Rude One vs. ISG Report

Via The Rude Pundit:

The bottom line of the report, though, seems to be that it's time to pass the buck over to the Iraqis, after a few handy steps: "Iraqis may become so sobered by the prospect of an unfolding civil war and intervention by their regional neighbors that they take the steps necessary to avert catastrophe. But at the moment, such a scenario seems implausible because the Iraqi people and their leaders have been slow to demonstrate the capacity or will to act."



Call it the "sand nigger explanation": like slaves after the Civil War were more or less just expected to get over it and become good little demi-Americans, so must the Iraqis forget about the decades of deprivations under Saddam Hussein, U.N. sanctions, and, well, fuck, war, and just get on with it. It's there in Recommendation 21, the "No Iraqi Left Behind" idea: "If the Iraqi government does not make substantial progress toward the achievement of milestones on national reconciliation, security, and governance, the United States should reduce its political, military, or economic support for the Iraqi government."



How can one completely poo-poo a report where the authors say shit like leave Iran to the United Nations and fuckin' talk to Syria, that sets a timetable of "milestones" for Iraq to achieve, that states "The United States should not make an open-ended commitment to keep large numbers of American troops deployed in Iraq," and more? Because the whole document, massive press coverage and all, carries about as much actual legislative weight as, say, the 9/11 Commission report.



Hell, in that case, we've been told that the vast majority of the recommendations have been carried out, which may be true, in the same way that chimpanzees are mostly the same genetically as human beings, 98.8% so. But, looking at all the nit-eating and shit-throwing, one might think that the remaining 1.2% is crucial.

Technorati Tags: Iraq, Rude Pundit, ISG, Iraq Study Group, White Man's Burden