Those Lazy Iraqis

[babylonsister]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/8295

Those Lazy Iraqis
by Allan Uthman | Jun 25 2007


“We have given the Iraqi people the chance to have freedom, to have their own country. It is up to them to decide whether or not they're going to take that chance.”
-Hillary Clinton

“We're spending $2 billion a week, $8 billion a month, over $400 billion over more than four years. They now have to assume the responsibility of their own future.”
-Chris Dodd

"We should put the responsibility for Iraq's future squarely where it belongs—on the Iraqis. We cannot save the Iraqis from themselves."
-Carl Levin

I can't take this anymore. It was bad enough when the White House started pushing that “when the Iraqis stand up, we'll stand down” crap last year, but now the Democrats are chiming in with this “lazy, ungrateful Iraqis” trash, seemingly all at once.

Where is this bullshit coming from? No doubt, some Frank Luntz type—possibly Frank Luntz—held a focus group and found that Americans respond better to criticism of the war when it doesn't hint at American culpability in the embarrassing disaster it has become. Politicians, desperate to avoid the logically meaningless but emotionally powerful charge of “not supporting the troops,” have hit upon a new formula: You can talk all you want about the hopelessness of continuing the occupation in Iraq, as long as you blame it all on the Iraqis.

Surely, politicians understand better than anyone the human desire to avoid acknowledging guilt. But blaming the occupied for the failure of their occupation is astonishingly despicable, even by today's standards. On the other hand, murderers often blame their victims to avoid dealing with their own insanity. No doubt Hitler blamed the Jews for the Holocaust.

You know, the Iraqis are hearing this stuff, too. They get Fox News. When Bush says we're fighting terrorism in Iraq to avoid fighting them in America, they hear it. Imagine what that sounds like to them: “Hey Iraqis, sorry about destroying your society and importing al Qaeda and all, but at least your deaths are keeping us Americans safe!”

snip//

Iraq, though, is no covert operation. There is no plausible deniability there. As much as we'd like to, there's no pretending we didn't just completely shit the bed on the global stage and create an entire generation of actual America-hating potential terrorists in the process. It's a blowback scenario that simply can't be swept under the rug. Americans can't go on pretending that this was a good idea, or that it never happened. So we go to plan C: It's all their fault. We really are a bunch of assholes.

[ixion]

1. 400 billion, and yet most of Iraq has no electricity, sewer, etc

the question I would be asking is where the hell has the 400 BILLION gone? :grr:

[dorkulon]

5. Ask Halliburton. (nt)

[rodeodance]

2. As Kerry said-Iraqi Leaders are after power-(mosques, contracts, army, etc) and

to get and KEEP power corruption is their friend.

[babylonsister]

3. Did you even read this? The writer is talking about how we RUINED Iraq for

the Iraqis, we're creating terrorists by our actions, and it has nothing to do with the leaders.

[dorkulon]

4. You just described all leaders everywhere. (nt)

[Black Adder]

6. Unfortunately

While we may have royally screwed up their country, the fact of the matter is that we finally concluded that we can't fix what we broke and to the extent that it can or will be fixed, the Iraqis are going to have to do it themselves.