Noon Today Marks a Historic Milestone

At noon there will be less than 2 years left in the Bush administration. Then you just add 50 years to recover and we're done.

Of course that leaves plenty of time for one last fiasco in Iran, but when it comes to Iraq, President Bush seems to be limping to the finish line of his time in office. He seems to want his legacy to be that he was an idiot but - by God - he was a stubborn idiot as well.

Lately his plans have sounded more and more deranged. For example, now after we win in Iraq, he wants to send our troops back to Vietnam to finish the job there, too. And no timetables.

The cynics among us see this entire exercise - this New Way Backward - as a complete hoax. It's just more ways to frame the issue and stall as we disguise our plan to stay in Iraq till the last drop of oil. That would certainly dovetail with the 30 Year contracts our oil companies are in the process of obtaining there.

True cynics might point out that the reason Cheney held those secret energy meetings with the captains of the oil industry, was not merely to write our energy policy, such as it is. No, the real reason was to divide up Iraq. Of course, this was before 9/11 happened, the excuse we needed to go to Iraq. Gee, Cheney almost sensed that coming, didn't he?

At any rate, the Iraq plans were discussed from Moment One of this administration and that's according to the highest levels of Bush's own people. That's why the White House fought against revealing what went on at the meetings. They even fought all the way to the Supreme Court. You remember, don't you? Cheney went hunting with Scalia, but both insisted there was no conflict of interest. To be fair, going hunting with Cheney back then did not trigger the same implied threat as it does today.

It's also a huge football weekend, which is why I'm going to break a rule here and let in a dreaded sports analogy. At least it's about the general subjects of winning and losing without tying the Iraq War to a specific play - although the whole thing is starting to remind me of the Oakland Raiders season. No, the sports analogy just involves a team's chances when they're on the bubble, and I think we can agree that victory in Iraq is far less likely than being on a bubble, even if it's a bubble of crude oil.

At any rate, towards the end of the season, some teams can make the playoffs by winning out on their own, or by getting help. When they can win on their own, the announcers always say they control their own destiny. This is a tribute to the team and the coach as it means they've succeeded in keeping things in their own hands.

The problem with Iraq - if you believe the sincerity of the plan, which I don't - is that we are currently waiting around for the Iraqi forces to get it together. In short, we've needed help. We've needed a big winning streak from the Oakland Raiders.

It is one thing for an American soldier to be killed because of a poor decision by our Commander-In-Chief. Hell, we're almost used to that. However, we are losing young Americans mainly because of the poor quality of the Iraqi leadership. This is a huge strategic blunder, and a stinging indictment of the quality of our "coach". A good leader does not put our troops into a situation like this. If - as in this case - the leader lied to the American People in order to do that, it is an impeachable offense, and that football coach should be fired. Why? Partly because he's placed us in a weak position where we no longer control our own destiny. That's enough of a defeat.

All this brings us back to high noon today. At that point we will officially have less than two more years with this mediocre loser. Two more seasons, and then we will begin the rebuilding process. Then maybe we can hope to get back to being a perennial powerhouse - a fan favorite - with a winning program again.