The Iraq war in a new light
WASHINGTON — OK, now they’re just making stuff up. George W. Bush went on television Sunday and claimed that on Iraq war policy, “We’ve never been ’stay the course’ ” — as if no record survived of all the times he has used those very words. Maybe he was trying to outdo Dick Cheney, who went on the radio last week and pronounced that the beleaguered Iraqi government is doing “remarkably well.”
Cheney’s sense of humor must be tremendously subtle. I can only assume that “remarkably well” was his version of the old joke about the man who falls off a 20-story building. As he passes the 10th floor, someone leans out a window and asks him how he’s doing. “So far, so good!”
I’m fairly sure that the president and the vice president of the United States haven’t completely lost touch with reality. I can’t believe that Bush has forgotten making “stay the course” a Republican midterm election mantra, the counterpoint to the “cut and run” label he is trying to hang on the Democrats. And someone must have summoned the courage to tell Cheney that more than 85 American troops have been killed in Iraq so far in October, making it the deadliest month for U.S. forces in a year.
If Bush and Cheney were being sincere, then they’re lying to themselves; if not, they’re lying to the rest of us. My money is on the latter. [more]