Peanut Gallery

The other day I came across an interesting opinion piece. Full text here.

One thing it didn't quit get right is that there is one other way for the auction to end; the "winner" must outbid the "loser" by a dollar and hope that the other side is rational enough to see that this way both sides go home to lick their wounds. In the grown-up word this is known as a compromise. Unfortunately, with the conflict in Iraq neither side will allow a compromise to expedite the ending of this vile affair.

At this point pulling out of Iraq would be disastrous for two groups of people; the people opposed to whichever force gains power in Iraq if it is indeed a violent force, and the Bush administration for losing their prize. So with the only sure losers being the ones that started this whole mess the chances of things ending cleanly are gone for good.

Also, the troop numbers from the "surge" in Iraq are now going to be reduced to pre-surge levels. The program wasn't effective according to officials in Iraq but the military claims it was; the administration gains from this ploy. By reducing the troop levels now there is effectively no nominal change in troop levels yet it looks like the administration is actually listening to reason and reducing the troops in a withdraw plan. The cynical part of me wonders if the surge was designed to never succeed at all but rather to allow a win to be claimed followed by a reduction in troops, filling both sides of the chart for voter approval.

Take your artificial win if you must Mr. President but grow up and stop throwing our soldiers into a cruel situation to die just to appease your stupidity.