The broken view

"McCain's whole discourse on Iraq is just a typical rightwing Washington fantasy made up in order to get you to spend $15 billion a month on his friends in the military industrial complex and to get you to allow him to gut the US constitution and the Bill of Rights." - Juan Cole

McCain takes a soldier's view. If you can't understand it, shoot it. If it still looks disagreeable, send in a tank or a cluster bomb and silence them. The USA does not need political leaders who appear to be still acting out of post traumatic stress disorder from being to hell and back as a soldier.

The world does not need the USA profiting from the sufferering created by enforcing an inaccurate political view of the world. The World agrees, terrorism is not the answer for anybody. Engagement by the US political machine now gearing up for its "big decision" may invoke discussions to prevent more military misadventures. A country committing to the unwise acts of a failed leadership seems inevitable as a result of the collective guilt accumulated and unjustified.

Can wisdom take over, or are we stuck with the broken view, this endless cycle of creating conflict and resolving it by killing people?

McCain seems to have a handle on the "failed war on drugs" because he takes a logical view that first time offenders require treatment instead of interment.

One can see him extending that logic to apprehend the guilt vote by saying that it is only fair the USA should complete the job it started. The problem seems that the situation in Iraq is not better or more stable than before and it has magnified the threat of terrorism.

One hears Obama saying he would walk away, or Clinton saying she would nuke Iran.

It does not sound contextually geniune - if Democrats who regularly return to this blog do not object too loudly.

Does the United Nations really understand the sitution in Iraq? And if Iran is about to harm Israel they have to do so knowing that Israel's response may be far worse than the USA's inevitable long term rebuilding excercise if it engaged with Iran over nuclear arms - whether they actually exist or not has proven to be a matter that the USA holds itself beyond the usual norms of truth or reality. Never mind, they are at war. So their behavior over the past seven years is beyond question.

Barack Obama may ultimately be the Democratic candidate, but defining his position on Iraq as chicken is too powerful a political tonic for McCain to exploit. Hilary Clinton realised that and that explains her recent belicose language about the USA response to Iran's threats towards Israel.