Baghdad Bush (Special Edition)

by eriposte

Chris Bowers at MyDD has a post on what we can expect from Bush's rally in front of the Press speech tomorrow. Chris focuses on another one of the malodorous droppings from the Wall Street Journal editorial page because the GOP propaganda apparatus communicates effectively the talking points that will likely come out of Bush's mouth. The editorial exudes the usual stench: blaming liberals, trashing timetables because it would allow terrorists to "wait us out", the "unreported progress" in Iraq, more violence "not a sign of an expanding insurgency", insurgency lacking popular support for sustenance, blah blah. In other words, well designed for the blogs of the 101st Fighting Keyboarders. Now, let's set aside the lack of an "expanding insurgency" as represented by an increase in the average daily casualty rate of Americans for the past 4 months, the increase in the number of daily insurgent attacks ("May 2003: 10, June 2004: 52, May 2005: 70") and the "expectation" (for the umpteenth time) of the Bushies that it "could become more violent between now and the constitution referendum and the election in December". Let's also set aside the lack of popular support in Iraq for the insurgency as represented by the 45% or so support for it in a US-coalition poll. The most important indicator that we are "winning" in Iraq is that we are nowhere near the last throes of repeatedly giving Baghdad Bob an inferiority complex. 

The latest edition of Baghdad Bob Bush needs to be mentioned since it is likely to come up in the speech. The "wait us out" theory, as in the Wall Street Journal's Bush's recent statement:

Why would you say to the enemy: Here's a timetable, just go ahead and wait us out? It doesn't make any sense to have a timetable. You know, if you give a timetable, you're conceding too much to the enemy.

Once again I have misunderestimated the neocons. In a nutshell:

Timetable? NYET! The terrorists in Iraq will start sipping tea and wait for us to leave so that they can later attack the same non-Americans that they are blowing to bits today.

Clearly, I have to learn to assimilate this new theory of the new Iraq (TM). Just so that I'm not entirely confused by this drastic turn of events, I felt I should catalog a bit of my learning over the years (not necessarily in chronological order).

I can't say why but I had this weird impression that we were in Iraq because: 

...our people will not have to confront terrorist violence in New York, or St. Louis, or Los Angeles...

and because:

...the coalition forces can deal with the terrorists now in Iraq, instead of having to deal with those terrorists elsewhere, including the United States...

and because:

Iraq had become "a terrorist magnet," drawing some anti-American extremists from abroad to "a target of opportunity." "But this," General Sanchez added, "is exactly where we want to fight them."

A "terrorist magnet" that makes terrorists sip tea, while they wait for us to leave? Doesn't quite sound misunderestimatable. But it is.

In fact, according to the terrorist magnet theory, wouldn't more terrorists in Iraq be a shining example of the Bush administration's "success", assuming less terrorists everywhere else (of course, not surprisingly, the latter didn't pan out at all)? But then my PC, unlike that of the 101st Fighting Keyboarders, suffered an irreversible blue-screen-of-death. And when I rebooted, I saw this:

...[she said] it was "simply naïve" to believe that Iraq today was more of a haven for terrorists than it was before Saddam Hussein was ousted from power..."There is almost a sense that they were sitting someplace minding their own business — drinking tea, having meetings" and then decided to come to Iraq only after the American military rolled into Baghdad...

Then, the next upgrade of my Baghdad Bush PC software suggested this:

I like to remind people that a free Iraq will no longer serve as a haven for terrorists or as a place for terrorists to get money or arms...

Hmm. Terrorist magnet - GOOD. Terrorist magnet - NOT REALLY. Terrorist magnet - ABSOLUTELY NOT! What terrorists, dudes?

Well, I must admit it got slightly confusing at that point (for me, for me, NOT for the 101st Fighting Keyboarders). Which might explain why I had to install the next Baghdad Bush upgrade via the internets. The new version provided a better explanation for the grand Iraq misadventure:

...we can now remove almost all of our forces from Saudi Arabia...Their presence there over the last 12 years has been a source of enormous difficulty for a friendly government. It's been a huge recruiting device for al-Qaida...

Indeed, the reboot after the upgrade also helped me understand that we also sent far fewer troops than required because:

Simply flooding the zone with two or three times the number of foreign forces that are here, it would increase the number of targets for the handfuls of criminals and the handfuls of terrorists...

A handful of terrorists could dramatically overmatch the 100,000+ troops, not to mention two-to-three times that number! Misunderestimation galore on my part.

The value of the reboot was further evident when I heard that:

Washington also hopes the resolution will call on Iraq's neighbors, particularly Iran and Syria, to block the flow of foreign fighters into Iraq, according to diplomats in Washington. The influx of foreign forces has become a leading U.S. security concern.

Which explains clearly why a timetable would lead to tea sipping and what not and why it's time for re-installing the most famous upgrade of all:

"There's a sense that people in America aren't getting the truth," Bush said to a reporter for Hearst-Argyle Television, one of five back-to-back White House interviews he granted to regional broadcasters. "I'm mindful of the filter through which some news travels, and sometimes you have to go over the heads of the filter and speak directly to the people."...

Yes, yes, it's that darn liberal media, as the 101st Fighting Keyboarders for Baghdad Bush say.