Wake Me Up When September Ends

Listening to all the generals and whatnot blathering about on the pundit shows have made me realize that, despite his outwardly dumb behavior and appearance, President Bush is as shrewd as ever. He responded to the post-midterm momentum for withdrawal by... escalating the war instead. And he's managed to beat the Democrats at every turn in their opposition to it. He's also now gaming the debate/dialogue about the coming months so brilliantly, it will be nigh impossible to end all of this.

Here's why the 'surge' as political strategy was always gonna be win-win for the Bush crew.

Let's say that they can make the case come September that it's showing signs of progress (which would be false signs anyway, because 'securing' an area via an indefinite occupation is NOT a long-term solution), then they will say they've earned the benefit of the doubt and that they need more time to finish the job. And let's say that come September that things are as bad or worse than ever (more likely than not), then they will use the increased violence as a reason to stay longer, so that they can finish the job.

Get it? Either way, the White House gets to demand to stay longer, thereby fulfilling its oft-stated goal (for those who actually pay attention to this shit) of dragging this out so they can dump it on the next President to end. No exit strategy, just more war.

And those 'angry' Republicans will once again coalesce to the President's whims, because having tied themselves so tightly to the war, they will not know how to free themselves. So they will say that they agree that we need to give this more time because David Petraeus of Nazareth said so. And if you disagree, you hate the troops and want us to fail and help the terrorists!!!!

The Democrats, in turn, will freak out, because they really do believe that the GOP will abandon this war soon (hence all their talks about putting 'pressure' on vulnerable Republicans). They will try some hard-hitting measures-- revoking the 2002 war authorization, etc-- and fail, thanks to Joe Lieberman and the aforementioned GOP, ultimately settling on more rhetorical resolutions expressing dissent. Why? Because their consultants will tell them that really taking action to end the war will play bad in the polls... even though reality is just the opposite.

In short? Same shit. Different month. This disaster won't end until people get REALLY pissed off. As Principal Skinner once said, 'Prove me wrong, children, prove me wrong'.

[Related: Iraq: The Battle of September Has Already Begun (Arianna Huffington)]