Be Careful What You Wish For or, Karma is a Bitch Sometimes

By Mimikatz

When the Iraq Study Group report came out, I characterized it as James Baker's Apologia for putting George W. Bush into office.  Well, GW has now returned Baker's efforts to throw him a life buoy as only Bush can.

As Devilstower at Kos put it yesterday, according to the BBC interview by a high ranking Adminstration trial balloonist, Bush intends to spit in Baker's face in his upcoming speech on the "way forward" in Iraq.  No talks with Iran or Syria.  No forthcoming phased withdrawal but rather an escalation.  And not for the purpose of training Iraqi troops, but only to "provide security," that is to say, to fight the Mahdi Army, the guys who just hanged Saddam Hussein. 

That'll show the Old Man and his cronies once and for all whose got the power and the balls around here!  It almost makes me believe it wasn't the oil after all, but just his Oedipal hangups.

The only factor feeding my slowly-becoming-shakier belief that Bush is going to ultimately be surrounded and disarmed is the last bit from the Beeb: "Already one senior Republican senator has called it Alice in Wonderland."   It will take the GOP and the military turning on him and making some sort of move with the Dems.  The odds are less than last month, but still better than even, I believe, since Bush has made it crystal clear that he won't change voluntarily.

Comments

[Mimikatz]

And kudos to John Edwards for calling escalation "the McCain Doctrine."

Edwards has shown that he learned much from his first run at the Presidency. The ability to learn from experience is very high on my list of qualifications for the Presidency--as high as experience itself, since experience is useless without the ability to learn the appropriate lessons from it. (Witness Dick and Dummy.)

[demtom]

Many have said that there's simply no preparation for the rigors of a presidential campaign, however strong the candidate. (Which makes you wonder about Giuliani's prospects) We're fortunate that Edwards had a dry run in '04; he's certainly off to a running start this time.

As to your original post: Bush seems determined to be to this war what Hoover was to the Depression...nothing, I mean nothing, will cause him to abandon his set positions. What will GOP members of Congress do, to avoid utter wipeout in '08? What are their serious options, facing a leader who has such an idee fixe?

[Jodi]

Bush must be desperate. I would guess that he feels he can't back down, and the only hope he has is ...

God Almighty, I just don't know.

[Canuck Stuck in Muck]

Happy New (Gregorian calendar) Year!
Alice in Wonderland? More like a Fellini movie, I'd say. I wake up ev'ry day thinking "This is the day that they're going to relieve the Commander in Chief of his command." Hell, he already has no command of the English language. He commands no respect from his global peers. And I suspect that he's no longer able to command his bladder when to void and when not to. In fact, the only commands I know of that he knows anything about are the ones he uses to tell his dog when to fetch his slippers, just before he goes on up to bed and sleeps way better than most people think he ought to be able to given that he's ordered the slaughter of more than a half a million people and counting. Shit, O.B.L. could take lessons from the POTUS on how to terrorize a people. And the now-deceased S.H., in retrospect, had nothin' on G.W.B.

[hauksdottir]

There's nobody to rescue him. This time. There is nobody to buy the team or the company or the country.

When he believes that God has appointed him as smiter-in-chief to destroy half the world, what mere human can hope to persuade otherwise? Knowledge, facts, data, are nothing next to belief, and indeed make belief stronger by their opposition.

And he can't quit or waver because Dead-Eye Dick is right behind him, staring intently.

"Stay the Course" has become like the repeating groove in a damaged record... while the needle keeps etching deeper and deeper into blackness. Eventually incoherence will become meaningless noise.

There were occasional reports that Bush "spoke in tongues" during meetings. Without that list of talking points that he uses to answer any and all questions, I'm not sure that he could get through a press conference these days without babbling in circles. We are going to get fewer answers to more questions as reporters become a bit emboldened.

Meanwhile, it is Vietnam Redux as the US keeps adding troops for no reason other than the desire of the President not to have "loser" stamped on his legacy.

How is this for a nightmare scenario... the Republicans nominate McCain, Americans go rah-rah, and a few from now we are sending hundreds of thousands of our kids to die on the other side of the world in an unending escalation.

It can happen again.

Geometry happens.

We have seen this graph before.

(And, yes, I still have vinyl records.)

[jwp]

This is correct:

"When he believes that God has appointed him as smiter-in-chief to destroy half the world, what mere human can hope to persuade otherwise? Knowledge, facts, data, are nothing next to belief, and indeed make belief stronger by their opposition."

As I noted last week, I am pessimistic that Dems will do other than play politics with Iraq.

After all, they are pols, and playing politics is how you stay a pol.

Only a shock to the system that changes the rules of the game can stop Bush and his holy wars.

The public must demonstrate in DC in large numbers. Something to shock the teevee people.

[ab initio]

The escalation strategy was a done deal well before the ISG report came out. Bush has been pretty clear in all his statements that he will not countenance withdrawal even if Barney is his only supporter.

What is changing however is that the JCS, Abizaid and Casey seem to be opposed and as Novak reports only 13 Repub/LfC senators support the escalation. And the Dems will begin hearings this week. While Edwards has brilliantly framed the escalation as the "McCain doctrine" and if that sticks McCain in 2008 is over.

As Sudarsan Raghavan reports in the WaPo from Iraq, the Shia are getting ready for the break with the Americans. The Shia and specially the Sadrists with their militias will not take "fallujahing" Sadr City lightly. Not only will the escalation bring massacres of Shia civilians in Baghdad but a complete revolt of the Sadrists throughout Southern Iraq. We will get to see how secure the supply route from Kuwait will be. We can be pretty certain that Bush's escalation will turn out to be a bloodbath.

Will the carnage in Iraq then turn the wheels in Congress that he needs to relieved of command of the military and many Republican senators decide that there is no option but impeachment?

[jwp]

Ab initio,

Your point about supply lines strikes me as compelling, though I have no expertise in that area.

Impeachment won't happen. Dick Cheney.

Republicans will just fecklessly "denounce" Bush and his policies.

The only way to bring the soldiers home is to cut off funding. The only way that happens is if we have large demonstrations.

Have the Unitarians proposed marching? Anyone?

[Tosese]

Kuwait supply lines? Saudi supply lines to Sunnis? Escalation in troops is more war?

The leak from an unknown person says it will be about sacrifice and the exact mission is still under discussion. So, they will leak the sacrifice, but pass on the exact mission.

Why train the police? The troops are there for security and that's all, we are moving out and this is one step. There will always be troops around.

Of course, if they bomb Iran the troops will come in handy, unless they are running into Iran using supply lines. They will probably skip the ground troops and bomb. More security in case Iran comes over the border.

Karma, bitch, wish? Sounds like Lucifer himself there!

[dalloway]

The whole point is to get the Democrats to "lose" Bush's war by voting to withdraw the troops or de-funding them -- so Republicans can brand us Defeatocrat-losers until the Rapture. Cheney is whispering in Shrub's ear: "There isn't another election until you're out of office. Screw the Democrats (and the country) every chance you get, empty the cashbox into Halliburton's pocket. There won't be any consequences. You have me, gold-plated impeachment insurance." Of course, if the Democrats had a gnat's bellybutton worth of courage, they'd impeach both of the bastards.

[Mimikatz]

Well, I think Pelosi's taking defunding and impeachment off the table is a baseline position--they won't do either as of the situation NOW. But if the situation changes, them maybe.

I've been worried about the Shi'a cuting our supply lines ever since Pat Lang's article about just that possibility. That would be the thing that lets the Dems and the sane GOPers negotiate to pull us out, however. The public wouldn't want a draft to go in and do a Brother Fallujah on the whole of Iraq--they'd recognize it for the consequence of a failed atrategy.

There is a demonstration on January 27 in various cities. Join us.

[Katie Jensen]

Belief clings....

Faith lets go.

We have to have faith in our democracy and wait for each step in the process. I think that while my mood makes me want to force solutions...my cognitive rational brain says that we need to take each step as it comes instead of trying to control the "decider" who is clearly fighting any attempts at control. Honestly, he is acting just like I would expect an addict to behave. No big mystery if I put his behavior in that context. What I know is that we will not be able to control this man. What I know is that the disease and it's behaviors only progress and get worse over time, without recovery. Now what Pelosi needs to do is make sure we do not enable him. That is put obstacles where we can. Speak out. Don't do anything that hurts the troops or that will go against the values of our democracy. Mind our own side of the street. And let Bush stand alone on his decision. That's my 12 step solution.

[bleh]

I really don't think de-funding is either likely or wise.

For one thing, it's political suicide: "cutting off the troops." If there's one thing the VRWC and their media stooges (willing or clueless) are good at, it's assassination and smear, and they would go to town on a new Democratic Congress reducing funding. And as a side-effect, it would kill off any hope of a political alliance between sensible military leaders and sensible political leaders.

Also it wouldn't necessarily be effective, and certainly not quickly. Funds are fungible. A lot of contracts (with a LOT of in-theater contractors) have been signed that can't be un-signed. Between work-arounds, slush funds, and the general complication and delay of logistics of that magnitude, it would be months -- even years -- before a cut-off of funds really FORCED a withdrawal, against the wishes and conniving of the Executive.

The Dems are going to play this one passive-aggressive. They'll snipe, stall, and sabotage, in the best tradition of Court politics. As Bush sinks, they'll proclaim their support for Democracy and the troops, opine piously about the need to do what is right but also prudent, and hand him a nice, big, heavy anchor.

There will be extra death, destruction, and national humiliation during the time this approach will take. But "politics is the art of the possible," and any more frontal attack on the war, or on Bush (e.g., impeachment), would imho be unacceptably likely to fail.

[janinsanfran]

While the Dems are being passive-aggressive, it is the democratic (small d) duty of the rest of us to make them miserable. I hope folks on the appropriate side of the country are marching on January 27 and lobbying on January 29 in DC. Sure, it's a drag, but so are more dead people killed to cover Bush's sorry ass.