XPost: soc.culture.french, uk.politics.misc, alt.politics   
   XPost: soc.culture.europe   
   From: bungle@bunghole.com   
      
   "Bill Willis"  wrote in message   
   news:3F6BB746.7A2F@bcpl.net...   
      
      
      
   When an intelligent writer, and Friedman *is* an intelligent writer, lowers   
   himself to brute simplification, resorts to deliberate misinterpretation of   
   events, delivers something approaching a mirror-image of reality, and   
   finally produces an article designed to appeal to precisely the sort of   
   mentality that he's spent a lifetime of intellectual effort trying to   
   escape--I mean the superficial atavistic stupidity of the soundbite-TV   
   generation--you have to wonder if he's become lazy, racist, or if he's just   
   stirring shit.   
      
   Consider the enormous efforts the US made to rouse the world into   
   co-operation to fight the first Gulf War.  The money spent, the diplomacy   
   into the small hours, the deals struck, the quantities of men and machinery   
   mobilised and lifted half way round the world, the allies reassured and   
   potential nay-sayers pacified.  To liberate Kuwait, the administration even   
   managed to get China on-side, got Japan to pay for most of the war, arranged   
   for a French aircraft carrier to stand off the coast of Iraq, settled the   
   whole thing with Russia and justifiably congratulated themselves on seeing   
   Germans, Indians, Swiss, British and the rest of the technicolor brigade   
   mopping up and ensuring security within a matter of weeks.   
      
   Now, for some reason, the US finds itself unable to get a government going   
   in Iraq.  And Friedman is blaming the French.  The contrast is odd.  The   
   first Gulf War was a shining example of how, if you make an effort, things   
   can go well.  Iraq shows that if you can't be bothered, you'll end up   
   looking stupid.   
      
   Bush's administration simply doesn't have the political will to transfer   
   power to the Iraqis.  Palast puts it bluntly but correctly: "Bush's oil   
   patch buddies can't complete the sell-off of Iraq's oil fields under an   
   elected Iraqi government".  If Bush put even a fraction of the political   
   capital into bringing the factions together as was mustered to kick Iraq out   
   of Kuwait, the Shi'ites and the Sunni would be working together as   
   representatives of ordinary Iraqis to get the lights back on and the oil   
   flowing.  They would be co-operating in a bad-tempered way, there would be   
   problems, there would even be areas of Iraq out of reach of their control,   
   but a government there would be.   
      
   Iraq has become a cash sink.  A billion dollars a week is going who knows   
   where.  People with better knowledge than me of the intricacies of   
   electioneering suggest the roots lie in Bush's attempts to win the next   
   election; I wouldn't dare begin fathoming the reasons. But if nothing else,   
   this futile waste of money should offend the Christian sensibilities of the   
   Bush administration.   
      
   People look up to America as a country young enough to believe that pretty   
   much anything good is possible.  The European style of weary compromise   
   needs that American spirit as a counterbalance.  But accusing the French of   
   causing Bush's problems isn't a youthfully optimistic step forward towards a   
   brighter future.  It's the old immaturity, racism and superficiality of the   
   playground.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)