Robert Scheer: Bush in Free Fall

[babylonsister]

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/8938

Bush in Free Fall
by Robert Scheer | Jul 25 2007


— from Truthdig (posted with permission)

At what point will President Bush finally grasp the enormous disaster that the neoconservatives, from Vice President Dick Cheney on down, have visited upon his presidency? Or, to put it numerically, just how does a president descend from a 92 percent approval rating one month after 9/11--the highest of any president since modern polling began--to the two-thirds disapproval score that has stalked him through the last year, thanks to the Iraq debacle, without getting the message?

Two major polls released this week show that the vast majority of Americans grasp the salient lesson of the Iraq misadventure: "Winning" this war has nothing to do with winning the war on terrorism. Thus, the public overwhelmingly supports the congressional Democratic leadership's demand that the administration begin concrete steps to extract U.S. troops from Iraq. This week's New York Times/CBS poll found that two-thirds of those polled said that the war is "going badly" and that "the United States should reduce its forces in Iraq, or remove them altogether." Meanwhile, a Washington Post/ABC survey reported that, "by a large margin, Americans trust the Democrats rather than the president to find a solution to a conflict that remains enormously unpopular."

snip//

As Winston Churchill once observed, a lie gets halfway around the world before the truth puts its pants on. But the truth eventually does catch up, and that is the specter that now haunts our president. There is simply no plausible national security argument for the United States' ongoing occupation of Iraq. That fact was driven home Tuesday when American and Iranian negotiators met for the second time in Baghdad at the insistence of Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who was quite clear that peace will not come without the Iranian government's cooperation.

The harsh reality that the United States must now enlist the support of Iran, the "rogue nation" that Bush claims threatens us with nukes, which this very week was once again accused by the U.S. ambassador of supplying arms to Iraq's anti-American Shiite militias, underscores the folly of this disastrous escapade. The regime change engineered by the neocons vastly extended the power of the regime housed in Tehran and will only intensify with each additional day of the U.S. occupation.

Yet, communication with Iran is a good thing, because Iranians at least have to live with the consequences of increased violence--as opposed to American politicians, who feel required only to muddle through to the next election. The Democrats and the few Republican dissidents are quite happy to make a show of their reservations about the war without actually ending it. The Democratic leadership in Congress is playing a risky game of pretending to be the party of peace without actually pursuing the budget-cutting measures that would force an end to the war.

While this opportunistic strategy may produce a temporary political advantage, it will be of slight comfort to the families of American soldiers killed and maimed in Iraq over the next 18 months, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of future Iraqi victims. Nor will it con a public that has turned solidly against this war and is determined to hold politicians responsible for ending it.
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[Phredicles]

1. That last paragraph especially deserves a close look;

Robert Scheer rules, the LA Times drools.:P

[luckyleftyme2]

2. U BET UR SWEET ASS

U BET UR SWEET ASS WE ARE GOING TO HOLD ALL THE PEOPLE INVOLVED RESPONSIBLE!
2008 THE YEAR THE PEOPLE TOOK BACK THEIR GOVERNMENT BACK-WILL BE THE ONLY THING HISTORY
WILL RECORD-EXCEPT THE IMPEACHMENT OF BUSH AND COMPANY!
U 29% SHOULD BE SHITTING IN UR PANTS! CUZ WE JOHN Q PUBLIC R PISSED!

[lazer47]

3. I for one don't care if Bush and Cheney are 90 yrs old and it takes

20 yrs to gain a conviction,, they will need to go to Jail, they had no thought for humanity, so therefore they shouldn't receive any,,,,K&R

[Bitwit1234]

4. Because he is so egotistical he will not realize that he is only

an elected (and there is a majority of people who doubt that) offical. He is supposed to be answerable to the American people. But he seems to think we are answerable to HIM.

[truth2power]

5. Yes. I don't know why people persist in this fantasy

that, at some point Bush will wake up and realize what a disaster his regime has inflicted on this country and the world.

Never gonna happen! Bush is INCAPABLE of insight. He's not psychologically-minded and can't reflect on the consequences of his actions.

Psychopaths (sociopaths, if you choose) do not use self-talk or consider consequences. Just one more indicator of how dangerously mentally ill he is. This is reason enough to remove him, assuming he'd be willing to submit to an objective psychiatric evaluation.

There's the rub, of course. Psychopaths don't show up at a psychiatrist's office of their own accord. They're just fine. It's everyone else who's crazy.

[cliss]

6. When will Bush learn?

Answer = he already has.

This is a little bit rhetorical question in that Bush of course has figured out that everything he's done is a disaster. But so what? What can he do about it now? It's not like he can pull out the troops because he will lose Iraq, all the oil, and it will be a complete Fait Accompli of his failure. Plus all the money we've spent there, for nothing. Not to even mention all the lost lives, in vain.

It will be the death Knell to his presidency. So there's no way he can bring the troops home.

He's set in motion a series of events which are undoable.

Whether he realizes it or not is completely irrelevant.