Just now I was listening to the latest Democratic debate and heard Biden talking about Iraq partition, and it reminded me — I’ve gotten exactly zero feedback from our lead editorial Sunday. It took a big new step in the direction of the Biden-Brownback plan, of which I had previously been leery.
Did anybody read it? Did you have any thoughts about it?
Related Posts
You can find all the information you need about the debate over federation/confederation/soft partition in our blog. The U.S. needs to realize that this is the only way to win this war in Iraq and it’s not too late to save the lives of the next generations of the nations that were forced by the Brits to become one country.
http://www.babylonians.wordpress.com
Your never ending spree of death and violence and hate
Is gonna tie your own rope
Tie your own rope
I completely agree that the time has come to partition the Iraqi state along already existing ethnic lines. The question for some time has been “how can we stabilize a divided Iraq?” The real question is “why should we struggle against Iraqis in order to maintain a unified Iraq?” On this point our country seems irrationally fixated on maintaining a set of arbitrary geopolitical boundaries. Perhaps our hesitation to divide a country stems from our indoctrination that nations are “indivisible” and “united” under a strong, central government. An excellent opportunity now presents itself to drastically reduce the sectarian violence that threatens to engulf a country that is divided deeply along ethnic boundaries. While not as pretty as a peaceful, unified Iraq, this solution is a practical approach to a problem that can only get worse.
There’s no question about it. It’s an artificial state created by powerful nations around it. It currently has a dysfunctional central government. It’s populated by ethnic groups who cannot stand each other. The time has come:
Break up Belgium!
The only good I can think of that we might accomplish with our troops in Iraq is to ease the partition, and try to prevent a bloodbath when they insist on doing it the hard way, which is what they are doing right now. I understand that the Iraqi Kurds are pretty stable right now. Of course, partitioning Iraq will give most of the oil to the Shiites, who, I suspect, will not want to sell it to us. Higher oil prices anyone?
No feedback on an editorial about a Biden-Brownback plan to divide Iraq into ethnic states under one Iraqi flag?
That points me three ways:
1) Not too long ago, someone here, probably you, noted that the Iraq war isn’t the kind of war that ends with an unconditional surrender, the kind of war that really unites a country. Well, yeah, the only unconditional surrender anyone cared about came from Saddam Hussein long ago. Now, not many know why we’re fighting. And only those few people care whether Iraq is divided into ethnic states or sunk into whatever lies closes to it.
2) The State is not really a national newspaper. Readers look to you for opinions local to South Carolina, not on world affairs.
3) Biden and Brownback don’t have the star power of Jesse and Al, Hillary and Barack, Britney and Norma Jean, or even Anna Nicole and Paris, not to mention O.J. So nobody’s paying attention.
If it ain’t shock and awe, it ain’t sexy. Change the channel, and how ’bout get me a beer, too.
John Boy and Billy were talking about Britney this morning, and it all went over, or under, my head.
I remember Norma Jean, though. She was something.
I feel it is my solemn duty to acknowledge and praise yet another music-related pun by Mr. Warthen.