Ed Rasimus wrote:
On Wed, 12 Nov 2003 01:16:20 -0500, "George Z. Bush"
wrote:


Certainly I'll categorically deny that being bogged down in Iraq is good for
any American, candidate or not. Many Americans, lately including members of
the Republican Party as well as Democrats, are starting to regret that our
nation allowed itself to get involved in this military adventure for
non-existent reasons in the first place. In hindsight, we may someday
conclude that we would have been better off letting the UN handle the mess
their way, instead of going it alone.

George Z.


(Snip)

Recent editorials have been comparing the Iraqi democratization to the
aftermath of WW II in Europe. Five months after V-E day, the region
was lawless, with looting, refugees, sniping and disorder.

I was in Italy until June 1946 and, other than the presence of some refugees,
there was little looting, sniping or disorder visible to the naked eye. Maybe
the birthplace of the Mafia was more law abiding than was defeated Germany, but
I didn't see the things you inferred were endemic. And I do not remember any
reports of ongoing resistance to the end of the war in Germany as is apparently
in progress in Iraq today. There may have been isolated instances of rifle
fire, but nothing more.

......It was eighteen months until George Marshall's genius of rebuilding
rather
than punishing ala Versailles began to create the stable, economically
powerful Germany and post-war Europe.

We live in a "USA Today/MTV" sort of world in which resolution must
occur within seconds or we jump cut to the next suggestive video
segment.

"Non-existant reasons"? Gotta say at the most superficial that
bringing democracy to an oppressed dictatorial nation is a pretty good
one.

If that's a reason to go to war, then we must have a veritable grab bag of
eligible sites for the next adventure. The world is full of oppressed
dictatorial nations, as is that region, and we are even allied with a good
number of them.

.....Ditto for demonstrating US support for an Arab people. Ditto
again for stabilizing the region and building a staunch presence
beyond Israel.

That's another way of saying that "this is going to hurt you more than it's
going to hurt me" isn't it? All we have to do is to beat them into stability,
even if it doesn't suit them.

"Letting the UN handle the mess their way..."? Gimme a break. Any
examples of UN successes in handling this sort of mess?

I confess that I would sooner have them firing their RPGs and detonating their
land mines when UN forces go by than when the targets are solely American. So,
if the policy fails, it's a UN policy that fails, and if there are casualties,
they are UN casualties. Let's face it, we're not in this out of the goodness of
our national hearts.....we're in it because, whether or not it's yet clear to us
ordinary Americans, we're going to profit in some way for our involvement.
Some of us suspect that it won't involve much more than oil or big business in
some way. In any case, anybody who swallows the proposition that we are
altruistic in our foreign affairs has got to be the world's most gullible guppy.

George Z.