Crock(er)

Ryan Crocker is trying really really hard to find the pony, without much success. He's talking about "provisional de-Baathification" (what the hell does that mean, some Shiite shared an ice cream cone with some former Baathist one time?) and trying to make a parallel between Iraq and the tumultuous gap between our Articles of Confederation and the Constitution.

It's clear what's actually happening. The assessment has been made that the political leaders won't be able to come to agreement, and that it's not even desirable if they do. So we're arming absolutely everyone to try and crate some kind of detente between the various ethnic groups. Only mutually assured destruction doesn't quite work as well as a policy between individuals. It's just going to make an inevitable civil war more deadly.

Crocker's talking about the fake agreement between Iraqi political leaders designed to save their own bacon, and this curious idea of bottom-up reconciliation, which again is arming people AGAINST a federal government, not for it.

2. What is the "bottom-up" reconciliation plan for southern and northern Iraq? Because Iraq's national political process is deadlocked, the Bush administration has tried to shift attention towards pockets of increased stability in the western al-Anbar province. This shift not only overlooks the fact that the central goal of the surge was to achieve progress in Iraq's national political process, it also ignores a deteriorating situation in the southern and northern parts of the country.

During the past six months, Iraq's south has seen escalating conflict between rival Shiite militias. In August alone, two governors of southern provinces were assassinated, militia clashes in the holy city of Karbala killed 50 people, and four top aides to the leading Shiite cleric Ayatollah Ali Sistani were murdered. These events are signs that various political groups in Iraq's Shiite ruling coalition are engaged in a deadly struggle for power. Northern Iraq is experiencing conflict between Arabs and Kurds -- much of it centered on the disputed city of Kirkuk. Will the new "bottom-up" reconciliation model address these problems?

Never mind though, because we built a couple sewers! And there's 6% economic growth! 6% of 0=0, by the way.