A Regrettable Threshold

Well, it happened. As of yesterday, the number of U.S. military deaths in Iraq since major combat "officially" ended on May 1. has reached 140 - two more than the number of servicemen killed during major combat in March and April. Dub the Shrub continues to speak in patriotic platitudes and of fuzzy fantasies about Iraq becoming a democratic, stable, peaceful nation - a democratic, stable, peaceful nation that will just happen to sell most of its oil at bargain prices to us - and how we should "stay the course," even in the face of global skepticism and a growing sense of doom here at home.

On September 12, 2001, the world was beset with chaos from the previous day's events. Bush's war on terror has only exacerbated the chaos. Afghanistan is still in disorder, with the national government in control of only Kabul and its immediate vicinity and warlords and renegade Taliban in control of everything else. In Iraq, terrorists and Saddam loyalists, who had no ties of any kind when Saddam was still in power, are beginning to join forces, as evidenced by last week's attack of a United Nations compound in Baghdad. We don't have enough money and resources to reconstruct Iraq, or something like it, by ourselves, but the Dubyanistas, fearful of sharing Iraqi oil, are refusing calls for seeking help from the U.N. Bush says we can do it all, do it alone, and do it right. He's lying on all three counts.

Molly Ivins recently wrote that if you type in "lies" and "George W. Bush" on Google, you get a quarter of a million results. Actually, the number is about 202,000, but Ms. Ivins is close enough. I'll come right out and say it: George W. Bush lies. And with my site included, you'll get 202,001 results on Google.