GREAT MEN GONE

As American and Israeli politicians spin the spin and spin again evermore to deflect incoming rounds of intense criticism, outright blame and strident calls for resignations and dismissals a former Nuremberg prosecutor this week called for both Saddam Hussein and George Bush to be tried for War Crimes-- No mention was made of Ehud Olmert-- Maybe Bush had an accurate premonition several weeks back when he plied some members of congress for special legislation insuring immunization from War Crime charges that might arise for aggressive actions already undertaken or committed-- Nevertheless Bush plods on emotionally desperate for war against Iran oblivious it seems to the truly quagmired condition of the U.S. Army on the ground in Iraq and how such an inhibiting situation has become so crippling to our foreign policy elsewhere in the world--

_______The Israeli failure to destroy Hezbollah missile capability by applied bombing of Lebanese civilians was supposed to deliver the robust template of success the U.S. could duplicate against Iran-- Total targets: 1,500 to be hit simultaneously from the sky-- Apparantly Bush did not get the message/lesson nor did the embunkered one Mr. Cheney though such imperceptibility or rather impenetrability hasn't stopped this administration's repeatedly emphatic use of the adjective 'robust' to tellingly describe their intentions and responses to the world-- It is the word they use most often to depict what they hope the world would think of their own actions-- Locked and loaded robust Neocon lackeys like Gingrich and Krauthammer want the world to think of the neocons in such a stupendously narcissistic and hallowed term as 'Churchillian'-- 'Maybe not today but someday the world will be indebted and thankful to us like Churchill for our courageous stand' (paraphrasing the 'other priorities' Cheney)-- What the Neocons know and betray with such galling hoped-for self-acclaim is redemption for the failure to live up to their Father's Generation-- Alienated from popular contemporaries, considered 'uncool' by the 'Sixties' and debilitated by the guilt-driven knowledge that when they had their chance to serve in a war they verbally supported, point blank pure and simple they didn't pull their trigger(like most of the middle class they went to college or bought x-rays of bad knees on the medical black market)-- Having endured a very long wait to attain power and influence, they want that long wait and that recently gained influence to have the same pay-off it did for the Greatest Generation-- Victory in WWII led to forty years of power for Roosevelt's Democrats-- For Gingrich to entwine the events of 9-11 with the attack on Pearl Harbor (the epic pretext goal PNACers salivated for) is fraught with both the tremendous respect for the heroism and attendant glory of their Father's Generation and the opportunity to redeem everything ignoble about his generation's to this day bitter loss of face in Vietnam-- Lost time is not found again-- As world events Newt's analogy fails-- In the case of Japan's attempted knockout blow we climbed up off the canvas re-armed, attacked and defeated the state army of the foe who dropped us for an eight-count-- In the event of 9-11 we attacked the terrorist foe(not an army employed by any state) in Afghanistan and weren't satisfied with a simple crushing victory there so we attacked a country even Mr. Bush this week stated had "Nothing" to do with 9-11 and who had never attacked us-- Being the aggressor in war means he has to win (only by winning and continuing to win in an ever widening ever-extended war can he avoid the charges of war criminal usually hung on the so called loser) and win Bush did in the beginning until a resilient and lethal insurgency arose capable of duelling the under-manned under-armored under-planned U.S. Army to a standstill stalemating plans for widening the war to grandiosely remake with shiny quick-victoried democracies as well as the unstated goal of securing if not outrightly capturing the oil reserves of the entire region which is where Israel enters the picture--

________ Israel too has its Ben-Gurion Dayan Begin generation legendary and militarily heroic in every sense of the word-- Their triumphant war of Independence and Statehood a success supremely magnified many times over especially by proximate comparison to the horrendous fate endured in the German camps-- Such triumph to say the least is intoxicatingly splendid for those involved-- The inevitable fate each succeeding administration/generation is tasked with is duplication if not supercession of the original feat which almost magically the Israelis accomplished in the 1967 Six Day War despite a minor dust-up when she attacked the USS Liberty an information gathering ship belonging to the U.S. in a disputable case of mistaken identity-- The air of invincibility marries hubris but the military victory/drug in its awesome aftermath as a way of life tends to mirror the heroin high--It is needed more often simply to feel normal or less relatively depressed and ultimately much harder to obtain delivering down the line unexpected demoralizing defeat or whatever the spin pins label to-- Two highly disciplined determined rag-tag irregular outfits with no air-power and no sea-power supposedly too weak too under-armed and too religiously faithful to be taken seriously except as proxy pawns of larger powers have stalemated two of the most highly rated armies in the world-- Bitter pills in the extreme for the Masters of Empire--

____ Revenge and anger engulf the leaders whose armies don't succeed or match their historical legends which is probably why Bush who needs to robustly embody Churchill attempted to goad Olmert who needs to outshine Dayan into attacking Syria-- In any event both men are clearly in a difficult desperate frustrated frame of mind-- Olmert who has a killingly impressive lineage of former Generals to measure himself or be measured against by political enemies and pundits almost immediately violated the international cease-fire in hopes of securing a quick lustrous battle victory using special force commandos to assassinate an Hezbollah higher-up which failed outright clearly tarnishing Olmert even further as well as adding to the embarrassing civil angst now enveloping Israeli society-- What Olmert and Bush should know or should have known is that Churchill like Ben-Gurion or any great man for that matter were great because they refused to be other than who they were and that nobody no matter how hard they pose will ever duplicate them-- Worse than buffoonish emulation of great men is the insanely delusional even criminal enterprise of attempting to create the circumstantial pretexts that would engender the emulator chance to occupy/fulfill his projected greatness in a prancing charade that always spells doom-- Not all who strut and fret their hour upon the stage attain true greatness before they are heard no more-- Circumstances more empowered than the neocon tribe will deliver our next great heroic men who will become heroic above all else by being true to themselves and by having a set of beliefs worth being true to-- Pretexts conjured by the ineptitude of self-interested self-absorbed hacks unerringly find history's dumpster-- Both men for the moment at least should tip their caps to Nasralla who as a statesman warrior repeatedly if unexpectedly outmaneuvered and outfought always a step or two ahead of our witlessly deadly duo (a new generation of Lebanese as well as a wider circle of Middle Eastern offspring will be tasked to outdo him)--

__________Krauthammer scalpeled out an initial obituary threatening Israel with loss of American confidence meaningfully understated to mean loss of our now continually devaluing American dollar as foreign aid/welfare and further weapon goodies complicating further the fragile Israeli mental state-- George Bush's big victory the one he didn't accomplish in the Air National Guard days of his youth is receding over the horizon like his own party bent on surviving the midterm elections distancing itself even further from the abject fraudulence of Mission Accomplished and it is certainly complicating if not endangering his not so clear and present mental state-- The country's horses are spooked--

HANDWRITING ON A WALL

Is it true FEMA has contracted with Hezbollah to help rebuild New Orleans??-- What about Mississippi's gulf coast??-- Halliburton too busy in Iraq??-- Bechtel??-- The present administration's inefficacy and corruption have now become child's play for cynics and satirists everywhere while media-nimble Nasralla and Iran were first out of the blocks to portray themselves as the creators and rebuilders of a Middle Eastern world ravaged and destroyed by Israeli militants and their war-crime enablers the Americans-- Asleep at the battered wheels of U.S. foreign policy not so media-nimble stay-the-course George Bush half-heartedly responded four days later with vague directions about coming up with some money somewhere for Lebanon so the Islamofascists don't get to 'catapult all the propaganda'-- There seem to be no alternatives in the minds of our leaders to the idea that the continuing failure of using military force to alter the Middle East in our favor as well as the Israelis is still the best applicable option available-- The failure is not a military one but really a failure of imagination-- A failure too of nerve-- The biggest most unmanly failure of all: Failure to admit obvious failure--

__________Now as the wheels begin to come off even the early true-believers are jumping ship-- George Will!-- William Buckley!-- Chuck Hegel!-- Joe Scarbrough!-- Larry Kudlow Wall Street cheerleader who devoted many segments of his business show in support of the neocon plan to surgically supplant a major world regime and blithely replace it with a brand spanking new freshly built national democracy all in five days-- Joe Lieberman walks his own gangplank a former Democrat neocon primary loser whose fate seems to have inspired many a John Kerry (I was for the war before I was against it ) mea culpa for example the one emmanating from John Edwards recently while More not Less Troops Hillaryous and her now positionless ilk lick their forefingers searching for wind resembling principle-- One never knows where Thomas Friedman really stands on anything but now he says he's for plan B, whatever that means-- Probably that he won't ride the ship down with a Captain who now stubbornly avows we will never leave Iraq while he is the President and Chief Decider-- Here comes Go-along-to-get-along John McCain badmouthing Shock and Awe Mission Accomplished Stuff Happens A Few Dead Enders Purple Fingers and whatever else will put some distance between his White House hopes and his staunch support for those Dead Enders currently esconced in its occupancy-- Will all those pundits like Geraldo and Greta Van return to CNN now that Foxstars WeareWinning O'Reilly and InevermetaLiberalIdidn'tHate Hannity face the difficult music falling from grace-- Neo-Neocon Casualties for whom facts never counted-- Chris 'We are all Neocons now' Matthews loses the Harball credibility he once sought--

_____ Kudos go to Scott Ritter the former United States Marine and U.N. weapons inspector who once personally dared Saddam Hussein to hang him but more importantly stood up for Truth and challenged the bogus neocon hysteria only to have his character assassinated and smeared by the vile Karl Rove-- Kudos to the late David Hackworth a Sam Damon-like officer and gentleman who when living was our Nation's highest decorated soldier and who always looked out for our/his troops first a singular truth teller for whom his country and his men always came before career-- And Kudos to Pat Buchanan who never jumped on the deluded zionist bandwagon in the first place risking his political status as well as his livelihood from the verbal assaults of those throwing around the false moniker of anti-semite awarded to those justifiably criticizing the stupidity and brutality of the Israeli Government-- The retired Generals Zinni, Batiste, Neubold et. al. who risked the moniker of 'traitor' from those who never served by informing the underinformed Americans among us that the Iraq war effort was botched from the swaggered start by false intelligence, true ignorance and the sheer incompetence of those provident leaders (Don Rumsfeld in particular but clearly aimed at those above him) 'who never have to execute such missions and never have to bury the results' --

_______The handwriting is on the wall for all the neocons and it is no longer legible but where and when and how the mess in Iraq finally ends is ominous guesswork at the moment-- In Israel now serious dissent and even more serious questions beleager PM Olmert and his entire war entourage from all quarters of society and what appears from the analyses, daily editorials and reader opinions in Haaretz is that survival and all its attendant issues from corruption to favoritism to incompetence to injustice to criminality in the military the government and in society itself must be confronted seriously and debated seriously and real working solutions must be found not just another election featuring the latest fashionable opportunists full of hollow slogans and retrograde pandering-- Failure may mean death of a nation-- Israel has made itself a pariah state that has become the least safe place in the world for Jews to live-- Made so by itself not making friends with the world-- Made so by constantly viewing the world as its enemy and not caring about the consequences--

_______ When the Iraq fiasco plays itself out in recognized defeat and if such a mega-defeat brings down the American economy and the American way of life topples due to a lack of cheap energy will Americans fight to find real solutions for the mega strenuous difficulties such a monstrous failure will deliver-- Will we face ourselves squarely and demand the American spirit rise to the occasion or will we simply sweep the unpleasant facts under the carpet opting for the manufactured oblivion of the latest entertainment fashion-- Whether Americans realize it yet or not the same issues confronting Israel will soon confront us-- Will the generation sired by the GREATEST GENERATION answer the call???-- We shall see!!!-- And fairly soon!!!!--

ROGUE: REVELATION & RETRIBUTION

Israel became the first violator of the fledgling cease-fire in Lebanon-- Like that's a surprise-- Political bookies weren't giving odds anyway-- Commando operation deep into Lebanon ended with one dead Israeli officer and two wounded-- The commandos were wearing Lebanese army uniforms and were quickly forced to retreat-- Prime Minister Olmert and his defense minister Peretz both approved the operation declaring it a defensive action-- Three moderate Arab countries Egypt Jordan and Saudi Arabia called for a restart to the peace process and were quickly rebuffed by Israeli officials-- Obviously Israel has no regard for peace-- War has been its inceptional raison detre-- The one-eyed warrior Moshe Dayan called war Israel's 'life drug'-- A life of drugs for the unitiated of the neocon think tank cabal usually leads to a short life but it can in moments be intoxicatingly intense and in this case crusadingly so while it lasts but.....when the pipester demands his payment usually it is not pretty-- Israel repeatedly violates its own signatoried agreements-- Repeatedly blows off U.N. resolutions while demanding all other mandated resolutions be enforced-- Masters of the 24 hour commitments-- Israeli self interest and vengeance uber alles-- No accountability accepted-- Israel's rabid right cult revels in the embrace of defeat bestowed by Mr. Bush and his poodle Mr. Blair-- Israeli extremism lends Mr. Bush-n-Blair the hollow air of someone else's toughness-- Stabbing State-sec Condi Rice in the back after promising her a 48 hour cessation in the bombing of civilian areas in Lebanon merits not Olmert nor Halutz a single derserved public rebuke from this chickenhawk duo--(Yo, Bush, not man enough to defend Condi's usurped honor??-- That ain't very Texican)--Israel brooks no criticism from afar and as her sad ship of state surges toward self destruction she invites us along for the ride-- The law of unintended consequences the ideologically blind traitorous neocon cabal never stopped to consider--

______There for the whole Middle East to watch wide-eyed The United States publicly abandoned all pretense of being a moderator to peace or an arbiter of conflict in the region-- Falsely confident in the Israeli Air Force the United States of America compromised itself being publicly coerced by the blatant inefficacy of that IAF into condoning its misguidedly ruthless strategy by supplying her with up-to-date state of the art guided bombs and missiles-- All the while all the eyes of the Middle East (As well as the geo-politically very important Pakistan just to mention another) watched disbelieving as America betrayed the weak but Democratic Lebanonese government and clearly collaborated in the wanton destruction of its civilians and their infrastructure-- This is complicity in its most blatantly public admission--a clear stipulation to the facts-- Those once friendly to the U.S. in the Middle East( the ones Bush rarely if ever speaks to) will be considerably less so from now on-- The fledgeling democracy of Lebanon (once a stated goal of the neocon dream) and its stronger and more courageous than advertised President Siniora (would Joe Lieberman had also been so but......) suffice it to sadly say may just be one more friendly-fire casualty of Israel's punitive and criminal collateral damage-- Hezbollah and Iran both have missiles capable of inflicting serious destruction on the oil infrastructure and the oil field reserves of Saudi Arabia not to mention Iran's proximity to the Straits of Hormuz-- What will happen to America and its economic life should Saudi oil supplies be seriously disrupted and did such potential consequences so much as bleep across Israel's 'life drug' radar-- Yo, Ehud, would it have mattered??-- Will you like Golda Meir be willing to irradiate every Arab capital in the Middle East to avoid battlefield defeat??-- Or to exonerate culpability for this one incurred in puny South Lebanon??--

______What will the next fix of Israel's 'life-drug' entail in collateral damage??-- The outright collapse of Mubarak's Egypt along with Abdullah's Jordan???-- Would the Shiites in southern Iraq make truce with the Sunni to focus pronto on driving the American troops out of Iraq or interdicting American re-supply routes out of Kuwait-- Toadie Blair and Bush resonate pathetic, weak and insufficiently capable of reining in Israel's rogue and desperado generals-- Ehud Olmert according to Seymour Hersh was strong enough to decline Bush's overture to empower Israel to overtly attack Syria but he appears not strong enough to prevent his own militia from enacting the next self-induced crisis-- While Bush struts the spoiled ineffectual prepster two-step with Blair his opposition party appears as a possible option for the U.S. electorate only by default-- Hillary told us Israeli sons were all now our sons but she failed to attend any of their funerals-- Nor did she express public condolences to the mothers of the murdered dead in Lebanon-- A substantial number of Lebanese Americans living in the United States may wish to know why Hillary didn't include their sons while she pandered for campaign funds-- We want Middle East oil without having contact with or knowledge of its people-- So much for the Democratic front runner's nuance of the Middle East-- She calls for Rumsfeld's resignation-- Now?-- Finally?-- Only when it can help her politically!!-- America is headed for major disaster in the Middle East and at home and soon and the political echelon in D.C. is too powerless to do anything about it nor like Bush does it seem too interested-- The idiotic punditocracy has a new version of an old oft-used distraction just off the shelf--The ChildKiller Confession coming too soon to our nattering tabloid television news round the clock-- An American mirage!!!--

NO FRENCH TOAST

Mr. Bush expresses disappointment in France who after playing a pivotal role in bringing about the Cease-Fire resolution now refuses to commit massive troop deployments into Southern Lebanon-- The recent war could re-erupt at any time especially if Israel wracked by the angst of defeat and internal dissension visible everywhere acquieses to its own desperation and attacks Syria conjoined by a U.S. attack in Iran-- The neocon dream for a new middle east in pristine ideological form continues to preoccupy the frustrated White House (unwilling and perhaps incapable of admitting defeat) and the only way to birth such a powerfully pristine vision is to first destroy the old Middle East-- Frustration coupled with Desperation in an extremely insular entity can create a seriously dangerous cultlike even psychotic mindset-- What happens to America and its people as a result of the wanton destruction needed to enact such a pipedream is of little consequence to those attempting to inaugurate this neocon Rapture of the Endtimes Prophecy-- Isn't the prophecy itself predicated on the actual defeat(or is it complete destruction) of a Jewish Army??-- Why in God's name has Israel allied (The Israel of truly independent action seems to be a charade) itself to the neocon evangelicals???-- Has drinking the neocon kool-aid given them a self-fulfilling Revelation?--

In the meantime horrific speculation aside but not totally off the table with this neocon crew Hezbollah at least temporarily reaps the victor's spoils having effectively introduced an asymmetrical warfare template available for implementation by any irregular group with access to such anti-tank and rocket based weaponry, intense military discipline coupled with sophisticated guerilla ambush tactics and of course their most underrated characteristic-- a freely expressed and a very devoutly intent faith-- Time and time again these fighters praise Allah-- God willing and so on they go about their task infused by the idea they are actually doing God's work and they pray God will be on their side-- Hezbollah courage derived from such faith met with clear cut respect from interviewed IDF ground forces-- Not much of this bold God-driven faith seems to enter into the expressed motivation of any large group of soldiers Israeli or American-- Israeli leaders express the belief that God gave them their homeland but there weren't many expressions if any across the varied internet sites of Israeli soldiers intoning their invasion of Lebanon as God's work-- Biblical retribution on target and ahead of schedule didn't elicit much confidence-- Many expressed serious dissatifaction with being called up, with the quality of their training and equipment and with the clear ineptitude of officers in the field-- An American General Boykin widely to his discredit sermonized that his God was bigger than their God but that was back in the heady days of Mission Accomplished dream still intact-- Dismissing the power of Faith is to risk extreme peril!!!!--

If wider contagion of war remits another defeat and possible exodus from the Middle East America can always blame the French--'You want fries with that?????'--

RETROACTIVE EXONERATION

Lost amongst the royal hubbub of England's many thousand Bomb Plot Foiled headlines and the many hundred analyses performing the autopsy on Israel's embarrassing military, political and yes social defeat at the hands of Lebanon's Hezbollah is the request of the U.S. Congress by the President of the United States of America George Bush for a retroactive shield immunizing Mr. Bush of possible war crimes for his many actions/decisions already performed/committed-- Is Mister Bush attempting to make congress a potential accessory to his crimes??-- As spineless as congress has been lately it seems likely a non-starter at least leading up to the mid-terms-- Who in congress has chutzpah enough to stand before the body and introduce such a corrupt request??-- Certainly not Senator Lieberman having cast off the loserman label by switching party affiliations a move which for now at least entertains him with front-runner status as a new RLC of one-- Is Bill Clinton still supporting him??--

But back to Mister Bush fresh from declaring defeated Israel the victor (tough sell even in The Lobby dominated American media) one must refrain from assuming the once and still hellbent Neocon benefactor denied his conduit (an Israeli attack on Syria) to war in Iran will give up the ideological dream easily and seek to rebuild the American railroad system in hopes of beginning to re-erect the sinking economy and infuse our people with a sense of American purpose-- None of Mr. Bush's adventures in the Middle East have succeeded-- Positive spin like bandaids can't conceal the nightmare forever-- You can't fool most of the people most of the time unless most of the people want you to but it does seem the midterms can't arrive fast enough even though the Republicans fear disaster while the Democrats fear having to actually lead-- Neither party with an engaging platform both symbolized by the self-serving power-grubbing Joe Lieberman mealy posterboy of all things wrong with the corrupt state of present politics-- When the mid-terms finally come and go possibly amidst oil @ $100/barrel, a dynamically deflating housing bubble, serious mega-unemployment in the rubble of a crushed manufacturing sector, the sustained dire threat to our soldiers in Iraq and the ever present possibility of terrorist scenarios both real and imagined there remains the blue elephant in the room no one wants to defend and no one wants to attack-- The most egregiously failed presidency in our country's history--

A LIABILITY OF STRATEGERY??

The two kidnapped Israeli soldiers in whose name the unrepentent destruction of Lebanon was perpetrated in the end were so unimportant to the Israeli Government they weren't even as much as a sidebar in the cease-fire resolution-- The aerial blitzkrieg Israel inflicted on Lebanese civilian infrastructure was to be a trial run of the same tactics Bush wants to employ in Iran according to journalist Seymour Hersh's New Yorker article 'Watching Lebanon'-- Bush apparently urged Olmert to attack Syria outright which met with Olmert's surprising refusal-- In earlier blog posts the disproportionate mega devastation of civilian areas of Lebanon was seen as a provocation to entice Syria into the war enabling Bush and the neocon criminals to declare overt war on Iran all predicated on the now vanished invincibility of the IDF-- As speculation it fell not too far off the mark but Syria opted not to take the bait and Israeli ground forces performed so dismally against the underrated Hezbollah the neocon delusion met with serious disapppointment-- Bush and Cheney will glean no lessons from the poorly planned poorly executed defeat and will proclaim victory-- Syria and Iran what?.....humiliated?...hah!!--

The most exceedingly foolish element in the war plan contained an embarrassingly ridiculous assumption devoid of any common sense-- That those civilians being bombed would channel their anger away from the bombers toward those risking their lives to defend those same civilians-- How far removed from reality must one be to believe such unadulterated horseroar??-- How does a command echelon approve such an wildly implausible assumption when the same unchallenged assumption met with such overtly visible failure in Iraq??-- Iraqis never did greet the U.S. occupation as its liberation but apparently word has yet to breach Cheney's bunker nor Rummy's lectern-- Rumors of extant civil war fail to penetrate the Bush cocoon--

Israel needs to radically reassess its response paradigm-- Brutality...not working!!-- Bombs away...not working!!-- Assassination(discriminate and indiscriminate)...not working!!-- Bulldozing the homes of rock throwers....not working!!-- Refugee (concentration) camps....not working!!-- Israeli racism.....not working!!--Face the music!!--Employ intelligence!!!--Horror of all horrors:Listen to your neighbors!!--The fourth most powerful (the criteria of such rankings are in need of a major reexamination or redefinition) military in the world has failed to supply basic security for the Israeli people and they are now totally aware of it-- Nearly sixty years of existence and Israeli actions (the F-16 as an arbiter of peace?....hardly)in their own neighborhood produce such persistent hatred-- They are reaping what they have sown-- Losing the battle of demographics is another front of considerable concern-- Economic issues reverberate through the demonstrable angst of defeat and fear and depression now beginning to percolate in civilian attitudes-- The future will not be arbitrated by a discussion between Israeli doves and hawks-- Israel is no longer a safe place to be an Israeli-- In fact it may be the least safe place of all-- Israel....a failed state???-- The discussion must entail speaking to your enemies-- Difficult??-- Impossible??--The choice is yours-- Wake Up!!!!!!!!

UNCEASED FIRE

Israel agrees to a cease fire and then inserts 10,000 more ground troops into Lebanon replete with accustomed bombing and strafing runs, heavy artillery fire and helicopter assaults near the Litani River-- Haaretz reported the deaths of nearly a dozen(now up to 25) Israeli ground troops none of whom were reservists and over one hundred soldiers sustaining combat wounds in fierce fighting-- Escalating the ground combat in the few hours before the cease-fire was to go into effect was exactly what President Bush toward the end of last week had specifically and publicly asked Israel not to undertake-- Saturday Bush spoke on the telephone with Prime-Minister Olmert for the first time since hostilities began more than a month ago-- Collaborating on a common defense strategy most assuredly should the world broach the topics of responsibility, of war crimes, and of course potential reparations for rebuilding Lebanon once again as well of course coordinating a mutual and agreeably positive spin on a most disappointing outcome -- A simple question-- Why is the President speaking to the number one supposed ally of the U.S. in the entire Middle East during a period when both leaders are at war for only the first time??-- To be so disengaged during such a momentous crisis seems not just a wee bit derelict-- Maybe the delusional Rumsfeld was at the helm??-- Maybe shotgun Cheney??-- Maybe the grounded Rice??--

Into effect goes the cease fire and this morning Mr. Bush proclaims the war a resounding victory for Israel-- A victory??-- An utterance of delusionary magnitude so apallingly bereft of factual corroboration as to elicit a frightening despair for the imminent future of our country-- The Ship of State point-blank is simply and vacuously rudderless-- This is what passes for Leadership??-- Kudos, perhaps, only for Ms. Rice's singular(was everyone else engaged by vacation?) but exemplarily tardy effort and less so for overall attempt to purposefully misunderstand the region's internecine complexities and how our top priority of shilling for Israel in this misbegotten stupidity seriously damaged overall U.S. respect and trust even amongst the most moderate once pro-western regimes-- On second thought, no kudos at all....none-- Denial is a river in Egypt and is their only option-- The U.S. foreign policy is now in complete disrepair-- Every action the Bush neocon administration has committed, demanded or endorsed in the Middle East has clearly failed to achieved his stated objectives-- Green lighted in this hubristic invasion by Mr. Bush himself Israelis everywhere are now asserting this mis-adventure is anything but success-- Hardly the victory laurel of the misinformed Decider in Chief, the prime-minister Olmert is the odds on favorite for the mantle of Loser in Chief-- There are serious questions he has yet to be asked--For one, was it criminal to send, we are now informed, reservist ground troops who complained earlier of being poorly trained and poorly equipped and poorly led into combat's meat grinder at the last moment in a vain effort to save political face??-- Hardly a question ever asked of the victor--

The analytical spinmeisters at the worlds keyboards must have spent the day a little reticent to declare the cease fire valid and who can blame them-- Mr. Bush states that he reads the resolution as Israel's right to self-defense and of course Hezbollah must be dis-armed oblivious to the fact neither is mentioned in the resolution-- What has changed over the week-end?--A foreign policy in tatters and one mountain bike-wreck later, the hopeful note is vacation is finished-- Isn't it??--

ISRAEL KRAUTHAMMERED

Charles Krauthammer ardent cheerleader for the neocon dream turned nightmare in the Middle East has publicly penned some phyrric disappointment with the failure of the Israeli Defense Forces to quickly eliminate the Hezbollah miltia forces-- Israeli inability to live up to the neocon/pnac fantasy endangers the confidence America has so deferentially placed on its special friend--

So Israel the childish ally bloated with state of the art military largesse and billions in financial aid for ostensibly strategic reasons by America during the cold war owes America a decisive Hezbollah defeat-- OWES??-- Israel must, at least, according to Krauthammer's hegemonic visions avoid a 'ruinous military failure in Lebanon' because failure would demonstrate an inability to make a contribution to Bush's War on Terror-- Sorry, Charles, America as you passionately aver not only 'wants but needs a decisive defeat' of Hezbollah but that is simply no longer in the cards as an Israeli option-- If it were to ultimately occur it would be an arduously gruesome slog including much higher casualties and no pre-ordained success-- Israeli officials allowed last week, perhaps cynically or dis-informationally, a dis-armed Hezbollah is no longer prerequisite to a cease fire-- Bush has stated this week he does not want an escalation of violence-- Who knows whether anyone in theatre is listening--

But what started as a nostalgic re-run of its historic Six Day War and all its attendant hubris has morphed into an unimagined military struggle not yet completely ruinous but quite clearly a failure to reach its initially stated military objective of a complete eradication of Hezbollah from South Lebanon-- Gone now is the air of IDF invincibility even while their explosive air assault capabilities ravage the civilian infrastructure of Lebanon dimmed only by their barbarously political ineffectuality-- Impressing who??-- Israel claims it never targets civilians but its highly precision-guided ordinance has murdered nearly 700 Lebanese civilians while the helter skelter randomly aimed and fired Hezbollah missiles have killed fewer than 100 Israeli citizens-- Obviously one of these terrorist groups has unleashed more effective terror than the other-- While the U.S. President idly allowed the Israeli a green light to effect the extermination of Hezbollah the failure of the IDF has frayed the nerves of the neo-con literati like Krauthammer holed up in their mahogany foxholed think-tanks--

The Maronite Christians the Druze the moderate Sunni Lebanese and other disparate groups in Lebanon have virtually united with the Hezbollah cause denouncing both America and its client state Israel(or is it the other way around?)-- Shock and Awe has failed once more--The Arab World itself has joined in the denunciation much to the support of the so-called 'Arab Street'-- Condi Rice the Secretary Of State of The United States of America was told by the Prime Minister of Lebanon (The country who was supposed to ultimately be the great beneficiary of this deranged adventure) to go home-- She is unwelcome anywhere in the Arab world-- How can anyone at the State Department spin this diplomatic implosion as a positive development?-- Hezbollah's fierce resistence on the ground coupled with the IAF's brutal destruction of civilian infrastucture has stiffened the spines of those who were supposed cave-in and what?... 'Welcome the IDF as their liberators"??-- Where have we heard that bullroar before??-- Israel may have perpetrated for all intent and purpose exactly what the Middle East so desperately needed-- Another freshly failed State endangering the moderate once pro-western regimes and perhaps tragically and ultimately their own-- What a way to make peace and friends hey??--

That Olmert's stated and attempted battle plan so paralled Shock-n-Awe in its delusional strategy and short-sighted tactics is troublingly surprising-- The Bushboys gave the obvious A-Okay! oblivious to where their battle plan (or Lack of one) actually delivered its own payload-- Quagmire!!-- Sectarian War!!-- Civil War!!-- Chaos no Kings' horses nor King's men can begin to grapple with-- The ideologues esconced impenetrably in the mohagany foxholes inside Neocon Think-Tank Central sit innoculated from just the facts, maam, but the powerdream is so addictingly intoxicating setback much less acute failure is not even remotely possible even when its slapping them in the face-- The map is never the terrain and if something in the war terrain goes wrong it is never the fault of the cartographers-- The map is always brilliant and must be clung to with insane desperation lest the PNACers admit culpability for the unimaginable disaster in the Middle East that could possibly culminate in American exodus-- In Israel the cartographers of this brilliant faux pas are pointing Blame's finger and scapegoating posturing and bickering with all the accusatory excuses deployed by the one most often deemed the game's loser-- Depending on point of view Israel seems to have effected regime change on the wrong regime-- Its own!!!-- Nevermind the Army was Sharon's The Intelligence was certainly not Olmert's and neither was the IAF's bombing plan but hey... Hollywood's Bibi Netanyahou is tan, he's rested, he's ready and he's waiting in the wings--

Krauthammer's criticism piles on the 'tremulous Olmert' but is on the mark, cogent, perhaps too brilliantly understated but completely oblivious as it pertains equally and applicably to the Deluded Rumsfeld, the Bunkered Cheney, the Ice-Maven Rice and the Decider Bush--Let's don't forget the grandiosity that knows no bounds Field Marshall Wolfewitz the super-competent World Banker who would now rid the World/Planet of poverty perhaps with as much misguided elan as he did attempting to rid the planet of Iraq-- Cheney an ardent believer in the invincibility of the IDF has spouted his faith publicly on many occasions must be like Krauhammer disappointed in Israel's less than decisive annihilation of the resilient and underestimated Hezbollah going so far as to blame Ned Lamont for the IDF failure -- Krautman implies that an always unprovoked Israeli blitzkrieg victory over Hezbollah would have rescued the tarnished Iraq situation from the blot of failure painted most recently by the belated recognition of Top Brass as imminent civil war while oblivious to their testifying line troops and non-coms for whom the imminent civil war has raged most evidently for over a year but what care the ideologues for those pesky little facts-- The Israelis have proudly stated for years 'Just give us the tools and we will complete the job'-- The tools they were given and after selling some of the high-tech to the Chinese Government violating American trust again failed to complete the job-- Cease Fire has been accepted with unspoken conditionality as per usual-- 'Israel has disappointed' Krauthammer tiredly writes as if he suddenly realizes he's embarassed by the fact he bet on a touted horse running a race on the downside of history-- Is Krauthammer devoted Israeli sycophant forever it seems now throwing in the towel on Israel as he clings to his delusory PNAC??--

Stay tuned--