Big Brother John McCain learns New Speak

Life is wonderful here in the post-1984 world, what with Big Brother John McCain daily re-setting reality in his bid for the presidency. For instance, in his mind, at least, the startup date for the war in Iraq has shifted from the initial invasion in March of 2003 to that date in early 2007, when the Bush administration made the decision to begin what has since become known as the “surge”. And, as luck would have it, this relieves McCain of the responsibility of having to answer for a serious lapse in judgment, in having been a strong supporter of war against Iraq, beginning in the first few days after 9/11, and instead, allows him to question the ability of his opponent, Barack Obama, to render judgment in these situations, not because Obama opposed going to war against Iraq in the first place, but because he never bought the idea that the “surge” could help salvage anything from what is still proving to be the most disastrous foreign policy decision in the history of the world.

Granted, the surge has done its job in one respect; the level of violence in that war-torn country has decreased dramatically. But, considering the fact that the neo-cons from the Bush administration unleashed war against Iraq, and yet still cannot satisfactorily explain why, this is the least it could do for a population that has lost, depending on who is giving the numbers, anywhere from 80,000 to over 600,000 killed. Of course there are the 4000 plus casualties suffered by our armed forces, as well, to consider. And the general wreck that this needless war has made of the U. S. economy. Twelve billion or so a month to sustain our effort in Iraq can certainly take its toll. Then there is the price of gasoline, which can certainly not have been helped by this war, that has crossed thresholds once considered unthinkable, first three dollars a gallon for gasoline, then four dollars a gallon, and the corresponding rise of food prices that would be more meaningful if more of us had the money to buy enough gas to get to the supermarket in the first place.

Well, at least Senator McCain can rest easy now. No need to worry about any of this now that the surge has proved so successful. Now he can tell the world that Obama has failed his test of leadership when he opposed the surge. And that is all that really matters, huh? McCain and his supporters want to win in Iraq. That is what he has been telling everyone, let us win in Iraq. Mind you, he hasn’t explained what he means by “winning in Iraq”, and it even seems that he can no more conceptualize this than he could conceive of a plausible reason for invading to begin with.

So, can we “win in Iraq”, as McCain has suggested we must? What do we have in Iraq that even suggests a “win” there is possible? Well, first of all, we have seen a duly elected government installed in Iraq, headed by their Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki. Funny thing about this government, though. It doesn’t seem to be too awfully at ease with the Americans. Oh, sure, if Bush or any of his minions deign to show up in Baghdad, Maliki is there to show them all official favor, but it seems to me, anyway, that he is far more comfortable with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. How many times has Nouri had a little kissy-poo on the jaw for Mahmoud?

You do remember Ahmadinejad, don’t you? He’s the leader of one of the “axis of evil” over in Iran, who is seemingly intent on joining that elite club of nations that have nuclear weapons. This club currently counts as members such “stable” countries as Pakistan, whose chief scientist on their “Manhattan Project” developed a full-color brochure for other similarly “stable” nations, such as North Korea, in case they, too, wanted to “deter attacks” from unfriendlies by acquiring some weapons of mass destruction. Pakistan has also served as the “unofficial” headquarters for bin Laden and company, aka Al Qaida, ever since the aforementioned 9/11 attacks.

More to the point, though, how can we, as Americans, be assured that once our forces have left Iraq, Maliki won’t make our worst nightmare come true by allying himself with Iran, especially if Iran and Israel come to blows? Put quite simply, we can’t be sure of that. In fact, we can’t be sure of anything once our forces are gone from that region. Maliki might be able to govern for some time to come. Or he might become the victim of forces within that country that see his government as having been guilty of collusion with the Americans. In that case, another Saddam Hussein might emerge. We certainly have nothing to assure us that the Iraqis will forever be our allies, no more than there was to anything to assure the Bush administration that we would be welcomed as liberators in Iraq, walk on paths strewn with roses, and live happily ever after. Sure, that’s what they said would happen, but we know the real story, don’t we?

It is, perhaps, this more pessimistic outlook that led Senator McCain to opine that we shouldn’t have a “time table” for leaving Iraq, even though his buddy, Nouri, has asked that the Americans come up with one. Perhaps Maliki thinks that his forces are now capable of defending the Iraqi people, or perhaps he is waiting for this date so he and Mahmoud, the boy next door, can make it official, and let the world know of their love for each other. If that is the case, McCain would need the one hundred years he has conjectured it could take to settle down this nation. And knowing the history of Iraq, even one hundred years might not be enough time to transform it into the kind of nation Dick, Dubb, and the Scrubbs had in mind when they dreamed up their little war there.

Certainly the British could testify to the stubborness of the Iraqis. Their little experiment, where they tried to install a British-style constitutional monarchy in the 1930’s ended in failure quickly enough. But then again, perhaps that is because they lacked a Big Brother, and the New Speak that McCain, and his mentors, the Bushies, possess, which allows them to reassess and redefine, as often as is necessary, what constitutes “victory” in Iraq.