A COMMON TASK

The high hopes or, better yet, the hopeful hype prerequisite to Operation Arrowhead Ripper has come and gone without delivering the crushing blow to Al Qaeda proponents of The Surge had optimistically touted-- The scrapheap of met milestones, which did not provide a turning point to the ongoing disasters that began with Shock and Awe in Iraq, has just had one more impressive tombstone added to its pile--

General Petraeus is clearly a brilliant and very well educated commander who happens to be the right man for the right job at the wrong time and, in what has become incontrovertibly so, the wrong place--The bravery, courage, and skill of the US Troops is beyond question and first rate but rarely does valor alone, even of high order magnitude, or coupled to exceptional tactics save mistaken strategery either inept, or incompetent, or taken on a cavalier lark from the far side of history-- Taking ground and holding ground is a serious brutal process made more difficult by the beautiful abstractions and delusional prognostications emanating from naive think-tanks--



The Iraqis plain and simple do not want the Bush version of democracy or even the not so divergent Hillary version nor are the Iraqi troops, no matter how well trained, willing to immolate their desperate, hungry, and disrupted lives in order to implement it, no matter how brilliant its ideological glow appears to its propagators-- Nor do they want foreign oil companies to control their national oil-- A willingness to die to prevent the American Occupation from succeeding shows no real signs of abating--This is as basic and prevalent to the current situation as the omnipresent heat and dust of the Middle East that so many of our propagandists are so readily incapable of perceiving--



Refined technique at this stage of the game may have educational value for future conflicts that must be weighed against the ever upward climb of friendly casualties but current Victory will not be among its progeny-- Manhood inherently necessary to stand up in the face of this disastrous enterprise and take on the painfully bitter consequences that this, yes, humiliating folly and its acute failure engenders, appears seriously wanting in the aggregate leadership of America politically, industrially, militarily and, also, spiritually-- Before Redemption can accomplish its heavy lifting, the unadulterated need for repair must be fully recognized and shorn of all craven denial-- Until that manifests, the wounds of defeat will only fester against our common fabric-- The ties that bind can and will be loosened, or even torn asunder, should we fail this daunting demanding task-

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PRETENSE NO LONGER SERVES TO FURTHER

John McCain's stroll through one of Baghdad's successfully surged neighborhood markets wearing a visible bullet proof vest and a look of focused concern is either a disingenuous campaign promotional photo-op designed to burnish his pro-surge bona-fides or a feeble exercise in self-delusional idiocy or more than likely some of both-- To the right of the command coterie in the news photograph are a group of Iraqi men watching the US officials on parade two of whom exhibit countenances closer to pure hatred than Chamber of Commerce welcome wagons--

Locals later claimed the area was teeming with dozens of armed US soldiers who arrived in heavily armored Humvees while numerous gunship helicopters hovered and circled overhead-- Locals later disputed a statement from McCain's group that the stroll was no different than a Sunday trip to an outdoor market somewhere in Indiana citing the constant threats of possible insurgent attacks at any time-- People may now wear bullet proof vests to Sunday markets in New Orleans but.........Indiana????-- Not yet, by a long shot!!!!--

The Surge may have shifted execution style killings away from Sadr City and other violent Baghdad neighborhoods but the number of killings country-wide have not diminished and lethal car bomb explosions everywhere have multiplied to record highs in both February and March-- The Sadr Shiites are not going to battle US soldiers toe to toe in a decisive formation they know in advance would fail-- The Shia have more than a healthy fear of the desperate Sunnis and if the US is unwittingly willing to take the fight to those Sunni insurgents on their behalf, the Sadr Militia is more than willing to allow it-- Hence, it is certainly not surprising the Shia, knowing full well Father Time is still currently on their side, would lie low and not openly challenge the US surge into their territory-- If McCain and his ilk read this superior position as a sign of weakness on the part of the Shia or as a sign of imminent full scale success on the part of the Surge chances for a sane conclusion to this fatal mis-adventure offer absolutely no hope--

Never say Die!!! is most often a commendable attitude but if it burnishes the sagging morale of abject congressional dimwits and oblivious has-been Neocon tank-thinkers while executing the destruction of an entire Army through imperial dissipation, bankrupt sloganeering and willful politcal refusal to cogitate harsh facts on the ground, what will it ultimately have wrought??-- Myopic security concerns of a piecemeal nature this late in the game have counterproductivity written all over it--Is Baghdad security so important that other areas are allowed such negligent security support they become cauldrons of everything the surge attempts to prevent in Sadr City-- Bloodletting mestastasizes as Baghdad becomes an island of temporary restive calm surrounded by an ocean of seething shrieking violence elsewhere??-- Who but posturing politicians could label this success??-- Wake up, Mr. McCain!!!!!--

Had the skillful intelligent Petreaus been in charge of the CPA at the beginning instead of Bremer his asymmetrical expertise may have been used to optimum effect but at this late stage he still obviously doesn't have the manpower to police the entire country all at once, nor are there troops enough here at home or around the world to fill this aching bleeding void-- The hearts and minds lost at the outset and during the ongoing torturous years Rummy and Company devoted to denial first of insurgency and later of outright civil/sectarian conflict won't give Petraeus the full scale second chance his plan would need-- Over a million, some say two, talented Iraqi civilians have opted for refugeedom and have left the arena-- Lost time is not found again-- Even as the Sadr militia melts away rampaging Sunni car bombers fearlessly ply their deadly attacks in the vacuum-- Wherever American Officials pronounce even minor success insurgent attacks pounce to dispel it as false and the Middle Eastern media are there in force to disseminate the continuing flaming chaos and its ugly truth-- The tempo and terrain belong to the natives everywhere but the Greed Zone--At the precipice of defeat pretense no longer serves to further---