Disgusting!

“The Bush/Malaki Deal”

It seems there is no end to the dirty-dealing, despicable, diabolical and disastrous dealings of the Bush administration. Their must recent end-run around Congress establishes the dangerous precedent of a large U.S. force in Iraq for decades to come. This was the strategy of Bush and Cheney in the first place. They plotted to oust Saddam, take over the Iraqi oil fields to pay for their immoral war, and establish permanent bases for possible strikes in Iran, China and North Korea. These bases will most likely be used for re-fighting the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan, battles we are losing since Bush chose to attack Rumsfeld’s “better targets” in Iraq in 2003.

What truly amazes this writer is that the story has all but disappeared from the media, replaced by the buzz about a potential peace agreement between Israel and Palestine. Without the involvement of Hamas and militant Israeli groups there will never be a lasting peace in the Middle East, and all the participants at Annapolis know it.
Why is it that we never learn the lessons of history, and are therefore always repeating them? We still have thousands of troops in Korea, almost a half century since that war ended.

When I was a child growing up in New York the police caught a very clever bank robber named Willie Sutton. When questioned about why he used his amazing talents to rob banks, Mr. Sutton replied, “that’s where the money is.” Iraq is “where the money is”, and the Bush administration has no plans to lose control of the billions of barrels of oil buried beneath the Iraqi desert. The Bush/ Malaki deal for “a lasting friendship” between the U.S. and Iraq is simply a way for Bush to keep on supporting the Shia majority in Iraq without holding them accountable for anything. It is at best cowardly and at worst another deep stain on America’s respect and dignity around the world.

I can only hope the next President will invalidate this agreement when he or she takes office in January of 2009.



By:

Henry A. Lowenstein