Why Oh Why Are We Ruled by These Liars? (George W. Bush Smirks Edition)
Kevin Drum's shrillness level exceeds aleph-null:
The Washington Monthly: "George Bush's rhetorical stance is that democracy is on the march and 138,000 troops are more than enough to get the job done in Iraq. He knows perfectly well this isn't true, but in public he just smirks and says that he'd be happy to send more troops over if any of his generals asked for them.... George Bush... [is] one of the shrewdest politicians to inhabit the Oval Office in a long time, but he doesn't sound like he's being shrewd. He sounds like he really believes that our current troop strength is perfectly adequate.
So what's the answer? As Juan Cole says, 'Sometimes You are Just Screwed.' Bush knows near term success is impossible with current troops levels, just as he knows that his economic policies are unsustainable as well. In both cases, he seems to be hoping only that he can avoid disaster during the next three years and then hand off both problems to his successor in 2009 while he retires to the ranch. Politics doesn't get much more cynical than that.
