1 Boring Old Man

It was fairly unclear why the U.S. was marching off to war in Iraq in the first place. Once we got there, it wasn’t long before our war with Saddam Hussein and his soldiers was essentially over.  Then came "the insurgency." As I recall, we were lead to believe that the people fighting against us were outsiders – Islamic Jihadists pouring in from other places to have a crack at killing Americans. But then there were the Militias, lead by religious leaders. The rhetoric from our Administration has gone through a few transformations. We were fighting Saddam Hussein first; then it was the Ba’athists; then it was "the Insurgents" [al Qaeda by implication]; now it appears it is warring sects of Islam – Sunni and Shi’a – for control of the country.

Our Administration seems determined to convince us that Iraq is not in the middle of a Civil War. Since it is patently obvious that Iraq is in the middle of a Civil War right now, the only viable question on the table is why our Administration is so invested in convincing us otherwise. I guess it doesn’t look good that we went there to bring about a "regime change" – to depose the unruly Hussein and bring a more U.S. friendly government to power [because Hussein was an immediate threat to our safety?]. And now we’ve cleared the way for a Civil War that will result in an even less U.S. friendly Islamic Theocracy of one sort or the other taking over the country.

Some days, it just doesn’t pay to start a war…