4-07-08, 9:44 am
Imagine, if you will, that it is 2014. President John McCain, soon after taking office, ended up heightening tensions with Iran and Russia beyond anything ex-President George W. Bush ever contemplated. Putin put together a 'coalition of the willing,' including Iran, Syria, North Korea and a few other friendly states, and ended up being able to invade and occupy the United States. (Remember, we are only imagining.)
Putin has deposed McCain and has installed his old pal who once 'looked into his eyes and saw his soul,' as his puppet prime minister of the newly 'liberated' United States of America. The slobbering Bush has yielded to his every whim, happy to be back in 'power,' and is now in the process of fighting 'insurgents' belonging to a large, well-armed militia led by former Admiral William Fallon. Fallon is angry that Bush has sold-out America, and an 'election' is set to take place in a few months. Bush and Putin know very well that a large proportion of the American population are loyal to Fallon, and Bush doesn't stand a chance in hell of winning a 'full and fair' election.
Bush, at the insistence of Putin's second-in-command, President Medvedev, breaks a months-long truce and sends in his new Federal Brigades into territory controlled by Fallon's nationalist militia with the intent of weakening resistance and killing off some of the voters of the opposition party before the upcoming ballot. Comrade Bush is so confident in his superiority that he plans and 'leads' the assault himself. Fallon's militia proceeds to wipe the battlefield with Bush's larger, better-equipped force, causing Bush to immediately yell for help from Putin's air force, which rushes to his rescue, blowing up everything in sight.
Many of the men in Bush's army refuse to fight Fallon's militia, including dozens of officers, and over a thousand of them actually desert and start fighting alongside the militia, whom they consider to be patriots of the real America. Most of them are only in the army so their families don't starve, anyway. Fallon, in hopes of keeping his countrymen, on both sides, from being slaughtered, sends emissaries to Cuba to negotiate a cease-fire with members of Bush's parliament who are saner than he is, and are just trying to hold out long enough for the occupiers to leave. The arrangements are made, and Bush's pitiful attempt at playing general ends in the same way all his other endeavors have - with him going home with his tail tucked, then strutting before his waiting propagandist press corps and declaring victory.
That, in a nutshell, is exactly what happened in Iraq when Prime Minister al-Maliki decided to take Basra from Moqtada al-Sadr's militia after a little visit from Dick Cheney. Sadr is, for good or bad, Iraq's Fallon. He believes that the current government is the puppet of the United States occupiers, and he wants them to leave so that the people of Iraq can get about the task of rebuilding their decimated country. He and his large following, along with a majority of Iraqis not serving in his militia, see themselves as patriots. Even many of those serving in Maliki's army believe that, as shown by the large numbers who surrendered, changed sides, or flatly refused to kill their own countrymen.
That is the whole problem with Bush's grand plan for Iraq's glorious new 'democracy.' The people he wants in power cannot hold power by democratic means. So Cheney goes over and tells Maliki that the way to win the elections is to kill the voters who vote the wrong way. But Maliki's army and police force is also filled with many voters who will vote the wrong way, and have no will to kill their brothers just so the puppet politicians can remain in power. And all the politicians are not puppets, either. They want no more to do with Maliki or his handlers, so they go to Iran to meet with Sadr's people to arrange a cease-fire behind Maliki's back so that the streets don't keep flowing with Iraqi blood. It works - for now.
I have no idea if al-Sadr's people will do a better job of running the country than al-Maliki. But one thing is certain: they couldn't do a hell of a lot worse. Democracy at gunpoint is no democracy at all. And if George W. Bush meant a word of the rhetoric he spews at every televised moment about wanting real democracy in Iraq, he wouldn't send Dick Cheney to whisper voter genocide in the ear of his puppet president.
