Condi's "bring it on" moment

Prominent war criminal, fashionista, former Stanford Provost, and sometime namesake of the Altair Voyager Condoleezza Rice made one of her appearances in the Green Zone of Baghdad where she taunted Muqtada al Sadr about sending others to their death while remaining at a safe distance.

The mind reels.

There begin to be so many layers of irony, projection, and utter lack of self-awareness in the Bush Crime Machine that one would need a computer to track it all.

Of course when Bush, in his faux machismo, uttered "Bring it on," they did. And American troops died. Having a woman taunt Sadr so publicly seems designed to goad him into action, thereby inflaming an already tense and violent situation - hardly the stuff diplomacy is made of. More Iraqis and more US troops are likely to perish because of her remark.

She, of course, flies blithely back to DC, leaving the mess in Iraq behind her.

I have seen comments on this at several blogs. Dday covers it nicely at Hullabaloo.

Brandon Friedman, an Iraq War veteran, has this to say:

But it's not just about Rice's dismissive, provocative tone, either. It's also this continuing, obnoxious Bush-brand of hypocrisy that the whole world sees: If Sadr had said the same thing of Rice--that she's a Washington, D.C. bureaucrat who sends others to fight her own battles--the Bush administration would freak out. And that fact isn't lost on Iraqis.

As Rice is one who will not have to stay and fight the Mahdi Army side-by-side with our troops, I suggest that she keep her mouth shut if she's not going to say anything helpful. Because statements like these are certainly not.

In an update Friedman notes the NYT quoting Rice on Sadr thus:

“I don’t know whether to take him seriously or not,” Ms. Rice said.

If she doesn't take him seriously she is a damned fool, which is a genuine possibility based on her inept diplomacy hitherto. But since she is also a notorious liar, this could all be some elaborate game, one in which the cost is real human lives, variously ended or shattered.

Were she herself not so dangerous, I doubt that any sane person would take Rice seriously.

Of course, she belongs in prison, but it will take the world a while to catch up with her crimes.
--the BB

Iran, Iraq, and the region in general

Professor Juan Cole reports:

Secretary of State Condi Rice wants the Arab states to shield Iraq from Iran's "nefarious influence." Rice seems unaware that she has installed in Baghdad parties like the Islamic Mission Party (al-Da'wa) and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI) that are very close to Tehran, and that Egypt, Jordan and Saudi Arabia advised her not [to] invade Iraq because this would happen. And Sunnis, Salafis and Wahhabis would dissuade Iraq's Shiite majority from good relations with their Iranian Shiite neighbors . . . how? Whenever I hear Bush administration officials say something about the Middle East, it is as though I am listening to bad fiction read with a drunken slur. Opinion polling does not find that the Arab publics are afraid of or worried about Iran in any numbers, and in fact Israel's attack on largely defenseless little Lebanon in 2006 made Iran and Hizbullah more popular in the region.

[Emphasis mine]

I cringe every time I see a headline or paragraph starting out with Rice's name. I just assume either a gross lie or some stupidity with very bad consequences is coming next.

Btw, Stanford will probably take her back so they can have bragging rights against Cal, with its John Yoo. The Torture Twins of the Bay Area. Sigh.

Why do we have idiots running this country?

[That's a rhetorical question. You don't have to depress me by answering.]

UPDATE:
Speaking of reality checks, Cole also noted this at the top of his post:

A suicide bombing at a funeral for pro-American militiamen in a village northeast of Baghdad in Diyala province killed at least 60 persons on Thursday and wounded a similar number. This attack follows a previous bombing in the provincial capital of Baquba that had killed 60.

--the BB

Hypocrisy or ignorance?

Reuters photo by Kevin Lamarque via Dependable Renegade

Reuters photo by Larry Downing via Watertiger

Barry Lando at AlterNet writes:

To thank the Saudis for supporting the latest, feeble U.S. peace efforts in the Middle East, Bush is promising them 20 billion dollars in sophisticated weapons—including 121 million dollars worth of precision guided bombs.

...

Which brings us to another irony of the current Bush trip. A few days ago in Abu Dhabi, trying to whip up support for U.S. policy, he gave a speech condemning Iran and extolling the virtues of democracy from the cavernous marble auditorium of a 3 billion dollar gold plated hotel.

A strange choice of venue: the rulers of Abu Dhabi and Dubai and the rest of the emirates give short shrift to democracy themselves.

What was this trip to the Middle East: a fashion show with Bush sending words down the runway that everyone could ooh and aah over but nobody was going to buy? In other words, a glitzy media event lacking in substance. [Sorry, couturiers of the world.]

Atrios summed it up thusly:

Spreading freedom by distributing high tech weapons to brutal oligarchies and dictatorships. It's the Bush way.

h/t to A. J. Rossmiller at Americablog.

UPDATE:
Steve Benen at Crooks and Liars pointed me to Newsweek's Michael Hirsh, who had this to say about the Preznit's trip:

A day after George W. Bush gave his big democracy speech and declared the opening of "a great new era … founded on the equality of all people"—a line he delivered at the astonishingly opulent Emirates Palace hotel, where most of the $2,450-a-night suites are reserved for visiting royals—the president flew to Saudi Arabia on Monday. There he planned to spend a day with King Abdullah at his ranch, where the monarch keeps 150 Arabian stallions for his pleasure, and thousands of goats and sheep "bred to feed the guests at the King's royal banquets," as the White House put it in the "press kit" it handed out to reporters on the eve of the president's eight-day Mideast tour. Bush was also expected to take time out to meet with a group of "Saudi entrepreneurs."

What could not be found on Bush's schedule was one Saudi dissident or political activist, much less a democrat. Just a day after his speech in Abu Dhabi—and three years after declaring in his second inaugural address that "it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture"—the president made time for a tour of Saudi Arabia's National History Museum but not for a meeting with Fouad al-Farhan. Farhan, Saudi Arabia's most popular blogger, was arrested in Jidda last month for daring to defend a group of Saudis who wanted to form a civil rights group. [emphasis mine]

Nothing Bush has ever done gives evidence that he believes in democracy.
--the BB