Dig Two Holes...Part II

Looks like Ramadi is back in insurgent hands--that's what the Guardian says, which also notes that five more Marines were killed by a bomb yesterday (according to the same article, a "sailor" was also shot dead):

Insurgents have taken over much of the Iraqi city of Ramadi and used it to launch attacks against US forces while terrorising the population with public beheadings.
A huge bomb killed five American marines yesterday and showered body parts on to rooftops, fuelling suspicion that armour-piercing technology is being developed and tested in Ramadi.

US troops recovered the remains and withdrew to their base outside the Arab Sunni stronghold, leaving masked gunmen to erect checkpoints and carry out what residents said was the latest of many executions.

A man described as an Egyptian spy was beheaded and his body dumped on a busy shopping street. Warned by the killers to leave it for five days, shoppers pretended not to notice the figure in the brown robe, its head resting on its back.

Four days ago two suspected Shia militiamen were beheaded in the marketplace in full view of traders, said a senior police officer who asked not to be identified.

Team Bush will do their utmost to spin this story as "civilization versus savagery;" however, the "savagery" is the direct byproduct of "civilization's" idiotic attempt to literally shoot and bomb the country to "freedom" (whatever THAT'S supposed to mean, considering that until 1990, the US was none too upset with Saddam Hussein). And the public, I think, is getting sick and tired of the whole operation--Bush's poll numbers are falling like flour out of a chute.

I think people are just getting sick and tired of it all--it's not like there's any sort of general knowledge of Iraq itself, apart from a vague understanding that it's "over there" somewhere (and/or that "feriners" or "A-rabs" live there and/or the soldiers are fighting for "freedom" although as to the latter, "freedom" isn't exactly well defined). The dollar costs of war might not have sunk in yet, but it's getting harder and harder to find regions of this country that haven't had military funerals or soldiers returning shattered either in mind or body.

And Team Bush STILL, as plenty have noted recently, hasn't provided a decent explanation for why we invaded in the first place. WMD's weren't there--the official explanation of "well, we all THOUGHT they were there" has more holes in it than a sieve, "Spreading Democracy" at gunpoint is simply foolish, and while Saddam is no longer killing or brutalizing people, it's not as if people are no longer being brutalized or killed. Add in the fact that OUR men and women are likewise paying a horrible price, and that makes for a losing formula.

Finally, there's no way out for Team Bush. He can stall and try to run out the clock until 2009 or admit defeat and bring the troops home. At this point even Mr. Freedom Fries himself wants a timetable for withdrawing the troops. And there's no reason NOT to do this if we keep seeing situations like Tal Afar or Ramadi--it's almost as if the military is being forced to chase its tail.

Bush looks like the kind of person who likes watching a dog chase its tail...it'd be nice if he realized that the military is a bit more important than a pet.