At a cost of how many dollars, and how many lives, and how many maimings, per job?
Strictly in terms of dollars, military spending is one of the least efficient ways to create jobs. A highway spending bill (for example) does much better at turning dollars into jobs than defense spending generally does. And in this instance, we also have the very real human cost. American soldiers are coming home without their full complement of limbs, and of course some are coming home without the breath of life in them. I think we can create jobs some other way.
I don’t know what the protesters want, since I don’t know any of them. I know what I want. Like Early Out, I’d like GWB to come clean about the recent past that got us into this mess. I’d like to see the war become less of a piggybank for Halliburton and Bechtel, and have contracts instead going directly to Iraqis wherever possible, instead of them being the sub-sub-sub-subcontractors. I’d like to see the Chalabi-and-other-exiles-dominated Iraqi “Governing” Council dispensed with, in favor of representatives of the “representative local governments” that Bush says Iraqis now have. I’d like to see us find an honorable way out of a land where American troops have to live behind massive fortifications, which is an indication that we really can’t do much good there.
I’d like to see some suggestions, some models from the Bush administration of just what sort of governmental structure might have a prayer of working in Iraq, because I don’t think they know, themselves. I’d like to see them admit that this war has actually been counterproductive in the war on terrorism, in that Iraq hadn’t been somewhere terrorists could operate, but it is now. And as I’ve pointed out in another thread, it doesn’t seem to be impeding their ability to operate elsewhere. I’d like to see them publicly thank their lucky stars that there have been no WMDs to speak of in Iraq, for if there had actually been WMDs there, they likely would be in the hands of terrorists by now, on account of Rumsfeld’s brilliant war plan that didn’t allow for enough troops to guard WMD sites, once the Wall of Steel had chased Saddam’s troops away, then moved on up the road.
I’d like to see the Bushies admit that there may be no good path to a united, democratic Iraq; that partition or some other solution (such as letting the Saudis annex Iraq, if they’re willing) might be the only answer. But ‘Iraq’ isn’t a real nation; it’s Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds living between some lines drawn by Europeans shortly after WWI. I’d like to see somebody in the Admin admit that, and publicly wrestle with its consequences.
There’s more, but that’ll have to do for now.