Mencken-esque

"Nobody ever went broke," observed the journalist H.L. Mencken, "underestimating the intelligence of the American public." Perhaps it is this piece of wisdom that John McCain and other Republicans have in mind as they insist that President Bush's surge tactic in Iraq has been successful and that now "We're winning!" By convincing the American public that we are indeed winning the war in Iraq, McCain and his pals hope to win the presidency this fall.

Granted, there has been a drop in the overall level of violence in Iraq in the past few months. Increased security due to the surge may in part account for this. A more significant factor is our paying eighty-thousand Sunni insurgents three-hundred dollars a month each not to kill us. Also part of the deal is that we get these men jobs in the Iraq army or police forces. That the predominately-Shiite government is balking at embracing these traditional enemies makes it not only possible but probable that sometime soon they will return to their old ways, then the violence will spike up again. In other words the decrease in violence is most likely just a lull in the violence -- the calm at the eye of the bloody storm.

We're winning? Just a few days ago Iraqi prime minister Nuri al-Maliki welcomed with open arms Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad --one of the "axis of evil" sort to whom Bush refuses to speak. That the Shiite government in Iraq is on very friendly terms with Iran and will be heavily influence by Iran in the future is without doubt. So it is for this that we've sacrificed four thousand lives (and counting) and half a trillion dollars (and counting)? An Iraq that's essentially a satellite state, not of the U.S. (only in Dick Cheney's dreams . . .), but of Iran?

John McCain has always relished his reputation as a "rebel." If he sincerely believes we are now winning the war in Iraq he's a rebel all right -- a rebel without a clue. Let's hope the American public is not so clueless come November.

The war in Iraq and the failure of democracy

The question has arisen: why is it that the War in Iraq, the central issue of the midterm elections, has been displaced by the Economy in 2008? Is it because, as some right-wingers have suggested, the Surge is working and things are getting better in Iraq, so people have stopped worrying about the conflict and moved on to domestic issues?

I doubt it. Rather, I think it is because people saw that making the war the central issue in the last election had no discernable effect on the war. The Bush administration simply thumbed its nose at the people's will, continued to fight the war as it damn well pleased. In short, the voters have decided that, when it comes to the war in Iraq, their votes don't work, mean nothing. In other words, they've seen that, just as it is in Iraq, democracy in America is a bit of a joke.

p.s. From a Washington Post story of 13 March: "During the last week in January, 36 percent of those surveyed said they were most closely following campaign news, while 14 percent expressed the most interest in the stock market and 12 percent in the death of actor Heath Ledger. In contrast, 6 percent said they were most closely following coverage of Iraq. "