Calvin Woodward and Robert Burns do an AP Fact Check, catching Obama in a whopper when blaming deficits on the Iraq war.

OBAMA:“Unfortunately, over the last decade, we have not done what is necessary to shore up the foundation of our own prosperity. We have spent over a trillion dollars at war, often financed by borrowing from overseas. This, in turn, has shortchanged investments in our own people, and contributed to record deficits.”

THE FACTS: This is partly true. For sure, the costly Iraq and Afghanistan wars have contributed to the nation’s budget deficit — but not by as much as Obama suggests. The current annual deficit is now an estimated $1.5 trillion. But as recently as 2007, the budget deficit was just $161.5 billion. And that was years after war expenses were in place for both the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts.

Most of the current deficit is due to the longest recession since the 1930s. It has seriously depressed tax revenues while increasing costs to the government — including social safety-net programs such as unemployment insurance and spending by both the outgoing Bush and incoming Obama administrations on stimulus programs and on bailouts of banks and automakers.

The AP doesn’t question Obama’s notion of “investing in our own people” –lib-speak for tax (take money from those who earned it) and spend (on someone Obama, et al, feel is more deserving.)

Obama last night:

But this milestone should serve as a reminder to all Americans that the future is ours to shape if we move forward with confidence and commitment.  It should also serve as a message to the world that the United States of America intends to sustain and strengthen our leadership in this young century.

This is the very opposite of what the Democrats preached during Bush’s term.

Only Sen. Joe Lieberman stood strong, and for that the Democrats purged him.

From this desk, seven and a half years ago, President Bush announced the beginning of military operations in Iraq. Much has changed since that night. A war to disarm a state became a fight against an insurgency. Terrorism and sectarian warfare threatened to tear Iraq apart. Thousands of Americans gave their lives; tens of thousands have been wounded. Our relations abroad were strained. Our unity at home was tested.

Our unity was tested because Democrats decided there was no political upside to backing Bush’s policy, despite having voted for the liberation of Iraq.

To explain away the change, they cynically concocted a Big Lie, with full support of the mainstream media: the notion that Bush tricked them.

Thus we endured years of ugly politics brought to us by Michael Moore,  Joe Wilson/ Valerie Plame, assorted Hollywood nitwits, Jimmy Carter, John Kerry, Cindy Sheehan, and Barack Obama himself.

Yeah, our unity was tested.

Peter Robinson:

Incoherent: The president argued that the war had represented a worthwhile cause, asserting that “We have persevered…because of a belief…that out of the ashes of war, a new beginning could be born in this cradle of civilization.” Moments later, however, the president insisted that the war had instead been mistaken: “We have spent a trillion dollars at war…This, in turn, has short-changed investments in our own people, and contributed to record deficits.” The president wants to have it both ways, associating himself with the victory we achieved in Iraq while distancing himself from the costs. As argument, this is incoherent. But of course it isn’t argument. It’s cheap manipulation.

Grudging: “The Americans who have served in Iraq,” the president accurately stated, “completed every mission they were given…They shifted tactics to protect the Iraqi people; trained Iraqi Security Forces; and took out terrorist leaders….Iraq has the opportunity to embrace a new destiny….” In other words, we won. Why? Because in 2007, when many, including then senators Obama and Clinton, insisted that the United States should simply withdraw from Iraq, leaving behind a nation reduced to chaos, George W. Bush instead insisted on a new strategy, the surge. Let me repeat that. We won because President Bush insisted on the surge.

Did President Obama extend the courtesy to his predecessor of saying as much? He most certainly did not.

“It’s well known,” President Obama said, “that [President Bush]…and I disagreed about the war from its outset. Yet no one could doubt President Bush’s support for our troops, or his love of country and commitment to our security.” Support, love, commitment. President Obama could bring himself to credit President Bush with nothing more than mere well-intentioned haplessness. How shabby. How tawdry.

Disgraceful: After having added $1 trillion to the deficit since taking office, President Obama suggested that somehow the $1 trillion the nation has spent in Iraq and Afghanistan over the last decade “short-changed investments in our own people, and contributed to record deficits.” Take just a moment to do the math—something of which our chief executive apparently believes most Americans incapable. The cost of the war against radical Islam has averaged $100 billion a year—which comes to one-eighth the size of the President’s stimulus bill, or one-thirtieth of the average federal budget over the same ten years. I have my reservations about the president’s economic advisors, but they know—he knows—that the war in Iraq has nothing to do with our economic woes. He was intentionally attempting to mislead us…

…writes David Brooks

The U.S. venture into Iraq was a war, but it was also a nation-building exercise. America has spent $53 billion trying to reconstruct Iraq, the largest development effort since the Marshall Plan.

So how’s it working out?

On the economic front, there are signs of progress. It’s hard to know what role the scattershot American development projects have played, but this year Iraq will have the 12th-fastest-growing economy in the world, and it is expected to grow at a 7 percent annual clip for the next several years.

“Iraq has made substantial progress since 2003,” the International Monetary Fund reports. Inflation is reasonably stable. A budget surplus is expected by 2012. Unemployment, though still 15 percent, is down from stratospheric levels.

Oil production is back around prewar levels, and there are some who say Iraq may be able to rival Saudi production. That’s probably unrealistic, but Iraq will have a healthy oil economy, for better and for worse.

Living standards are also improving. According to the Brookings Institution’s Iraq Index, the authoritative compendium of data on this subject, 833,000 Iraqis had phones before the invasion. Now more than 1.3 million have landlines and some 20 million have cellphones. Before the invasion, 4,500 Iraqis had Internet service. Now, more than 1.7 million do.

In the most recent Gallup poll, 69 percent of Iraqis rated their personal finances positively, up from 36 percent in March 2007. Baghdad residents say the markets are vibrant again, with new electronics, clothing and even liquor stores.

Basic services are better, but still bad. Electricity production is up by 40 percent over pre-invasion levels, but because there are so many more air-conditioners and other appliances, widespread power failures still occur.

More on the mess and who made it. Instapundit:

CHART OF THE DAY: Deficits, With And Without The Iraq War. “Do you see alarming deficits or trends from 2003 through 2007 in the above chart? No. In fact, the trend through 2007 is shrinking deficits. What you see is a significant upward tick in 2008, and then an explosion in 2009. Now, what might have happened between 2007 and 2008, and then 2009? Democrats taking over both houses of Congress, and then the presidency, was what happened. Republicans wrote the budgets for the fiscal years through 2007. Congressional Democrats wrote the budgets for FY 2008 and on.”

UPDATE: The Anchoress emails: “That deficit graph is going to go viral. This piece in the NY Times from 2006 reinforces it.”

Yeah, note this excerpt:

An unexpectedly steep rise in tax revenues from corporations and the wealthy is driving down the projected budget deficit this year, even though spending has climbed sharply because of the war in Iraq and the cost of hurricane relief.

Well, that was back when the Bush tax cuts were kicking in. Now, in the Age Of Obama, the “unexpectedly” language is in regard to very different kinds of developments . .

Sources: CBO and U.S. Statistical Abstract.

Joe Biden has been claiming a democratic Iraq will be a feather in Obama’s cap (despite both his and Obama’s opposition to the Bush policies that won us breathing room.)

But Iraqpundit — who lives there — says Obama’s passivity has turned a US victory into defeat.

…When the U.S. watches as Iran steals the election from the people of Iraq and withdraws its troops and forgets about the plight of the people, Bin Laden and Zawahiri celebrate. Why? Because this U.S. move will damage whatever positive accomplishments were made over the past few years. This will result in a victory for the radicals. Al-Qaeda knows how to turn that anger into spreading their operations in the region.

The Iraqis were skeptical at first but gave the U.S. a chance. People were skeptical because the U.S. had urged the Iraqis to rise up in 1991 against Saddam; the people did. But when Saddam attacked the uprising, the U.S. sat back and watched. From here it looks as though history is about to repeat itself.

When the U.S. removed Saddam, the Iraqis welcomed the change. When the U.S. brought democracy and asked the people to vote, do their part to bring aobut positive change, the Iraqis did. But when the Iraqis gave the secular candidate the most seats inparliament, Iran kicked into high gear. The U.S. is doing nothing.

It’s already happening. People in the streets are saying the U.S. doesn’t care what happens here. They say the word of the Americans means nothing. They cannot be trusted. All that plays directly into Zawahiri’s message. He and Bin Laden have been saying the Americans are not to be trusted, so now they can say I told you so. That is serious damage. and it is probably irreversible. Again, al-Qaeda has it figured out. But I don’t know whether the White House has.

How depressing. And how tragic for the Iraqis.

Iraqpundit, who lives in Iraq, on the mealy-mouthed Obama administration

Oh God. Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse. I just found out the Obama administration recently decided to drop references to Islamic radicalism. I’m not sure I understand the reason behind the decision, but I can only guess that it’s perhaps to avoid upsetting the militants.

Of course that’s not how the administration describes the logic. “President Barack Obama has argued that words matter, and administration officials have said that the use of inflammatory descriptions linking Islam to the terror threat feed the enemy’s propaganda and may alienate moderate Muslims in the U.S.”

How a normal Muslim would be offended by a reference to radicals who target civilians is beyond me. Any self-respecting Muslim knows that the vermin who go around killing in the name of Islam and get support from radical religious leaders are deserving of an accurate depiction. That is, let’s call them what they are: radical, militant, extremist, violent Muslims. Why not refer to them in honest terms? Is everyone that afraid of them? I know I am, but the mighty White House should not be.

A White House official explained that by “describing our enemy in religious terms would lend credence to the lie — propagated by al-Qaida and its affiliates to justify terrorism — that the United States is somehow at war against Islam.” All he has to do is say the U.S. is at war with radical Islam. I think the White House might be surprised to learn that most normal Muslims would agree that it would be a noble war to fight. (more…)

Iraqpundit:

The talk about the suicide bombers was lively today at work. Not one person said they supported the killers because nobody could justify the killing of civilians. The intersting thing was those who are pro-Baath said the killers were Iranian. Those who hate the Baathists say the killers were Baathists who joined forces with al-Qaeda in Iraq. Everyone else in the middle believes the killers were al-Qaeda in Iraq.

One of the bombers who was stopped before he could detonate in being interrogated. He is said to have been drugged for the event. If the guy was courageous, why does he need drugs? He certainly sounds like a coward who was too frightened to perform a cowardly act. And the killers are believed to have hit the embassies to discourage foreign investors in Iraq. Only those who hate Iraq would discourage investment in its future.

People are still discussing the new government. The groups are all talking with each other and visiting neighbouring countries. Many have visited Iran, and even the Sadrists sent a delegation to Saudi Arabia.

There is a great deal of pressure on the politicians to form a government as soon as possible. Even the sermons at the mosques last Friday called for the new government to be set up right away. Nobody wants to see a vacuum. They’re still negotiating. The different groups are looking for what they can get out of joining whatever group.

Iraqis are still hopeful and refuse to let al-Qaeda destroy the country. Only those who worry about their government jobs are afraid of a new government. The rest haven’t been discouraged.

Entertainment Weekly:

In a quietly remarkable piece of television, David Letterman interviewed Tea Party member Pam Stout on last night’s Late Show. “I know nothin’ about the tea party,” Dave began, saying Stout had come to his attention after the 66 year-old Idaho woman had been featured prominently in a Feb. 15 New York Times story on the Tea Party movement.

Letterman invited her on to ask about the movement and whether it aimed to become a “third party.” She said, “I don’t think it will become a third party,” but that its voice “can be pretty devisive” in some elections, and that locally, she wanted the Tea Party to “take over the Republican Party… [and] go back to the old ideas.”

You can watch the entire interview at the link. Letterman was indeed respectful, and in fact seemed curious to learn something.

One odd bit came in the third segment. Letterman was comparing citizen anger at the cost of the bank bailout vs. the cost of the Iraq war.

(Rough transcription)

“Money spent to militarily go in a destroy the country of Iraq, we don’t get that money back. And we’ve lost thousands and thousands and thousands of lives.”

Every death is a tragedy, but in terms of wars, the numbers are low. American deaths were 4287 through 2009. Compare that to 308,000 who died on American highways in the same period.

“We’ve turned Iraq into a hotbed of terrorism, which may or may not have been the case before.”

Iraq is not a hotbed of terrorism today. Where did he get that?

As for the money spent on the wars, it is impossible to measure the return. Did we kill terrorists in Iraq that might have pulled off another 9/11? Dissuade others from joining the jihad?

Will creating the first real Arab democracy have a lasting impact on the region? We won’t know for a while.

Iraqpundit says his fellow citizens are optimistic.

The rain continues today with the happiness that people feel about Allawi’s win. Everyone had grown tired of Maliki’s government. Sure he did good things for a while, but he turned out to be sectarian, which is something Iraqis don’t want.

When I read the western papers online, I get the impression that war is around the corner. I also love WaPo’s description of the situation as “the country’s fledgling political system.” Why is WaPo afraid to say democracy? We might as well all pack up and leave the Iraq that is about to burst into hellish flames. That’s the outsider view.

Here people are optimistic. It’s true that Maliki is acting like a sore loser. But in all fairness he says he will challenge the results in court.

Just like Al Gore.

He didn’t say he would take up arms. And of course people worry about al-Qaeda who made it clear they don’t care who wins, they plan to keep killing Iraqis. And people fear Moktada Al Sadr’s Jaish al Mahdi and its offshoot Asa’b ahl al Haq. They are likey to keep up their wicked deeds. But if the Iraqi Army and police feel like they are working for their country, they will work to protect the people against terror.

Under Maliki, plenty of ordinary workers didn’t know whether they were working for Iran or Iraq. Too many of Maliki’s top advisers took their orders from Iran. Now at least they can have a prime minister who puts Iraq first.

Iraqpundit mocks the ignorant and pompous Iraq coverage from the Gray Lady.

Perhaps it’s true. I do go on and on about how badly the media misread or misunderstand Iraq. Maybe I should stop. I’ll stop as soon as the reporters stop misrepresenting Iraq. Until then, it’s hard not to react. Look at today’s NYT. Writer Anthony Shadid devotes an entire piece to the savage culture of Iraq. He calls the Iraqis who defied the terrorists to turn out to vote “cliche.” Probably because they don’t fit into his idea of Iraqis. He can’t tie it up in a bow and present it to his readers. But what he says next is what? Not cliche? Not stereotype? Read this:

“The roots of political violence run deep in Iraq, long a turbulent frontier between Romans and Persians, Ottomans and Safavids and, now, Americans and Iranians.” I just love these reporters who show off after reading a couple of pamphlets. Suddenly they’re experts. Get it, violence is in Iraqi blood. We don’t know how to be anything but violent. This country made no contributions to civilization. We just murdered people. And what’s more, we’re unique in that tradition. The reporter quotes a local as saying this is the culture of the shoe.

What the reporter doesn’t get is the macabre sense of humour of the Iraqis. Just watch as an Iraqi offers you a cigarette from his open pack. If you say no thanks, I’m trying to cut back. He’ll say, “come on, you only die once! it might as well be from cigarettes!” For the Arabic speakers, “hiyya fard mota!” Also, people here will elevate anything above Iraqis. Any product made outside Iraq is better than local stuff. It’s out of frustration. But this doesn’t mean that we don’t recognize the rich history and culture of Iraq.

Now that you’ve read what the NYT has to say about Iraq, let me tell you what the Iraqis are saying. First of all, Iraqis are waiting patiently for a winner to be declared. The vote was March 7, and the race is still too close to call.

All the experts-for-hire said they knew Iraq really well. They said Iraqis voted along sectarian lines. If the Sunnis are about 20 percent of the population, why is Allawi running so close to Maliki? It’s because the division is not Sunni-Shiite. The division is secular and religious. This is one of the things that Iraq does share with Lebanon. The divide between the Hezbollah supporters and the March 14 people in Lebanon is like what we’re going through here. The marches and demonstrations in Martyrs square were about 50-50 from what I’ve read. In Iraq, the division is similar.

Had western reporters spoken with some Iraqi academics, they would have learned of their analysis. Several political science professors and information science professors were interviewed [Arabic]. They said the success of Allawi is a rejection of the political religious movements. Iraqis saw what religion does when it enters politics, and they don’t like it.

It’s hard for me to see western analysis as anything but the western reporters and other experts looking down their noses at Iraqis. If they had respect for Iraqi people, they would not focus on the anger of some who are justifiably angry at the violence of recent years. Of course one can and should mention that violence. But there is so much more to Iraq than some murderous thugs kidnapping and killing civilians.

Iraqis showed their feelings about U.S. presence this week. It;s the anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. If the Iraqis hated the invasion and hated the United States so damn much wouldn’t they have marched in the streets yelling yankee go home? There were no large demonstrations here. It was very much ho hum. From what I understand, all the protests were in the United States. No Iraqi wants the U.S. to stay forever, but most here don’t hate Americans. I know it doesn’t fit that picture presented by western media, but it’s real.

Claudia Rosett:

What’s the most e-mailed article right now on Al-Jazeera’s English language web site?

It’s an opinion piece about Iraq’s elections, headlined “Iraq: An example for the region.”

Someone out there is very interested in that proposition — actually, a great many someones are so interested that this article (which conveys praise of Bush, and a faith in democracy, that are both much at odds with a lot of Al-Jazeera’s usual coverage) has been the #1 most emailed article on Al-Jazeera for five straight days.

True, this is Al-Jazeera’s English language web site, not the Arabic — nonetheless, folks inclined to log on to Al-Jazeera (this will give you an idea of its huge TV footprint) are clearly taking a good look at this piece, and sending it around.

The author is Richard Grenell, who served during the George W. Bush presidency as spokesman for the U.S. Mission to the United Nations –working under four ambassadors, including John Bolton. Grenell makes no apologies for Bush’s 2003 ouster of Saddam Hussein. Rather, he celebrates it as ushering in an era of “free and fair elections” in Iraq, and says that while Iraq’s young democracy is “messy, incomplete and imperfect,” it is also “currently the envy of the Arab world.” He argues that Iraqis are lucky they had the backing of Bush, and that if Obama had become president earlier, with his wish to cut and run, it would have been a disaster for Iraq.

Today, writes Grenell, Iraq’s March 7 election reminds us that “Bush’s vision for democracy in the Middle East is beginning to unfold with the consecutive democratic elections in Iraq and Afghanistan.” He closes with the questions: “Which Arab country will be next? Who will start the long, expensive and bloody process of bringing freedom and democracy to their people?”

If Al-Jazeera’s web site readers find that commentary and those questions interesting enough to make them the most emailed on the site for five straight days, sounds like one more sign that Bush was right about that craving for democracy –yes, even in Al Jazeera’s main stomping grounds of the Middle East.

Christian Toto in Pajamas Media:

The late Howard Zinn would be very proud of his protégé, Matt Damon.

The actor has long admired the lefty historian, a man whose anti-American impulses were so profound he could cast the United States’ participation in World War II and its aftermath in an unflattering light.

Damon’s latest film, Green Zone, rewrites history regarding the Iraq War in a way Zinn’s acolytes will cheer.

Never mind the facts. Green Zone keeps the “Bush lied, people died” narrative front and center while creating an alternative reality as warped as that of Inglourious Basterds.

But at least Quentin Tarantino fashioned his film so Jewish people could extract much deserved revenge against their Nazi captors — at least on film. Green Zone exist as liberal wish fulfillment writ large.

It also arrives at an inopportune moment considering the liberal magazine Newsweek’s recent cover story declaring victory in Iraq.

Green Zone is set at the start of the Iraq War, a chaotic time in which U.S.-led forces are swarming the Middle Eastern country following the collapse of its army.

Chief Warrant Officer Roy Miller (Damon) is leading the charge on a site known to house WMD (weapons of mass destruction). A lone sniper protects the building, but Miller and co. eventually fight their way past him.

It’s a tough, taut scene, one director Paul Greengrass (United 93, The Bourne Ultimatum)  could shoot in his sleep.

But they find nothing there, just an empty warehouse. It’s the third time a suspected WMD site has come up dry, and Miller wants answers. Now.

So do we. The moment reminds us of the frustration felt when each new news report told us those elusive weapons weren’t there. Even neoconservatives can relate, and feel echoes of a rising anger.

Miller finds a soul mate in CIA station chief Martin Brown (Brendan Gleeson), a man who can see Iraq, the WMD hunt, and everything else about the region with perfect hindsight. The character, like several in the film, speaks as if his dialogue were written yesterday, not in the context of events occurring in 2003.

Together, they uncover the real story regarding the administration’s lies about WMD to coax the country into war.

Why? We’re not told. And, much more importantly, the false narrative flies in the face of how many countries’ intelligence services also supported the WMD claim, as did the Clinton administration and numerous Democratic senators.

And why would Bush lie about WMD knowing that he’d soon be found out?

Jeff Jacoby in the Boston Globe:

RONALD REAGAN liked to say that there was no limit to what a man could accomplish if he didn’t mind who got the credit. The transformation of Iraq from a hellish tyranny into a functioning democracy will be recorded as a signal accomplishment of George W. Bush’s presidency, and he probably doesn’t mind in the least that the Obama administration would like to take the credit.

This week’s parliamentary elections in Iraq brought 12 million voters to the polls – a remarkable 62 percent turnout, notwithstanding a wave of Election Day bombings that killed 38 people.

“Iraqis are not afraid of bombs anymore,’’ a middle-aged voter named Maliq Bedawi told a New York Times reporter as they stood amid the rubble of a Baghdad apartment building destroyed by a Katyusha rocket. If anything, the jihadists’ violence only intensified the refusal of ordinary Iraqis to be intimidated. “Everyone went’’ to vote, Bedawi said. “Even people who didn’t want to vote before, they went after this rocket.’’

Iraqis have paid a steep price for their burgeoning young democracy; tens of thousands of lives were wiped out in the horrific insurgency that followed the ouster of Saddam Hussein. Perhaps that awful butcher’s bill explains the fervor with which Iraqis have embraced democratic self-governance. In Sunday’s elections, 6,200 candidates representing 86 political parties contended to fill 325 seats in parliament. (Would that our own congressional elections were so competitive.) Such democratic passion would be impressive anywhere. To see it flourish in one of the world’s most dangerous and undemocratic neighborhoods is downright heroic.

Of such heroism, a new Iraq is being fashioned – the Iraq Bush foretold in an address to the National Endowment for Democracy in November 2003, when he declared that “Iraqi democracy will succeed’’ and predicted that “the establishment of a free Iraq at the heart of the Middle East will be a watershed event in the global democratic revolution.’’ Six years later – six years in which Iraq was convulsed by the bloody agony of sectarian terror, and in which 4,000 US military personnel were killed – that prophecy is coming to pass. (more…)

Tigerhawk

According to the BBC, which has never shown enthusiasm for Operation Iraqi Freedom or its aftermath, the good guys won. Or rather, they proved they won today.

These elections will certainly be seen as a big success – despite the depressing level of violence, which demonstrates that it is still altogether untrue to suggest that Iraq is now a country at peace.

But it is reasonable now to include Iraq in the world’s list of democracies.

This is the second parliamentary election in seven years which has been properly conducted.

The threat to the polls here does not come from government interference with the voting system or the count.

We did something great there, and its consequences have only begun to be felt. They may yet turn ugly, but our war there has not only been a huge victory for freedom in the Arab world but — if we do not deny it and apologize for it — a geopolitical triumph for the United States. That second assertion particularly is, obviously, in the deep minority, but if the present trajectory sustains itself history will respect it.

Iraqpundit:

Yesterday I thought I had heard the worst of it all. I thought when the WaPo reporters called terror leader Qais Al Khazaali “cerebral,” that was as bad as it could get. But I was wrong. WaPo was topped today by the NYT, which attributes the finest qualities imaginable to none other than Moktada Al Sadr.

“Since 2005, when Iraqis elected a national assembly to draft a constitution, Mr. Sadr has proved maddeningly Delphic in his pronouncements.” Delphic?!! Mookie?!!??

The NYT writer explains why he chose the word: “He refused to support that election, as long as American troops occupied the country, but stopped short of calling for a boycott. Last year, his loyalists declared that they would not participate officially in the vote, but offered their support to independents.”

What’s with these reporters who get dazzled by the odd politician? The NYT guy says: “On Thursday, Mr. Sadr’s stance was clear. He called the coming vote an act of ‘political resistance,’ a compliment in Mr. Sadr’s lexicon.” Lexicon?!! Mookie?!!?? This is the guy who can barely put two words together. Remember what his, um, lexicon includes? This is the guy who argues that soccer is an Israeli conspiracy to distract young men. His “Delphic” ness is so nonexistent that his handlers rarely, if ever, permit him to speak in public. Mookie pretty much always speaks via a statement he most likely has never seen. In other words, it was written by his handlers. Maybe the NYT should notice what he writes: “’We cannot say at this time that the elections are illegitimate,’ he said in a statement.”

I have yet to meet anyone here in Iraq who thinks Moktada is anything but a buffoon. I’m not saying he has no supporters. But the words I hear over and over again used to describe him are “child” and “fool.” Nobody has said Moktada was wise, at least not that I have heard.

Of course there are people in Iraq who believe Moktada Al Sadr would make a fine prime minister based on his lineage. But there are people who are ready to vote Nancy Ajram in as prime minister. There are days when I can see the wisdom of voting for Ajram, but there are never days when voting for Mookie is an option.

Elections are on tomorrow in Iraq. Omar at Iraq the Model has his observations and predictions, and says the poster below caused minor traffic accidents.

More from Fouad Ajami in the WSJ:

Forgive Vice President Joe Biden the audacity of claiming last month on CNN’s “Larry King Live” that Iraq is destined to be “one of the great achievements of this administration.” The larger point he made—that a representative government is taking hold in Baghdad—is on the mark.

As Iraq approaches its general elections on March 7, we should take yes for an answer. The American project in Iraq has midwifed that rarest of creatures in the Greater Middle East: a government that emerges out of the consent of the governed. We should trust the Iraqis with their own history. That means letting their electoral process play out against the background of the Arab dynasties and autocracies, and of the Iranian theocracy next door that made a mockery out of its own national elections.

In a perfect world, the Iraqis would have left the past alone and avoided the ban that was imposed on some 500 candidates accused of ties to the Baath Party. But this is a matter for the Iraqis themselves. In the twilight of the American regency the United States can’t order Iraqi political life.

Sure, there are some candidates tainted with Baathism who should have been allowed to take part in this round of elections. It would have been the better part of wisdom to let the Sunni parliamentarian Saleh al-Mutlaq participate. He is a gregarious man with natural political gifts, better inside the tent than outside. (more…)

Peter Wehner on Newsweek’s admission that Iraq is turning out okay.

Here are some further thoughts on the story and what it tells.

1. The progress in Iraq has been truly remarkable, especially when one considers where things were at the end of 2006. Iraq was caught in a death spiral. The odds were stacked against us. And most people in Iraq and America — including almost all of the political class and virtually the entire foreign policy establishment — had given up on the possibility of success. The main question for them was the terms of our retreat and de facto surrender.

2. In Iraq we have seen the rebirth of a nation. The “emergence of politics” in Iraq — including the willingness of its political leadership to engage in compromise; the Iraqis’ passion for democratic processes and willingness to set aside sectarianism; a free press; and the respect and legitimacy the Iraqi military has gained among its people — is unprecedented in the Arab world. But the successes there remain fragile and can still be undone. Iraq has proven to be treacherous terrain for foreign powers.

3. With the passage of time, President Bush’s decision to champion a new counterinsurgency strategy, including sending 30,000 additional troops to Iraq when most Americans were bone-weary of the war, will be seen as one of the most impressive and important acts of political courage in our lifetime. And those who fiercely opposed the so-called surge were not only wrong in their judgment; in some instances their actions were shameful. (I have in mind those who insisted the surge was failing long after it was clear it was succeeding. For a recapitulation of the words and actions of the critics of the surge, including Barack Obama and Joe Biden, go here and here).

4. Those like Joe Klein and Tom Ricks, who claimed the Iraq war was “probably the biggest foreign policy mistake in American history” (Klein’s words) and “the biggest mistake in the history of American foreign policy” (Ricks’s words), were wrong. Ricks went so far as to say in 2009 that “I think staying in Iraq is immoral.”

Now, if we had followed the counsel of Klein and Ricks and not implemented the surge, their predictions might have been closer to the mark. (Bush’s decision was one of “adolescent petulance” and “the decision to surge was made unilaterally, without adequate respect for history or military doctrine,” Klein wrote on April 5, 2007.) As it is, if the positive trajectory of events continue and Iraq does end up reshaping the political culture of the Arab Middle East, the Iraq war will, on balance, have advanced American interests in the region.

5. What has unfolded in Iraq is not an accident or based on luck. It was the result of one of the most astonishing military turnarounds in American history. The story of how that happened, and the men who made it happen, will be studied for generations. And Gen. David Petraeus — whose views pre-2007 were not widely shared and were often resisted within the military chain of command — has already secured his place among the greatest wartime generals in American history.

6. The former American ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker — another one of the heroes of this effort — said it as well as anyone has when he stated, “In the end, how we leave and what we leave behind will be more important than how we came.”

The war has taken longer and been harder than any of us ever wished. There were terrible mistakes in judgment along the way. But very late in the day those mistakes were corrected, allowing something good and hopeful to emerge in Iraq.

A nation that was broken is on the mend. A warring country is now peaceable, no longer a military threat to its neighbors or the region. A genocidal dictator is dead and gone. The Iraqi people are free. And a nation that was our enemy continues to work closely with us in rebuilding what was a shattered society.

In 2006, the Middle East scholar Fouad Ajami wrote a powerful and stylistically beautiful book, The Foreigner’s Gift: The Americans, the Arabs, and the Iraqis in Iraq. That gift, Ajami said, was the idea of consensual government. It is a gift we gave the Iraqis at the cost of many American lives and much treasure. It is a gift they appear to have received.

“Iraq seemed the most forbidding place for a campaign of reform, the hardest soil,” Ajami wrote during the darkest days of the war. “Yet every now and then, that country offered glimpses of hope that Iraqis may yet pull off a decent political world that works. There were days its sectarianism seemed like an affliction that would never go away. Then there were hints that the multiplicity of its communities could yet support a politics, and a culture, of pluralism.”

The Iraqis were not as enchanted with tyranny or indifferent to democracy as some critics of the war insisted.

What America has done for Iraq, which had been brutalized for so long, may not be the noblest act in our history. But it ranks quite high. The Iraq war was, in fact, a war of liberation. And the liberation appears to be working. Nothing is guaranteed; “Everything in Iraq is hard,” Ambassador Crocker once said. But regardless of where one stood on the war and the surge, what we see unfolding in Iraq today is something to be grateful for, and to take pride in.

Newsweek finally figured out we won in Iraq.

“Iraqi democracy will succeed,” President George W. Bush declared in November 2003, “and that success will send forth the news from Damascus to Tehran that freedom can be the future of every nation.” The audience at the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington answered with hearty applause. Bush went on: “The establishment of a free Iraq at the heart of the Middle East will be a watershed event in the global democratic revolution.”

In Iraq, meanwhile, an insurgency was growing, terrorism was spreading, and American forces were in a state of near panic. They had begun rounding up thousands of the Iraqis they had come to “liberate,” dragging them from their homes in the middle of the night and throwing them into Abu Ghraib Prison. At the time of Bush’s speech, some of those detainees were being tortured and humiliated. Iraq had entered a spiral of gruesome violence that would kill scores of thousands of its people and cost more than 4,000 U.S. military personnel their lives. American taxpayers month after month, year after year—and to this day—would spend more than $1.5 billion per week just to keep hundreds of thousands of beleaguered troops on the ground, fearful that if they withdrew too quickly, or at all, the carnage would grow worse and war, not democracy, would spread throughout the region.

Bush’s rhetoric about democracy came to sound as bitterly ironic as his pumped-up appearance on an aircraft carrier a few months earlier, in front of an enormous banner that declared MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. And yet it has to be said and it should be understood—now, almost seven hellish years later—that something that looks mighty like democracy is emerging in Iraq. And while it may not be a beacon of inspiration to the region, it most certainly is a watershed event that could come to represent a whole new era in the history of the massively undemocratic Middle East.

The elections to be held in Iraq on March 7 feature 6,100 parliamentary candidates from all of the country’s major sects and many different parties. They have wildly conflicting interests and ambitions. Yet in the past couple of years, these politicians have come to see themselves as part of the same club, where hardball political debate has supplanted civil war and legislation is hammered out, however slowly and painfully, through compromises—not dictatorial decrees or, for that matter, the executive fiats of U.S. occupiers. Although protected, encouraged, and sometimes tutored by Washington, Iraq’s political class is now shaping its own system—what Gen. David Petraeus calls “Iraqracy.” With luck, the politics will bolster the institutions through which true democracy thrives.

…

What outsiders tend to miss as they focus on the old rivalries among Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds is that sectarianism is giving way to other priorities. “The word ‘compromise’ in Arabic—mosawama—is a dirty word,” says Mowaffaq al-Rubaie, who served for many years as Iraq’s national–security adviser and is running for Parliament. “You don’t compromise on your concept, your ideology, your religion—or if you do,” he flicked his hand dismissively, “then you’re a traitor.” Rubaie leans in close to make his point. “But we learned this trick of compromise. So the Kurds are with the Shia on one piece of legislation. The Shia are with the Sunnis on another piece of legislation, and the Sunnis are with the Kurds on still another.”

The turnaround has been dramatic. “The political process is very combative,” says a senior U.S. adviser to the Iraqi government who is not authorized to speak on the record. “They fight—but they get sufficient support to pass legislation.” Some very important bills have stalled, most notably the one that’s meant to decide how the country’s oil riches are divvied up. But as shouting replaces shooting, the Parliament managed to pass 50 bills in the last year alone, while vetoing only three. The new legislation included the 2010 budget and an amendment to the investment law, as well as a broad law, one of the most progressive in the region, defining the activities of nongovernmental organizations.

The Iraqis have surprised even themselves with their passion for democratic processes. In 2005, after decades living in Saddam Hussein’s totalitarian “republic of fear,” they flooded to the polls as soon as they got the chance. Today Baghdad is papered over with campaign posters and the printing shops on Saadoun Street seem to be open 24 hours a day, cranking out more. Political cliques can no longer rely on voters to rubber-stamp lists of sectarian candidates. Those that seem to think they still might, like the Iranian-influenced Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, have seen their support wane dramatically. Provincial elections a year ago were dominated by issues like the need for electricity, jobs, clean water, clinics, and especially security. Maliki has developed a reputation for delivering some of that, and his candidates won majorities in nine of 18 provinces. They lead current polls as well.

IraqPundit:

It’s hard to decide whether to be sad or happy over Thomas Ricks’s piece in the NYT. For years, reasonable people tried to persuade others about the serious threat in the Middle East. Too often those people were ignored. I know I have spent a long time arguing that the Iraqi people deserve to be protected from the terrorist al-Qaeda and Shiite militias who target civilians. But honestly, I never thought that was as bad as what President Bush endured. Say what you wish, but the man made sense. Even Ricks admits it now.

“Looking back now, I think the surge was the right thing to do.” Wow! Is that the same Ricks who argued vociferously that Iraq was a waste of time and money? He continues: “In rejecting the view of the majority of his military advisers and embracing the course proposed by a handful of dissidents, President Bush found his finest moment. That said, the larger goal of the surge was to facilitate a political breakthrough, which has not happened.”

Ricks was not persuaded by reading IraqPundit, and he was not convinced by listening to President Bush. For years, Ricks insisted that his little visits to Iraq were enough for him to dismiss an entire population. If he only knew what goes on here. If he could see what the terrorists do here. But it seems he finally met someone who made Ricks listen.

“As a longtime critic of the American invasion of Iraq, I am not happy about advocating a continued military presence there. Yet, to echo the counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen, just because you invade a country stupidly doesn’t mean you should leave it stupidly.”

Nice to know Ricks finally gets it. Too bad the damage has been done. Most people don’t care about Iraq. The entire U.S. Congress has forgotten that it exists. President Obama doesn’t remember Iraq, and he never claimed to care about its people.

I don’t know what to make of Ricks’s conclusion. I hope he means well.

“The best argument against keeping troops in Iraq is the one some American military officers make, which is that a civil war is inevitable, and that by staying all we are doing is postponing it. That may be so, but I don’t think it is worth gambling to find out.”

Thanks. I think. I don’t know if readers (IP has so few) understand what it’s like to keep arguing that Iraqis should not be dismissed as a population. It’s humiliating. But I have to keep trying.

This much is undisputed: President Bush pursued the winning Iraq strategy –the surge–with tepid support from Republicans and open resistance from most Democrats.

Bush saw the mission through. Bush negotiated the eventual withdrawal of troops from Iraq beginning this year. Bush.

Now, Joe Biden– who once declared that the only hope for Iraq was to be partitioned into three countries–is ready to take credit. He tells Larry King:

I am very optimistic about — about Iraq. I mean, this could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You’re going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer.

You’re going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government. I spent — I’ve been there 17 times now. I go about every two months — three months. I know every one of the major players in all the segments of that society.

It’s impressed me. I’ve been impressed how they have been deciding to use the political process rather than guns to settle their differences.

Me me me. Ugh.

UPDATE: A day later, instead of walking back from Biden’s boast, the WH doubles down. Gateway Pundit writes:

Shameless liars. Robert Gibbs today tried to take credit for the success in Iraq even though both Biden* and Obama voted against the successful surge that stabilized the country. That’s not all. Biden caused rioting and protests when he pushed legislation to divide Iraq into three countries. Barack Obama told supporters in 2007 that, “Preventing a potential genocide in Iraq isn’t a good enough reason to keep U.S. forces there.”

Gibbs claims, in the clip below, political pressure from Obama as a candidate, pressured President Bush. Obama was not a candidate when Bush ordered the surge.

…as he should. Critics of the Iraq war seem to assume that Iraq’s status quo circa 2003 would have stayed in place had we not invaded.

And had Saddam struck the US, even directly? They’d have lynched Bush for not connecting dots.

Former prime minister Tony Blair said Friday he had no regrets about removing Saddam Hussein after delivering a robust defence of the 2003 invasion of Iraq at a public inquiry into the war.

Related article: Saddam was a ‘monster’ says Blair Rounding off his day-long evidence session, Blair said he accepted “responsibility but not a regret for removing Saddam,” insisting the Iraqi leader was a “monster” who had “threatened not just the region but the world.”

As he left the London hearing, there were shouts of “liar” and “you’re a murderer” from the public gallery, where some of the relatives of the 179 British troops killed in Iraq watched his appearance.

In earlier testimony, Blair denied striking a “covert” deal with then US president George W. Bush over the war, but said he had been convinced Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and had to be tackled.

“The decision I took — and frankly would take again — was if there was any possibility that he could develop weapons of mass destruction, we should stop him,” he said.

Meanwhile, Max Boot reports good signs in Iraq.

We often hear about the supposed “unraveling” of Iraq—a regular trope of veteran defense writer Tom Ricks, among others. No doubt there is cause for concern—ranging from bombings that kill dozens, even hundreds, to candidate disqualifications that threaten the integrity of upcoming elections. But as General David Petraeus notes in this interview published last Monday in the Times of London, Iraqi politicians have shown an impressive ability to overcome crises that could lead to the resumption of civil war. Speaking of the 500 candidates disqualified for Baathist links, Petraeus said:

I’m considerably much less worried than I was say last weekend when this was all really appearing that it actually could boil over and result in a reversal of the effect of two and an half years of reconciliation among different groups. It appears however in the last 48 to 72 hours that Iraqi leaders have really gripped this issue.

It turns out now that each party has at least double-digit numbers of individuals on this particular list of over 500 names and that it is reportedly 55 per cent or so Shia and 45 per cent or so Sunni. So if it ever was as was reported a predominately Sunni list and predominately focused on sidelining Sunni candidates that is not the case now and it appears there is going to be, as has been the case in Iraq on a number of previous occasions when there has been quite considerable political drama, that Iraqi leaders will resolve the issue without unhinging and undoing again two and a half years of very hard work at reconciling all of the factions inside the new Iraq.

I noticed another sign of how “the new Iraq” is making progress in this Wall Street Journal article about the rush of foreign airlines to increase service to Iraq at the same time that Iraq Airways is building up its fleet by placing an order with Boeing.

“It’s a good market,” said Turkish Airlines Chief Executive Temel Kotil. Turkish was one of the first foreign carriers to serve Baghdad after the end of Saddam Hussein’s regime in 2003 and it plans in March to start flights to Basra, in southern Iraq. “We want to serve many Iraqi cities,” Mr. Kotil said, adding that most of the carrier’s passengers are Europeans.

It’s not only Turkish Airlines that thinks Iraq is a good opportunity. Other carriers already flying there include Bahrain’s Gulf Air, Lebanon’s Middle East Airlines, and Austrian Airlines. And, reports the Journal, “German giant Deutsche Lufthansa AG recently announced that it aims this summer to start serving Baghdad and Erbil, pending regulatory approval. Austrian Airlines, a unit of Lufthansa, is increasing flights to Erbil, the one Iraqi city it serves. Upscale Qatar Airways also is examining the Iraqi market, officials said.”

A fragile but working democracy, an increase in foreign investment, a steep decline in attacks over the past several years—all these are signs that Iraq is hardly unraveling. That doesn’t mean that it is on a one-way flight to Nirvana. American vigilance and involvement remain essential. But an awful lot has gone right recently—more than I would have predicted back in 2007, when the surge was just beginning. Perhaps, just once in the Middle East, the pessimists will be proven wrong.

…Clinton was president. Saddam was dictator.

Britain and America have pulled back from the brink of war with Iraq after an offer to let UN weapons inspectors back into the country.

American and British bombers were on their way to Baghdad when they were called off after Iraq’s letter was delivered to the United Nations Security Council on Saturday.

But US President Bill Clinton warned military strikes would take place if Iraqi President Saddam Hussein broke his word.

“Now Iraq must live up to its obligations,” Mr Clinton said.

Yep, Slick Willie said it. Over and over and over. He even threatened to put Iraq on double-secret probation.

Critics of the liberation of Iraq claimed US forces aided or abetted the destruction of Iraq antiquities. It was an unanswered libel.

Now those who complained the loudest have reserved themselves.

Melik Kaylan in the WSJ:

Whatever other mistakes were made in Iraq, it certainly didn’t help the cause of peace that the U.S. and its coalition partners were routinely blamed for the destruction of Iraq’s heritage—from allowing the National Museum in Baghdad to be overrun by looters, to neglect of sundry archeological sites, including the most revered ancient site of Babylon.

Today, after extensive recovery efforts, the National Museum is again open to the public, with the majority of its greatest treasures back on display. Moreover, we’ve long known that much of the pillaging had already occurred in Saddam’s time, along with the substitution of fakes for many objects. Many of the museum’s most valuable items were locked away in a vault, untouched by looters.

As for the ancient sites, a June 2008 trip by top Western archeologists to southern Iraq’s eight most important sites found little or no post-Saddam damage, much to the archeologists’ surprise. The trip included the two leading critics of American conduct, Elizabeth Stone from Stony Brook University and John Curtis, head of the British Museum’s Middle East Department. They did not visit Babylon in the north, but the places they saw covered a full fifth of the entire landmass of Iraq—all relatively undamaged.

Throughout the bloodiest war years, reports had mounted of depredations to ancient Babylon by coalition forces. Mr. Curtis emerged as the single most persistent source of such accusations. Considering the authority of his position and the incendiary potential of his public statements, it was reasonable to assume he was certain of the facts before he spoke out.

A Jan. 15, 2005, BBC report, for example, began with the following statement: “Coalition forces in Iraq have caused irreparable damage to the ancient city of Babylon, the British Museum says.” It continued with such details as “sandbags have been filled with precious archeological fragments and 2,600 year old paving stones have been crushed by tanks,” and that long trenches were dug “through archeological deposits.”

Mr. Curtis’s accusations piled up over the years with added details such as the purported damage from a nearby coalition helicopter base that allegedly caused cracks in the animal bas-reliefs on Babylon’s original walls. Finally, at the British Museum, he mounted a five-month-long exhibition that closed this past March, titled “Babylon Myth and Reality.” Its final room chronicled the depredations to Babylon in recent years. Here he belatedly began to acknowledge that Saddam himself had already caused grievous harm to the site in various ways—by building a palace at its heart, by ineptly renovating ancient remains, by deploying a tank regiment there, and the like.

In July of this year he authored an official Unesco report with Ms. Stone and others on the state of the site with much the same content. Not surprisingly, it resulted in numerous media reports blaming the U.S. for the destruction of ancient Babylon. One memorable Boston Globe story began, “Iraq’s US-led invaders inflicted serious damage on Babylon, driving heavy machinery over sacred paths, bulldozing hilltops, and digging trenches through one of the world’s greatest archeological sites.”

Neither the report’s authors nor those in the media who repeated their accusations, it seems, bothered to read Emilio Marrero’s memoir “A Quiet Reality” published this April by FaithWalk, nor attempted to contact him. As chaplain of the Marine Expeditionary Force that first secured Babylon from looters during the Marines’ three-month stint there in 2003, he records how they worked conscientiously to protect the site, ejecting looters, undertaking repairs to the perimeter and establishing ground rules for the war’s duration. Chaplain Marrero saw the site immediately after Saddam’s forces evacuated. It was in poor condition then.

In recently reviewing the Unesco report, which came out after his book, Chaplain Marrero said to me that the cracks in the ancient bas-reliefs were already there when the U.S. came in. He doesn’t believe that the helicopter base could have caused any damage because it was “up to two football fields away.” The choppers rose vertically upon lift-off and the ancient remains are located in an excavation considerably below ground level.

Just One Minute:

The NY Times front-pages a mini-debacle – Peter Galbraith, adviser to John Kerry and Joe Biden, has been getting rich off the advice he has been giving the Kurds:

American Adviser to Kurds Stands to Reap Oil Profits

By JAMES GLANZ and WALTER GIBBS

OSLO — Peter W. Galbraith, an influential former American ambassador, is a powerful voice on Iraq who helped shape the views of policy makers like Joseph R. Biden Jr. and John Kerry. In the summer of 2005, he was also an adviser to the Kurdish regional government as Iraq wrote its Constitution — tough and sensitive talks not least because of issues like how Iraq would divide its vast oil wealth.

Now Mr. Galbraith, 58, son of the renowned economist John Kenneth Galbraith, stands to earn perhaps a hundred million or more dollars as a result of his closeness to the Kurds, his relations with a Norwegian oil company and constitutional provisions he helped the Kurds extract.

In the constitutional negotiations, he helped the Kurds ram through provisions that gave their region — rather than the central Baghdad government — sole authority over many of their internal affairs, including clauses that he maintains will give the Kurds virtually complete control over all new oil finds on their territory.

If this had been an advisor to Dick Cheney, libs would be leaping from tall buildings (Glenn Greenwald may leap anyway).  Instead, the Times is utterly and absurdly opaque on the Biden connection:

As the scope of Mr. Galbraith’s financial interests in Kurdistan become clear, they have the potential to inflame some of Iraqis’ deepest fears, including conspiracy theories that the true reason for the American invasion of their country was to take its oil. It may not help that outside Kurdistan, Mr. Galbraith’s influential view that Iraq should be broken up along ethnic lines is considered offensive to many Iraqis’ nationalism. Mr. Biden and Mr. Kerry, who have been influenced by Mr. Galbraith’s thinking but do not advocate such a partitioning of the country, were not aware of Mr. Galbraith’s oil dealings in Iraq, aides to both politicians say.

Joe Biden did not advocate partitioning Iraq?  Uh huh, and Dick Cheney never worked for Halliburton.

Meanwhile, back here in reality we are left wondering, if Biden never avocated the partition of Iraq then why did the Times print this guest rubbish from none other than Peter Galbraith back in 2007:

IN a surge of realism, the Senate has voted 75-23 to acknowledge that Iraq has broken up and cannot be put back together. The measure, co-sponsored by Joe Biden, a Democratic presidential candidate, and Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas, supports a plan for Iraq to become a loose confederation of three regions — a Kurdish area in the north, a Shiite region in the south and a Sunni enclave in the center — with the national government in Baghdad having few powers other than to manage the equitable distribution of oil revenues.

While the nonbinding measure provoked strong reactions in Iraq and from the Bush administration, it actually called for exactly what Iraq’s Constitution already provides — and what is irrevocably becoming the reality on the ground.

And why did the Times accept this piece in May 2006 from Leslie Gelb and a what I infer is a Biden pretender calling for the partition of Iraq?  Why did they tell us in 2007 and 2008 that Biden favored the partition of Iraq?

Back when Biden-advisor Galbraith was positioning himself to make millions with the Kurds, Biden was advocating the policies that would help Galbraith achieve just that.  For the Times to pretend otherwise is absurd.  The only argument I can imagine them making in support of their burial of the Biden connection is that as of November 12, 2009, Joe Biden no longer advocates the partition of Iraq.  So what?

To their credit the Times does acknowledge that this is a story by front-paging it; after they reprise their own archives it may dawn on them that the story is not limited to one opportunistic “private citizen” but points directly to the judgment of the Vice President.

One of the many lies — most of which the Bush administration never tried to counter — was that an eager Pentagon pushed for the invasion of Iraq. That Rumsfeld et. al. were oblivious to the potential mess lying ahead.

Douglas Feith was one of Rumsfeld’s key deputies. In War and Decision, he tells how the downside of invading Iraq was given a thorough review.

Despite Feith’s key position and recorder of history, the LA Times, New York Times and Washington Post never reviewed the book.

Here then, what might be news to some readers.

The ‘Parade of Horribles’

Rumsfeld resolved to give the President a comprehensive list of possible calamities in the event of military action against Iraq. The decision on war was pending, and Rumsfeld, of course, would be associated with it. Weighing risks had naturally been part of the policy-making and planning processes on Iraq all along, but Rumsfeld thought it would be valuable to review all together the major problems we could anticipate, to get them in writing and air them with the President and the National Security Council— well before irrevocable decisions were made. No one asked him to do this, but an exercise of this kind was an important check on the assumptions underlying our planning (1).

Rumsfeld had shown me a version of this list back in August, and I had given him some written comments in response. Now, in mid-October, Rumsfeld called a “drop everything” meeting with Wolfowitz, Myers, Pace, and me. As we sat down at his office conference table, Rumsfeld handed each of us the draft of his list of possible problems and disasters, which had been substantially revised since the August version. Highlighting roughly twenty items, it made for grim reading.

After letting the four of us absorb it for a minute or two, the Secretary asked us to sharpen the list, add to it, or otherwise improve it. We spent more than two hours in intense discussion reworking the paper. To relieve some of the tension inherent in the task, I began referring to the memo as the “Parade of Horribles.” By the time we finished with our revisions, it had grown by another ten items or so.

The ultimate version of the Parade of Horribles memo was dated October 15, 2002. Its key political warnings can be summarized as follows:

• The United States might fail to win support from the United Nations and from important other countries, which could make it harder to get international cooperation on Iraq and other issues in the future. We might fail here by not properly answering the question: If the United States preempts in one country, will it do so in other countries, too?

• The war could trigger problems throughout the region: It could widen into an Arab-Israeli war; Syria and Iran could help our enemies in Iraq; Turkey could intervene on its own; friendly governments in the region could become destabilized.

• The United States could become so absorbed in its Iraq effort that we pay inadequate attention to other serious problems—including other proliferation and terrorism problems. Other countries in the Middle East and elsewhere might try to exploit our preoccupation to do things harmful to us and our friends.

• The war could cause more harm and entail greater costs than expected, including possibly a disruption in oil supplies to world markets.

• Post-Saddam stabilization and reconstruction efforts by the United States could take not two to four years, but eight to ten years, absorbing U.S. leadership, military, and financial resources.

• Terrorist networks could improve their recruiting and fundraising as a result of our being depicted as anti-Muslim.

• Iraq could experience ethnic strife among Kurds, Sunnis, and Shia.

Most of these dangers, Rumsfeld noted, would become more likely and more severe with a longer war, underlining the tactical importance of speed and surprise (2). This was one of the factors arguing for a smaller force.

In addition, the memo included these three notable items:

• “US could fail to find WMD on the ground in Iraq and be unpersuasive to the world.”

• “World reaction against preemption or ‘anticipatory self-defense’ could inhibit US ability to engage [in cooperation with other countries] in the future.”

• “US could fail to manage post-Saddam Hussein Iraq successfully, with the result that it could fracture into two or three pieces, to the detriment of the Middle East….”

This was a serious and disturbing memo. The concerns it listed included military, diplomatic, and economic matters. The list was more wide-ranging and hard-hitting than any warning I saw from State or the CIA— even though their leaders are widely viewed as the Administration’s voices of caution on the war. Even so, this memo did not anticipate postregime violence of the type that we have encountered in the insurgency—an effort organized, financed, and directed largely by former Baathist officials, in strategic alliance with al Qaida fighters and other foreign “holy warriors.” (more…)

Next time you hear the White House whine that they inherited two wars, remember that Bush handed them the Iraq war tied in a bow — withdrawal agreements signed, etc.

USA Today reports:

Pfc. Adrian Vesik heard that war could be hell.

He was happy to discover when he arrived in Iraq earlier this year that his war experience also would include salsa dancing, yoga and martial-arts classes.

“When I signed up for the Army, I thought I was going to be a hero — go out and do some fighting,” says Vesik, 19, during a break at a Filipino-Okinawan jujitsu class. “I haven’t come close to doing anything that I was trained to do. I work, maybe, four to five hours a day. I have time to try all these new things. It’s not so bad.”

Because of new rules that require Iraqi approval for all U.S. missions, and a general decline in violence nationwide, many of the 117,000 U.S. troops stationed in Iraq say they now have more idle time than at any previous point in the six-year war.

Combat is still a daily reality in some parts of Iraq, and U.S. troops are being killed here at a rate of about one a week.

But for many troops in places such as this large military base in southern Iraq, traditional soldiering such as kicking down doors and searching for roadside bombs has at least partly given way to book clubs, karaoke nights, sports and distance-learning university programs.

StrategyPage:

The overall level of violence in the country continues to decline, despite the occasional terrorist bombing. This has led to continued economic growth, and more Iraqis are using their freedom of movement, and action, to protest government incompetence. The inept performance of elected and appointed officials is more stark in Iraq, where economic freedom has created many spectacularly successful entrepreneurs, and a growing middle class. Thus it is obvious that Iraqis can get things done, and more Iraqis are openly upset at the poor performance of their elected officials. People are also very unhappy about the ability of criminal gangs to kidnap and rob the newly affluent. While the very rich can hire security guards, the middle class is dependent on the police and other security forces. It is believed that the cops are paid off by criminal gangs, and the population is not happy with this.

The government is certainly inept in the way it handles money. With the collapse of oil prices in the last year, officials were slow to adapt. Now there are shortages everywhere in the government, especially in the security forces. This is having an impact on how effective the police are, and how safe the citizens are. Iraqis are fed up with this sort of thing, but slow to realize that it takes a country full of responsible people to create a responsible society.

Iraqis are confused about the sudden surge of terror bombings in western Anbar province. Long an al Qaeda stronghold, over the last two years, the locals have turned, often violently, against the terrorists. The new violence is believed to be partly political, as new parties use violence to make incumbent politicians look bad. People believe that because politics has always been pretty dirty in this part of the country.

Iraqpundit:

An elderly businessman explained why a pocket on a shirt or a jacket is always on the left. He said it is because it is over the heart. “When the pocket is full, the heart is happy,” he meant full of money. His business is doing well. In recent years, some of his shops were bombed, his employees were killed. But he continues to work hard and look to the future.

We talked about the elections, his entire family will vote for Nouri Al Maliki. He said they look forward to voting. The Iraqi parliament is expected to come up with a new election law by the 15th of this month. The politicians all say they want an open list, but nobody believes them. The man said, “It does not benefit them, so they will have an election with the old election law, meaning the closed list.”

The TV stations show politicians promising an open list. Iraqis march in the street for it. But nobody believes the candidates. As the elderly businessman put it: “Their pockets are full, and their hearts are happy.” Why would they change the system, he asked, when it serves them. “Their heavy pockets protect their hearts.” They protect their seats in parliament, too.

When you are vice president of the United States, you can control a lot of things. One thing you cannot control, as Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. discovered Friday morning here, is the weather. Mr. Biden, on a two-day diplomatic mission to Iraq – his first trip to the country since becoming vice president — had intended to get around town a bit, and had hoped to fly by helicopter to a breakfast meeting Friday morning with the top American commander here, General Ray Odierno, and the new ambassador, Christopher Hill. Instead, he was grounded by intense sandstorms — but not before he got a chance to fly.

Nowhere did the NYT remind readers that gasbag Joe Biden once proclaimed that Iraq could not survive as a single nation and must be (contrary to the will of its elected government) be partititioned into three countries.

Biden was wrong about Iraq. Obama was wrong about Iraq. Both are willing to take credit for the success of George. W. Bush.

Most Democrats, including our current prez, were wrong about Iraq. Worse, it was only a political football to them. Ralph Peters:

OUR effort in Iraq passed a major milestone today: Our troops are leaving the cities.

Advisers remain in place. Joint patrols will still occur. And our forces will wait nearby to respond to Iraqi calls for support. But the last of the bases and US-only outposts within Iraq’s urban centers will be vacated.

Terrorists have already begun testing the new security arrangements. Iraqi forces won’t always pass with flying colors.

Yet this situation seemed a pipe dream not so long ago: Iraq’s security forces, serving an elected government, assume primary responsibility for the good order of their own country.

We all recall the delighted leftist claims that Iraq had entered a hopeless civil war. Wrong. That Iraqis preferred al Qaeda to us. Wrong. That Shia militias represented the people. Wrong. And that Iran would seize control. Wrong again.

Looking back over six years of good intentions, tragic errors, generosity, arrogance, partisan vituperation, painful deaths and ultimate vindication, two things strike me: the ever-resisted lesson that human affairs are more complex than academic theories claim, and the simple truth that most human beings prefer a measure of freedom to immeasurable repression.

Now the symbolism of our troops withdrawing from Iraq’s cities is richer than Washington grasps. Mesopotamia created urban culture: Ur, Babylon, Nineveh and countless lesser-known sites are where humans first worked out ways to live together in close quarters in large numbers. The coming wave of terror will strike cities that make Baghdad seem a youngster.

The “cradle of civilization” is rising from the grave again. (more…)