EL Blog Post 2

Source Text: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070524/ap_on_go_co/us_iraq

Post 2: The Mess is on.

One must actually wonder why the statistics look so unfavorable right now. 6 years on from the events of 9/11/01, which began the entire Middle Eastern Saga, here is the scoreboard. No WMDs found, Osama not yet caught, Saddam executed, unstable situation in the Middle East, 3,400 American lives lost, many more Arab lives lost, no sustainable resolution in sight, and a approximate cost of $300 billion, no small sum for any country.

A fiasco, if one might be cynical about it.

Clearly, the Bush administration's rather gung-ho US "preemptive strike" policy seems to be costing them quite dearly, what with walking into the Middle East and overturning 2 whole governments, and never really finding what you were looking for, such as a man named Osama and the WMDs he and Saddam supposedly has on hand. It seems to be lowering many people's views of the Bush administration, so much so that even Americans themselves have lost faith, allowing the Congress to be taken over by the mainly anti-war Democrats.

This had led to much conflict between the presidential agenda and congressional agenda, which has, in its own time, led to the events that is the focus of this newspaper report. Once again, Congress has to decide on whether it should withhold funds from the troops in the Middle East or not, and this time it won't be so easy for them to decide. After all, the majority of the Democrats are not highly enamoured of Bush's plans, and that is plain.

However, it is of interest to note that it is also in their interest to support the funding of the troops, as it will make it seem as though they are in support of the troops, but just not in support of Bush's plan to resolve the war, as some of them may feel, or espouse.

Personally, I feel that this war, while originally justifiable in its nature (against terrorist aggression), has become something a lot less honorable in its latter years, and made to seem more like an attempt to find things that they have no evidence for (WMDs), and close up some loose ends (Saddam was formerly an ALLY of the US against the Soviets).

I also feel that the situation in the Middle East is not so easy to fix, as what they are up against is terrorism plus a religious philosophy which has been deeply ingrained in the psyche of those they are up against, so that they would actually be willing to die for what has been in their heads for so long, without questioning the worthwhileness of their deaths - if they die for their religion, then that alone makes them honorable.

Terrorists are like a pack of wolves, and that does not change. Just driving in with a big lumbering army is really not the smart way of doing things, it just leaves one open to the minor, but chaos-causing, slashing attacks that weaken armies, and then packs of wolves just love using. They should have never walked in like that in the first place. If they had proof, then they could walk in, without fear of such setbacks, because they would be vindicated by the proof.

But they didn't, and still don't have any, so too bad, seriously.