Sigh.
That’s the sound of a global sigh of relief, mind you, now that El Presidente has decreed that the U.S. will begin expediting the transition to Iraqi “self-rule”. Apparently, the Iraqi people have been expressing interest in becoming “more involved in the governance of their country,” according to President Bush in yesterday’s remarks on the subject of the post-war transition of power.
Well, with that in mind, it’s nice to know the United States has been victorious in the cliched “battle of hearts and minds” that Rumsfeld et al kept championing throughout the spring and summer. Just check out these editorial cartoons from the Arab press as collected by Al-Jazeera, the noted television news mouthpiece of the Arab world. The caption for the strip above, incidentally, is as follows: “You see! Democracy is good. Isn’t it?”
Why, there’s hardly any anti-American sentiment in sight.
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3 replies on “Breaking hearts and losing minds”
I agree: the news couldn’t be better. The US is going to hightail it out of an Iraq destroyed both by American bombs and sanctions (not to mention a vile dictator, originally on the US payroll), leaving it, not unlike Afghanistan, to the tender mercies of whatever group or groups are able to consolidate power within the next year. An alienated world community will not lift a finger to help, as they’d much rather watch an arrogant, resented hyperpower fall on its face than to put their underpowered troops in harm’s way. The dysfunctional post-Saddam state will be a item A on the bills of particulars issued by anti-American thought leaders worldwide for years.
And the best part is that we’ll get to have parades and “Mission Accomplished” banners just in time for the 2004 election. The White House will presumably lift the ban on press coverage of soldiers returning to be buried in ticker tape rather than cold earth. And opponents of the administration will be in the awkward position of arguing against bringing the troops home.
Sigh. I sure am relieved.
Your Al-Jazeera attribution is wrong. AlJazeerah.info is not related to Al-Jazeera TV, whose website is http://english.aljazeera.net
dammit, i’ve been suckered/had/dummied. well, partially, at least, in terms of attribution, like you say.
not unlike the kind of chumps who click on this link or this link or even this link.
ok, poor example.