Monday
Guerrillas and Lying Monkeys
It is well into July and our troops continue to die in Iraq. In what has clearly become an organized guerrilla insurgency, there are well planned attacks by lone gunmen, drive by attacks by cars with rocket launchers, and whole groups engaging U.S. forces in full blown firefights. Yet in the face of this seemingly irrefutable evidence that the Iraqi people are less than joyous at our presence, Donald Rumsfeld looks us in the eye and poo-poos the notion that there's-a-trouble brewing in River City.
Rumsfeld, known for his love of and need for verbal precision, was read a dictionary definition of guerrilla warfare by a reporter last Friday. The definition ended with "an organized, armed insurgency by an indigenous people against an occupying force." Rumsfeld scoffed at the notion that any such thing were happening in Iraq, and said that clearly the reporter misunderstood the situation there.
I only mention this because as I sit here reading page 3a of the July 7 Journal News (my local Gannett rag), I find an ongoing Roll of Honor, today paying homage to four brave servicemen killed since Memorial Day. And not more than two inches to the left is a sidebar that notes:
RESPONSIBILITY CLAIMED "A group calling itself Wakefulness and Holy War claims responsibility for attacks on U.S. troop in Falluja. "We are carrying out operations against the American occupation here in Falluja and other Iraqi cities," said the statement, released on Iran financed al-Alam TV in Baghdad."
I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm getting damn tired of this administration looking me in the eye and lying to me. What we are trying to do in Iraq is no less misguided than the British, French and American efforts to impose a Western style of order in the Middle East throughout much of the Twentieth century. Learn from history? Nah, guess not. And so the Journal News tells me that today it was Army Pvt. Shawn Pahnke, Army Spc. Jose Amancio, Army Military Police Staff Sgt. Brett Petriken and Army Staff Sgt. Andrew R. Pokorny that paid the price for our foolishness.
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It is well into July and our troops continue to die in Iraq. In what has clearly become an organized guerrilla insurgency, there are well planned attacks by lone gunmen, drive by attacks by cars with rocket launchers, and whole groups engaging U.S. forces in full blown firefights. Yet in the face of this seemingly irrefutable evidence that the Iraqi people are less than joyous at our presence, Donald Rumsfeld looks us in the eye and poo-poos the notion that there's-a-trouble brewing in River City.
Rumsfeld, known for his love of and need for verbal precision, was read a dictionary definition of guerrilla warfare by a reporter last Friday. The definition ended with "an organized, armed insurgency by an indigenous people against an occupying force." Rumsfeld scoffed at the notion that any such thing were happening in Iraq, and said that clearly the reporter misunderstood the situation there.
I only mention this because as I sit here reading page 3a of the July 7 Journal News (my local Gannett rag), I find an ongoing Roll of Honor, today paying homage to four brave servicemen killed since Memorial Day. And not more than two inches to the left is a sidebar that notes:
RESPONSIBILITY CLAIMED "A group calling itself Wakefulness and Holy War claims responsibility for attacks on U.S. troop in Falluja. "We are carrying out operations against the American occupation here in Falluja and other Iraqi cities," said the statement, released on Iran financed al-Alam TV in Baghdad."
I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm getting damn tired of this administration looking me in the eye and lying to me. What we are trying to do in Iraq is no less misguided than the British, French and American efforts to impose a Western style of order in the Middle East throughout much of the Twentieth century. Learn from history? Nah, guess not. And so the Journal News tells me that today it was Army Pvt. Shawn Pahnke, Army Spc. Jose Amancio, Army Military Police Staff Sgt. Brett Petriken and Army Staff Sgt. Andrew R. Pokorny that paid the price for our foolishness.
