Vilsack

I was watching John Stewart interviewing Tom Vilsack, current governor of Iowa and the first Democrat to announce he will run in the 2008 presidential campaign. Early in the interview (here's the link on youtube; the relevant comment occurs 3 minutes and 24 seconds into the interview - ain't technology great?), he discusses the war in Iraq, calling it a mistake and so on. OK, about as much as you can expect from the "opposition", I suppose. But then get this:

"We've created a culture of dependency with our presence there, and I think it's time for us to say to the Iraqis and their government, `hey, it's up to you, it's your country, you fight for it, you die for it.'"

....

Huh?! A "Culture of Dependency?" Is this guy serious? Who are you, Dr. Phil? This is perfect - how can we pull out of this thing without admitting that we're the bad guys? Oh, I know - make it the Iraqi's fault!

I think the post-hoc rationalization has come just about full circle now. Let's see:

1) Saddam has WMD. Iraq dangerous. Protect Americans.

2) Whoops. Saddam still dangerous - links to Al Quaeda. Protect Americans.

3) Whoops. Well, Saddam was bad. Protect Iraqis - give them democracy.

4) Hmmm.... OK, foreign insurgents bad, disrupting struggling democracy. Protect Iraqis.

5) Oh hell. Iraqis not grateful - keep killing our soldiers - need to take responsibility for their own problems. Protect Americans.

Perfect. Genius. Poor brave America - tried so hard to help, but now its time to let these people catch their own fish.

I really don't have much faith left to lose at this point, but I'll keep my fingers crossed and hope for a candidate who has the sack (sorry) to admit to the blood we have on our hands and deal in an honest way with our nation's responsibility to the people of Iraq.