Bush on Iraq

Jim Leher interviewed Bush tonight and most of it was more of the same, but I haven't heard him this clear on what happens if Iraq in his terms "fails":

"20 years from now it's conceivable the world will see a Middle East that's got radial Shia and radical Sunnis competing against each other for power. Which will cause people to have to choose up sides in the Middle East. Supporting ideologies that are the exact opposite of what we believe.

Secondly it is likely if that scenario were to develop that Middle Eastern oil would fall in the hands of radicals which they could then use to blackmail western governments.

Thirdly when you throw a nuclear weapons race in the midst of this you've got a chance for radicals to use weapons of mass destruction in a form that would cause huge devestation.

In other words there would be a cauldron of radicalism and extremism that a future generation would have to deal with. Now is the time to succeed in Iraq. That's why in my State of the Union Address and why in other speeches I have and will spend time talking about the need to defeat this ideology with a ideology that is hopeful. An ideology of hate with an ideology of hope. And that would be democracy.

And so Iraq must be viewed in a context larger than just that single battlefield. It must be viewed in context of how Iran reacts. it must be viewed in the context of democracies like Lebanon and the Palestinian terrirtories. All these young democracies by the way are being attacked by the same type of extremists that are attacking democracy in Iraq."

Wow, hard not to object to every single thing there. So radical Shia and radical Sunnies are competing against each other and we should be in the middle of this because? The answer is oil. So it really all is about oil. And what are we doing to prevent this? Getting ourselves less dependent on middle eastern oil? No we're doing nothing about that, we're not even being asked to drive less. No we're going to fight future blackmail with present violence, because that will bring about hope. And it seems that all the countries in the Middle East are fighting the same battle. It's not like the Palestinian issues have anything to do with Israel and he didn't mention anything he's doing to help resolve that mess.

The real problem in Iraq is that the current Iraq government isn't a unity government, it's a sectarian one, and that's why people are fighting. The Saddam hanging made it clear if you were blind before. And Bush's plan doesn't even address this.

Here's a much more reasoned article: Bush lying again about Iraq.