January 30, 2007 6:06 AM

So, 'splain to me again what we're fighting for....

Read this article, and you’ll understand why Iraq is lost

Iraq Leader and Sunni Officials in Clash on Security

Iraq’s Shiite prime minister and Sunni lawmakers hurled insults at one another during a raucous session of Parliament on Thursday, with the prime minister threatening a Sunni lawmaker with arrest and the Sunni speaker of Parliament threatening to quit. The uproar revolved around the new Baghdad security plan, but it came as the prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, is under increasing pressure to demonstrate evenhandedness. President Bush’s new strategy for Iraq hinges in large measure on the Iraqi government’s ability to rein in both Shiite and Sunni militants. In Parliament on Thursday, Mr. Maliki focused his anger on Sunni lawmakers, accusing one of being involved in sectarian kidnappings. The confrontation erupted after Mr. Maliki described the outlines of the new Baghdad security plan and pledged there would be no “safe haven” for militants. The leader of a powerful Sunni bloc, Abdul Nasir al-Janabi, provoked Mr. Maliki, saying over jeers from Shiite politicians, “We cannot trust the office of the prime minister.”….His microphone was quickly shut off, and Mr. Maliki lashed into him, essentially accusing him of being one of the outlaws he had just said would not be granted sanctuary.

I understand that Iraq’s fledgling democracy is experiencing what could only charitably be called “growing pains”. I understand that dissent from within is one of the signs of a healthy democracy. What I cannot understand is why our sons and daughters continuing dying for a government that cannot begin to even hope to unify Iraq. The Kurds in the north are a virtual independent country, and Shias and Sunnis seem bent on mutually assured destruction. Is there even an Iraq left to save? I cannot begin to answer that question, but what I do know is that our sons and daughters are being used as pawns in a game of geopolitical “chicken”, and they’re dying for…well, for no real reason at all from what I can see. Though Americans continue dying in Iraq, the political situation and the civil war the country is embroiled in seems largely unchanged. And yet The Decider © is determined to see this catastrof—k through to “victory”?

When does common sense and the desire to do the right thing by our men and women in uniform come to be factored into the Iraq equation? When do we admit that the lives of our loved ones do not deserve to be sacrificed on the altar of lies and propaganda? When do we hold Our Glorious and Benevolent Leader © accountable for the lies, the incompetence, and the mismanagement that has characterized the catastrof—k in Iraq almost since Day One of the war?

While the politicians battled in Parliament, the sectarian battle on the streets went on unabated, with 25 people killed by a suicide car bomb in a Shiite neighborhood in Baghdad.

It was the latest in a series of attacks directed at Shiites, claiming more than 200 lives in little more than a week and increasing pressure on Mr. Maliki to restrain his supporters from exacting revenge. Sunni leaders and critics of the administration’s strategy remain deeply skeptical about Mr. Maliki’s ability or desire to confront the Shiite militias, particularly the Mahdi Army of Moktada al-Sadr, one of his most important political backers.

American military officers say they have seen evidence in the past of the Maliki government using its influence with Iraq’s security forces to further a sectarian agenda, turning a blind eye to Shiite militia death squads while cracking down on Sunni insurgents.

Mr. Maliki spent much of his speech before Parliament trying to counter that image, going further than he has before by promising to stop sectarian militias from driving rivals out of their neighborhoods and to return houses to their rightful owners. It is a daunting challenge given that the map of Baghdad has been almost completely redrawn along sectarian lines over the past year, displacing hundreds of thousands of people.

“Let it be known today or tomorrow, we will start arresting anybody who took by force the house of a displaced family,” he said.

The prime minister’s claims were challenged by Mr. Janabi, who leads the Sunni-dominated Tawafiq Party.

Mr. Janabi, over jeers from the Shiite politicians in the room, said that the government should suspend executions, which he said were being used for political purposes, and called for parliamentary oversight of the new security plan to be sure Sunnis were not unfairly singled out.

And so it continues. Iraq burns while The Decider © continues to fiddle decide. While Shia kill Sunnis, and Sunnis retaliate by killing Shia, American soldiers are caught in the middle. Ever-increasing numbers of our sons and daughters will come home in boxes, while exactly nothing changes in Iraq.

Same as it ever was.

WE DESERVE BETTER. So do our sons and daughters, the ones being used as IED fodder.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on January 30, 2007 6:06 AM.

Or, you could just get a Mac and get off the merry-go-round was the previous entry in this blog.

So this is what we have to look forward to for the next 18 months? Just shoot me now.... is the next entry in this blog.

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