just sit back and accept this explanation, they say that this is still going on because Washington has made a royal fucking mess of the war in Iraq and screwed everything up sp badly that there's no way out before 2010. They point to that fiasco involving the Iraqi Pigs and say that is proof enough that America does not know what it is doing and get the fuck out of there. Their point says that if there is no way that America can effectivelky train these dudes to take over their own affairs and govern themselves properly, then America has zero business there to begin with. The truth is that there has been fuckup after fuckup by Washington over in Iraq, the entire operation has been badly flawed since the beginning. To many that says that America just needs to get out of there before they fuck up any more, and damn the consequences, whatever they may be. Washington says that one of those consequences would be another September 11th, 2001 happening in America, because the terrorists would just run after the troops and go after them at home, and President Bush has always said that he wants to fight them"over there" instead of "at home", and that is why the troops must stay untl the mission is accomplished. Problem is that there are serious flaws in that line of thinking, because the reality of it is that Iraq would be far too fucked up a place if the American troops left for anyone to even consider going halfway across the world to strike at America on its own turf again, because they woul dbe far too concerned about trying to live and existin a chaotic and anarchic Iraq to have either the time or the resources to go to America to cause trouble, if it's trouble they want, they'll have plenty of that at home, so no need to cross the ocean to get more. So if America did leave iraq and sent its troops home, about the only problems that would exist would be the problems of the civilians of Iraq getting slaughtered even more than they are now due to the insane levels of violence, and those would mainly mainfest themselves in political ways in America, as politicans the land over would try to make political hay out of this all. The chances of planes being flown into skyscrapers again or of bombs being detonated are slim to none, and the opponents of the war know that, and that i swhy they want to see the troops brought home now. they see no shame in what America has done in Iraq, they look at it as a matter of they tried but it did not work out, and they look at the health and welfare and lives of the American troops as far more important than whatever political goal that Washington had for the place. There is no question that the American policies have cost American lives and that this continues every day. that is why many want to end the scene now before it gets worse anbd more and more American lives are lost over there for these vague and unclear political reasons. That's why they are telling the White House that in no uncertain terms and why they freaked out so over that report that came out last week and that 2010 date on it. However, Washington had other reasons for doing what it did, and as always, they are not going to be forthcoming about them to the public.

   The reality of it is that Washington wants the American troops to be in Iraq until 2010 and way beyond that. Everything that they have done in running the war has shown that, and the new plan does as well. They want them to stay there for many reasons, one bveing that Mr. Businessman is doing very well on the war thank you, and he wants the gravy train to continue. The other is that president Bush and those that started this war see it is their legacy, and they want that legacy to continue on longer than they are around. Bush has said that he feels that troops will remain in Iraq after he is gone in january 2009, and this plan confirms that. Bush wants to be known as this great statesman and leader that started this Iraq war and not be the dude that was therte at the finish because there's no way to tell how that will turn out. If the war goes successfully and America established the state in Iraq that they said that they would, Bush gets to spend  his retirement saying "I told you so", and taking all sorts of credit and glory just for starting the thing and inthe proces makes himself into an American legend. If it all goes sour and a future President, especially a Democratic one, has to end it and America ends up with egg on it face, Bush gets to go on and on about how that would have never happened if he had still been in charge, and how the law thast limited him to teo terms fucked America over in the war because if he had been allowed to stay and see it all through, that it would have ended up in every bit the glory  that he said that it would back in 2003. Either way, the dude uses this war to live on until the day that he dies, and that is why he cannot have it end before his Administration does. So what he has done is get the American people used to the idea that the troops were going to be in Iraq for a long time by degrees. At first, he cautioned everyone about how this was not going to be quick and easy, and as it went on, he never set any kind of timetable for withdrawl or produced any kind of strategy for ending this war, just ones for continuing it eternally. He teased everyone about bringing the troops home from time to time, but that was always just talk, never any real action, in fact, he kept sending more and more troops there instead of bringing them home. He had the Pentagon build this massive headquarters, which is really a sort of city-state, it is going to be larger than Vatican City when it is done, and you do ot do that unless you are planning to stay somewhere for a very long time. Now, we have this new report that has 2010 as a date in it, a date by which Bush and many of the architects of the war will be gone into retirement and the like, which is supposed to get Americans used to the fact that as long as George  W. Bush is President, there will be troops in Iraq, and bringing them home will be some other future President's problem. Little by little, he has told everyone that this Iraq mission is something that will outlast him and probably a few other Presidents as well. He has gotten everyone as used to that fact as they can get by degrees, and last week's report was just part one of the final section of that plan, the one that throws this war into the next President's lap. Those that oppose the war and want the troops home need to realize that they are not coming home as long as Bush is President, and if his hand-picked successor (whoever that turns out to be) wins in 2008, maybe even not for another Administration or two, and try to make Washington pursue some kind of plan to properly manage this thing, and not just make it an endlkess affair, because that is the best that they will be able to do until at least the next Presidential Administration takes office in January 2009.

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