Informant38

Harry Reid's on CSPAN saying in the most sanctimonious tones that the American people demand that the Congress vote on whether or not to support the escalation of the war in Iraq. Or something like that.
All the trauma and damage of the war is brought out to justify, not leaving, not withdrawing, not hearings and impeachment for lying to the public, but a debate.
And the Republicans are engaging him on whether or not he "supports" the troops.
He insists he does and insists that the war not be escalated, he's making a stand. Arguing gravely for a debate about whether to escalate the war or not. He and his brave cohort have to fight the opposition for the right to debate whether or not to escalate the American troop presence in Iraq. If they win, the debate will take place. If they win that debate, Bush's plan, or "Bush's" plan, or "Bush's" "plan" to throw another 25,000 or so bodies at whatever that is over there, will be rejected.
And things will remain just like they are, just like they were before the election in November, going on four months ago. Bad and getting worse every day.
Reid sounds so damnably sincere I could smack him.
He's talking about diversionary tactics. He sounds like a not-particularly professional junior mortician practicing his solemn shtick on some family with no connections and not enough money to hire a better one.
Something about additional troops, something about adding to the problem.
He probably looks like a valiant principled fellow, while he advocates for keeping the Iraq war right where it is.
Americans want the war over and done, regardless, they want the troops out and the fighting stopped. And the public relations masters who've run this show all along have created a sit-com where the steady denial of the public's expressed will is transformed into the actions of their champions.
It's true that they don't want Bush's "surge", but it's a lie that that's all they want.
Even the not-so-sharp among us can see that maintaining whatever's happening in Iraq may have a naturally-occurring end-point, that whatever it is the scammers and jammers have had in mind may be accomplished. Say Iran, or Syria, like the way the public's attention was jerked from Osama bin Laden to Saddam Hussein so seamlessly.

Flags are coming down all over the place - where I used to see them in yards all around town, now they're rare again, stores that had them in the window don't - and the big flags are gone from the walls inside, like the one that used to be pinned above the safe in Long's downtown.