UNCLEAR ON THE CONCEPT. I guess that I'm a little bit unclear on the administration's political strategy for maintaining a U.S. presence in Iraq. The Korea nonsense and this latest from Ryan Crocker seem to be part of a campaign to convince someone that the United States ought to stay in Iraq for twenty or thirty years. What I don't understand is the logic behind this campaign; even if you want to keep the troops there, wouldn't it be better to say that you envisioned a point in the fairly near future at which U.S. troops could be withdrawn? While a Democratic presidential victory in 2008 won't necessarily result in a complete and immediate withdrawal, it certainly won't help the vision of permanent U.S. imperium on the Tigris. Moreover, there's virtually no short-term political gain to be had from advocating a policy that will incur significant costs for the next forty years. I can't imagine that anyone now believes that arguing for a long-term presence in Iraq will actually help the Republican candidate for president; whatever one can say about the administration, it continues to have a fair grasp on domestic PR. I'd almost be inclined to say that the administration is giving a true assessment of how it sees the world, but that seems so far fetched...
--Robert Farley
