What's HE Up To Now?

“The stakes in Iraq are too high and the consequences too grave for our security here at home to allow politics to harm the mission of our men and women in uniform,” Mr. Bush said in a statement . . . .

To harm the troops' mission, mark you, Mr. Bones! -- although no doubt the Big Party hired hand who "crafted" that utterly unpartisan sentence for her Little Brother to emit wouldn't mind if Televisionland and the electorate were to mislay the mission part of it. Let's see, what else is quoted or paraphrased from the august lips in Aunt Nitsy's account ?

Mr. Bush chided lawmakers for calling for a change in policy before hearing the views of the two men who are, as administration officials repeatedly point out, “on the ground in Iraq. (...) Congress asked for this assessment,” Mr. Bush said in the statement, “and members of Congress should withhold judgment until they have heard it.”

That seems to be it, and it sure ain't much. To review the biddin', we've got "stakes" and "consequences" and "mission" and "policy" all left floatin' around undefined by the Dynasty Brat himself. Of course anybody at all could connect those dots in a plausible way, yet what we want to know is how they are connected bratwise.

Ah, here is what we require, sir, and no need to trust fiendish MSM summatorializers!

President Bush Meets with Secretary of Defense Gates and Joint Chiefs of Staff The Vice President and I met today with Secretary of Defense Gates and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. We had a very productive discussion. We discussed our commitment to provide our military all it needs to meet the challenges of this new century. This includes a larger Army and Marine Corps. In January, I accepted Secretary Gates' recommendation to increase the overall strength of the two services by 92,000 soldiers and Marines over the next five years. This will strengthen our military and help reset our forces to respond to multiple contingencies around the world at any given moment. The effort is well underway, but there is more to do, and the Joint Chiefs are doing a terrific job monitoring the health of our all-volunteer force. We also discussed military and civilian coordination. We now have joint civilian and military teams deployed in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Horn of Africa, and the Philippines. In Iraq, we have more than doubled the number of civilian-led Provincial Reconstruction Teams this year, most of which are embedded with U.S. combat brigades. These teams are a force multiplier for our men and women in uniform, and they are essential to the "bottom up" political progress taking place in Anbar, Diyala, and other provinces across Iraq. The Civilian Reserve Corps now being developed will enlarge the pool of civilian volunteers to support and enhance our missions. The American people will soon hear an assessment of the situation on the ground in Iraq and recommendations from Ambassador Crocker and General Petraeus. This status report comes less than three months since our new strategy became fully operational and will assess what is going well, what can be improved, and what adjustments might be made in the coming months. Congress asked for this assessment, and members of Congress should withhold judgment until they have heard it. The stakes in Iraq are too high and the consequences too grave for our security here at home to allow politics to harm the mission of our men and women in uniform. It is my hope that we can put partisanship and politics behind us and commit [ourselves] to a common vision that will provide our troops what they need to succeed and secure our vital national interests in Iraq and around the world. I always leave these meetings inspired by our men and women in uniform and resolved to do everything I can to support them. The brave men and women of our Armed Forces and their families are making heroic sacrifices to secure our country. America will honor these sacrifices by ensuring that our children and grandchildren inherit a more peaceful, just, and democratic world.

Though it fall hot and steamin' straight from the horse's own e-anatomy, Mr. Bones, it remains a bit disappointing. "Stakes" and "consequences" and "mission" and "policy" are no better defined than before, plus now we've got "commitment" and "challenges" and "common vision" and "vital national interests" to wonder about as well. Our Brat-in-Chief does not much care to let his subjects in on anythin' much concrete and particular, does he? But of course that's an old song comin' from the Harvard Victory School MBA classes and we need not rehearse the HVS MBA GOP political deficiencies yet again, at least not when our BiC does diverge into specificity at least a little bit.

How about "a larger Army and Marine Corps ... to increase the overall strength of the two services by 92,000 soldiers and Marines over the next five years," for instance? That's specific, surely, if nothing else. Unfortunately, there ain't much else to it, and especially not from a gung-ho Boy-'n'-Party perspective. In 2012, there will be 92K more more IED-fodder units to deploy globally in order to make the world safe for M. Charles de Krauthammer and the editorial board of the Weekly Standard. Well suppose there will be. Take a look at the way the Krauthammer-Murdoch Griff nach der Weltmacht is goin' in 2007 and tell me with a straight face that that won't be far too little far too late in 2012, Mr. Bones! Does 92000/5 even match the general rate of population growth amongst the lesser breeds without, let alone provide adequately for unpredictable and possibly extreme "multiple contingencies around the world at any given moment"? Our Brat-in-Chief still seems to expect that the patients of Weltherrschaft are goin'ta throw roses at their neoliberators instead of the sort of thing they actually do tend to throw. Still, many of his own Party neocomrades are well-versed on all this, and we may leave it to them to attempt to correct the Yalie lad's Panglossian notions of what it costs to set up and maintain a neue Weltordnung.

More immediately, how about "military and civilian coordination ... joint civilian and military teams"? Have Dr. Rice and Neocomrade K. Hughes -- who actually have to deal directly with leeser breeds without -- actually made some slight impression upon the brain of the Brat at last, then? 'Twere nice to think so, Mr. Bones but probably mistaken, for look how the lowly chickenhawk component gets smuggled in: "These teams are a force multiplier for our men and women in uniform." In hired-hand technical mathematical arithmetic, F times C is no doubt equal to C times F, but when it comes to HVS/MBA/GOP political arithmetic, the order of factors matters: Amazin' Force (how sweet the sound!) always comes first, mere chickenhawk multipliers come in only a distant second. If one perversely wanted to evaluate the expression (Chickenhawkery times Force), one would not come up with (Force times Chickenhawkery) at all, but only with the Kosova Krusade of St. Bill Clinton and Secretary of War Albright, the former so-called "Military Humanism." Perhaps the salient asymmetry might be expressed in grammar as well as in algebra: supposing (as I do asume) that nouns outrank adjectives, what Boy and Party and Murdoch and Krauthammer have in mind is not Militärhumanismus but rather "humane militarism," or call it "militarism with a human face."

Even more specifically and concretely, how about "force multipliers" (or "chickenhawk multipliers" per contra) in the former Iraq? To edit the August Lips of our BiC only a very little, how about this, Mr. Bones?

We also discussed military and civilian coordination. We now have joint civilian and military teams deployed in Iraq, we have more than doubled the number of civilian-led Provincial Reconstruction Teams this year, most of which are embedded with U.S. combat brigades. These teams are a force multiplier for our men and women in uniform, and they are essential to the "bottom up" political progress taking place in Anbar, Diyala, and other provinces across Iraq. The Civilian Reserve Corps now being developed will enlarge the pool of civilian volunteers to support and enhance our missions.

A militant extremist economic OnePercenter from Grant's Old Party like our Brat-in-Chief even pretendin' to believe in "bottom up" as a matter of principle would be a phaenomenon totally contrary to nature, Mr. Bones, but when "bottom up" only happens way out in their Party's semiconquered boodocks somewhere, they can put up with it tactically. Plus of course what George XLIII is opportunizin' and micawberizin' about most recently, in the wake of his "David," Dr. Gen. Petrolaeus of Princeton and West Point, and possible even in the wake of his chickenhawk Proconsul R. Crockerius to some slight extent, is not "political progress" at all, it's very strictly a matter of Amazin' Force. Perhaps their nifty Bribe-a-Tribe™ scheme could be redirected to properly political ends, and obviously poor M. al-Málikí is terrorized of that possibility, but it hasn't been redirected yet, and myself I suppose it can't be and therefore won't be. Time will tell. Meanwhile the Big Management Party is not buyin' up every unattached shaykh or wannabe in al-’Anbár and Diyálá to do more than shoot at detestable operatives of takfírí invasionism rather than at equally detestable operatives of GOP invasionism. As long as the pensions are promptly paid, it's a very impar congressus. Rich though M. Bin Ládin is reputed to be, he and Dr. Zawáhirí certainly can't throw their own money at the former Iraq on any scale to match the Brat-in-Chief and his crucial military Petrolaeus (and his optional chickenhawk Crockerius) throwin' ten thousands of millions of other people's taxpayer dollars at it. Any counterbribery of the shaykhs and the wannabes to shoot at GOP invasionites first is simply out of the question.

As long as the pensions are promptly and reliably paid, that is.

And there's the fatal rub, it seems to me, Mr. Bones: Boy and Party can continue to (sorta) occupy their semiconquered Peaceful Freedumbia as long as they can pay the price of their herrliche Irakherrschung, no doubt, but how long will that be? Congress is closing in on them, with Televisionland and the electorate maybe not so very far behind. So what rabbit does their magician "David" pull out of his Ever-Victorious Surge of '07™ hat to deliver them with? Why, a proposal to buy all unattached shaykhs and wannabes in sight and pay them pensions to be tame and good forever! (That is to say, a proposal for even more expenses still.)

There's a really lovely Cloudcookland circularity to this latest HVS/MBA/GOP bozodom, really, Mr. Bones: if the Party perps were once quite sure they could hang around the former Iraq forever, wouldn't that be just what they should do to make sure they could hang around forever?

Such a lovely neo-narcissistic bubble it is, after all, so why you and I should feel specially called upon to puncture it, Mr. Bones. Sit back and enjoy the show, sir, and please don't panic as if the OnePercenter black hats could ever actually triumph by blowin' clever self-referntial bubbles like that one. Admire their last-ditch Bribe-a-Tribe™ bubble of Micawberism while it lasts, sir, and treasure it up to tell your grandchildren about it.