Friday, February 28, 2003
White powder and desperation
As the rush of news picks up ever greater velocity, and the tide appears to be turning in directions that the Bushies can’t possibly be happy with, out of left field comes an oldie but a goodie. This time, the powder was sent to Republicans—House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and three freshman Senators (Norm Coleman, Saxby Chambliss, and Lamar Alexander). Preliminary testing has produced negative results.
According to the CNN report, the four envelopes were all postmarked here in Seattle. But for some reason, I keep thinking that a more likely site of origination might be, oh, say, Crawford, Texas. Not that I’m suggesting that Karl Rove and Dick Cheney are flailing about in search of a “crisis” to somehow elicit flag-waving support for their faltering program. No one would suggest that such cynical manipulation could be carried out by this administration, would they?
Speaking of desperation, how ‘bout that Paul Wolfowitz? After this week’s estimate of future post-war troop needs (several hundred thousand) by Army General Eric K. Shinseki, Wolfowitz testified before a House Budget subcommittee. He pooh-poohed the general’s estimates, though (despite numerous requests by committee members) he didn’t supply the Pentagon’s troop estimates or dollar figures. However, Wolfowitz *did* offer some “reasoning” to explain why his estimates might be lower than General Shinseki’s. According to Eric Schmitt’s article in the NYTimes:
In his testimony, Mr. Wolfowitz ticked off several reasons why he believed a much smaller coalition peacekeeping force than General Shinseki envisioned would be sufficient to police and rebuild postwar Iraq.
He said there was no history of ethnic strife in Iraq, as there was in Bosnia or Kosovo. He said Iraqi civilians would welcome an American-led liberation force that “stayed as long as necessary but left as soon as possible,” but would oppose a long-term occupation force. And he said that nations that oppose war with Iraq would likely sign up to help rebuild it.
Say what??? No ethnic strife? Does Mr. Wolfowitz not recognize the term Kurds? Is he unaware of the long-running clash between the Shi’ite and Sunni concepts of Islam?
It has long been obvious that Paul Wolfowitz envisions some sort of idealized world that bears little semblance to the one inhabited by his six billion fellow human beings. But it really wasn’t this clear until the Dubya dreamworld started collapsing out from under him.
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Posted by N in Seattle on 02/28 at 12:09 PM
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