The Iraq Study Group Report

The Iraq Study Group's report is finally out, and it tells the nation what a good deal of us already knew - that the situation in Iraq is "grave and deteriorating,” and it gives 79 recommendations, including pulling back all U.S. combat troops over the next fifteen months, direct talks with Syria and Iran to stabilize the anarchic state of affairs in Iraq, and letting the government in Baghdad know the the United States would reduce its support for it unless it makes "substantial progress” on Sunni-Shi'a-Kurdish reconciliation and security in the immediate future.

Study group co-chairmen James Baker and Lee Hamilton hoped that the White House would accept all of 79 of the recommendations, and not just pick a few out of the report. Well, they're in luck: George W. Bush has gone ahead and rejected most of it. So, uh, what was the purpose of having the damn study group if Dub the Shrub wasn't going to listen to them anyway?

Bush is convinced that he can still set up some kind of democratic utopia in Iraq - so much, in fact, the White House is convinced that the report from the Iraq Study Group can be read as something other than a repudiation of its Iraq policy, even though they're, uh, not really paying it any heed. So there you have it: The White House is a Carrollian Wonderland where everything is the opposite of itself and everyone is living backwards.

Remember what the dormouse said: Feed your ego, baby! :-O