MISS LYNX: One reason for the silence [1] is the serial capitulations the US is making. On elections, on time lines, even on their beloved Sons of Iraq program. All of which suggest they have fallen behind the Maliki makeover program into the new Saddam. It's a tough thing to come to terms with, after all the wasted energy over "democracy" and the COIN "enlightenment" path toward it. DR. CARTOONOCLASTES: Or possibly ... that Bush, turning the whole idea of "conditional engagement" on its head, is telling Maliki et al that they should take advantage of their friend Bush's last months in power let him help them secure their grip on power, if they will just please sign something. In other words, that the Americans aren't just capitulating but have actually joined the parade in a proactive way... MISS LYNX: I think thats right, that the US is on board with Maliki's radical new make over. I meant that those doing the capitulating were those democracy and COIN folks towing the line - for what now appears to be at best, token propaganda. |
Perhaps the Silly Season has finally infected even me, Mr. Bones, but there seems to be less nongoofiness in about 180 words there than in six months of regular output from the angelic agitprop mills of Lynx, Badger, Cartoonoclastes LLC. There is not any more evidence for today’s baloney than usual -- not any evidence at all, really -- but the huntin’ - shootin’ - conspiratorializin’ gentry have deviated into plausibility for once, if not into Sense pure and simple.
Naturally that means they must have stumbled onto turf previously taken possession of by thee and me, sir. And so they have, for what does this alleged proäctivity amount to but a specific exemplification of our own fundamental Crawfordological speculation that Team Aggression, for a long time now, has been prepared to accept pretty well anythin’ whatever in the former Iraq as long as it can be maketed to Televisionland and the electorate as Success and Victory for Boy and Party and Ideology. The positive character of the bushogenic quagmire, the weal or woe of thirty million spear-won subjects of AEI-GOP-DoD-USIP-EIB -- such exotic details count for nothing or little compared to makin’ sure that the cowpoker vigilantes can holler "Yippee, we finally won!" -- plus naturally add in a less exuberant tone, "Plus please note for future reference that the Demoncrat Party did NOT win."
Oddly enough, we arrived at that Crawfordological guideline of ours by looking towards Crawford. Over at Goofville, they look more towards beautiful downtown Takrít, the Mecca of Sunninterní Antisectarianity. That indirect procedure is as if one were to pursue astronomy by gazing always downwards into a dentist’s mirror. Thee will not be amazed, O Bones, that it might take them rather longer than us to arrive at this little scrap of common ground that I think I have unearthed.
The odds are heavily stacked against sanity persisting at Mu’ámara Junction, alas! The selection of Senator Biden is bound to set Cartoono the Magnificent and his clown troupe off on a bender. Old White Joe is, of course, the very model of a modern schizomaniac, forever chuckling to himself with glee at the prospect of tearing other folks’ former countries to shreds for them, then setting the shreds on fire, then "dance around the funeral pyre, playing a violin, -olin, playing a violin." [2]
The good news is that Barry and Barry’s Joe will lose in November. [3] Once J. Sidney has been safely installed as Commanderissimo of AEI-GOP-DoD-EIB (&c. &c.), the USA neorégime won’t have to truckle to poor M. al-Málikí any longer. His whole Hannibal of Da‘wa shtyk will crumble rapidly, as the irresistable military supremacy [4] of Sunnintern and TwentyPercenters combined makes itself felt. In no time at all, it will be "Helicopters on the roof, aloof." (And about time!)
So everything is still all right, basically, from the Goofville perspective: more annoying delays of the inevitable, but no fate worse than that. Today’s unaccountable deviation sensewards is not so extreme as to involve Cartoono & Company becoming less idealistic and Parmenidean about the strictly military prospects of their pets. When Himself speaks of poor M. al-Málikí and selected I. Z. quislings "securing their grip on power," he means, I take it, their power vis-à-vis the remainder of the Quisling Community. The Mighty Muqáwama is entirely another story.
Perhaps I had better specify the ungoofy part of the MJ new look with more precision. Above all it is the guess that ruling circles of AEI-GOP-DoD-EIB have decided to allow poor M. al-Málikí to borrow their Uncle Sam’s hyperpower and warm bodies and violence pro expertise in order to advance specifically Málikiyyan objectives in the native politics of the International Zone neorégime. After they have assisted the Hannibal of Da‘wa, little Miss Lynx’s "new Saddam," to make himself intramurally supreme, Hannibal will be replete with gratitude and willing to agree to pretty well anythin’ that Cap’n M’Cain may subsequently desire of him.
That is not bad at all, especially if it could be taken with assurance as the effort of a recoverin’ goofball, but it is not perfect. It may well soar over the heads of the GOP geniuses unnoticed that the sort of loyalty that they expect from Hannibal Gloriosus is not common in the evil public sector and will probably not be forthcomin’ in any marked degree. "Austria will astonish the world with her ingratitude."
Regardless of what the cowpokers themselves miss or figure in, Miss Lynx and Dr. Cartoonoclastes have not noticed their own new analysis product’s strongest point, namely that it implies a return of the former Iraq to Greater Levantine normalcy. Hannibal is to become what Gen. Mubárak or Messrs. les altesses royales du Ryad have always been. This mode of being involves some very particular specifications about the loyalty-gratitude nexus: Hannibal must be kept on a short leash, compelled to be loyal and grateful on a day-to-day basis, he must never be allowed not to worry about somebody else supplanting him, whether, improbably, from below by ‘revolution’ and muqáwama or, far more likely, from the side, by some near peer who sneakily persuades Team Aggression that he could be an even better Kirkpatrician "our S.O.B." for them than poor M. al-Málikí. Fifteen or twenty years deeper into the Century of J. Sidney McCain, these unpleasantly paranoid requirements will be less necessary, and Hannibal, or Hannibal’s heir, will at that point no doubt be trustworthy out of sight for short periods of time. But to dispense with the leash at the outset would be madly irresponsible.
I conjecture that Lynx and Badger and Cartoonoclastes do not care to notice this aspect because it seriously interferes with their Pangloss-cum-Pollyanna attitudes about the swiftly approaching triumph of strict nondenominational pro-Sunninternianity. They do not want a short leash to connect Hannibal with George XLIII and John XLIV and Ignoto XLV and .... What they crave is Hannibal left on his own in some shady corner where their factional pals can tear his [exp. del.] guts out with claw and fang and impunity. So to speak.
If goofiness is to be eschewed altogether, Cartoono & Co. will have to learn to keep their hormones in check. To think ‘unthinkable’ thoughts, such as that once in a while the bad guys really do prevail, and that’s that.
Oh, well.
____
[1] Cartoono had scribbled
| [R]ecall the Diyala operation of Monday, where the American involvement has been made clear (a "rogue operation" according to the deputy commander of US forces in the region), and this American involvement has elicited no follow-up whatsoever by those who purport to explain "counterinsurgency" to the American people from some kind of a supposedly progressive standpoint. Preferring instead to push ahead with the story about the American forces as a moderating influence. |
So one must infer that Miss Lynx ponders the ‘silence’ of Juan the Wicked, and Helena the Foreign Policy Foxite, and Maarcvark the Off-On-Vacation-While-Baghdad-Burns. No doubt there exist other fake-progressive nonfollowers-up, but that unholy trinity will do to indicate which hand is getting bitten by Miss Lynx. Himself, being in a temporary snit against Dr. iRack, probably meant that nogoodnik in particular by "who purport[s] to explain ‘counterinsurgency’ to the American people." Anyhow, what the traitor fiends are ‘silent’ about is the story about the extremist Republican forces as a perpetual wellspring of s*ct*r**nism.
[2] T. Lehrer fecit
About a maid I'll sing a song, Sing rickety-tickety-tin, About a maid I'll sing a song, Who didn't have her fam'ly long. Not only did she do them wrong, She did ev'ryone of them in, them in, She did ev'ryone of them in. (...) She set her sister's hair on fire, a-Rickety-tickety-tin, She set her sister's hair on fire, And as the smoke and flame rose high'r, Danced around the funeral pyre, Playin' a violin, -olin, Playin' a violin. |
[3] Good news for rabid schizophobes, I mean. Should the MJ gentry actually care about any other branch of progressivity in central North America, they may not be quite so burblin’ly happy on the morning of 5 November 2008. Mais nous verrons.
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