Say, I wonder what’s been happening in Iraq lately. Let’s find out, shall we?
Angry fellow Shi’ites stoned Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s motorcade in a Shi’ite stronghold of Baghdad on Sunday in a display of fury over a devastating car bomb that tore through their area.
Oh. That doesn’t sound very good, does it? And frankly, neither does this:
The bloodiest bombings in Baghdad since the U.S. invasion in 2003, and the reprisals that swiftly followed, show that Iraq’s sectarian conflict may be too far gone for leaders to stop, even if they want to.
The killings of some 250 people last week marked a “high-water mark”, analysts said. It demonstrated with savage clarity how little control Iraq’s government exercises, with a security force accused of sectarian bias and a series of peace plans doing little to slow the pace of killing.
Ah. But surely there must be some good news that the mainstream media is hiding from the American people to influence the midterm elections and hurt Bush’s approval ratings. Right?
The threat of civil war lurched closer in Iraq Saturday as a suicide bomb killed four people and Iraq’s Shiite prime minister faced criticism as he prepared for a summit with U.S. President George W. Bush.
I see.
You know, at some point we’ll have to leave Iraq. I’m not naive enough to think that our exit will make anything better (it won’t), but there comes a time when you must accept the reality that there is nothing we can do to make things better. Our exit will likely be followed by a sectarian bloodbath that Tom Friedman and David Broder will say could have been prevented if only we had stayed for six more months. This is, of course, complete horseshit. Iraq is going to get worse no matter what the United States does, and we have to decide whether we want to be in the middle of it or not. It’s not a great choice we have before us, but I don’t see any non-disastrous options on the table.
Gavin adds: Stop the presses! Jon ‘Get Saddam’ Chait, liberal hawk extraordinaire, has unveiled a new plan…
