Blame it on the
military but make it look like you're supporting the troops. That's been
the convenient gambit of failed emperors throughout history as they
witnessed their empires decline. Not surprisingly then, it's become the
standard rhetorical trick employed by President Bush in shirking
responsibility for the Iraq debacle of his
making.
Ignoring the fact
that we have a system of civilian control over the military, which is why
he, the elected President, is designated the commander in chief, Bush hides
behind the fiction that the officers in the field are calling the shots
when in fact he has put them in an unwinnable
situation and refuses to even consider a timetable for getting them out.
He did it again,
responding to the prospect that both houses of Congress seem in agreement
on setting guidelines for the "progress" that the President
continually proclaims is at hand. "I will strongly reject an
artificial timetable for withdrawal and/or Washington politicians trying to
tell those who wear the uniform how to do their job." This is
disingenuous in the extreme; because Bush is the Washington politician who
plotted this unnecessary war from the moment the 9/11 attack provided him
with an excuse for regime change in a country that had nothing to do with the
terrorist attack.
