He's the Decider
- And the end of all our exploring
- Will be to arrive where we started
- And know the place for the first time.
- --T.S.Eliot, Little Gidding (Four Quartets)
"Three U.S Troops Killed in Iraq Fighting," (AP, Kim Gamel) got second page billing in our local paper. It shared a page with "Judge orders Paternity Test in Rape Case [Duke Lacrosse players]" and a college hazing story. The troop deaths are not news we need to open the paper with. It might put a kink in an otherwise pleasant breakfast.
The article also speaks on al-Maliki's plans to reshuffle his cabinet. "'I am not obliged to accept anyone and I will choose ministers myself if I have to,' he said. The warning came as the Shiite prime minister's national unity government is facing growing dissent by coalition partners..."
Somehow, something seems to have been lost in the translation as to what constitutes a democratic approach to government. It looks like Malaki is adopting a Saddam-like approach to leadership. Democracy implies approval of all cabinet members by the members of the elected government. Remember the oversight function of the legislative branch?
Possibly this fine point can be scrapped. But, isn't that where this whole mess started? Saddam was the decider, minus any democratic niceties. So, after $2 billion a week, almost 3,000 U.S. deaths, 25,000+ U.S. wounded and untold Iraqi deaths, we've arrived back at square one.
Is this administration borrowing from the Nietzsche play book, as well as Tom Cruise's? Like Nietzsche, we are creating our own "myth of the eternal return" of which we do not seem capable of ending. This particular return (to Afghnistan and Iraq) was not a particularly enlightened nor beneficial one. Had we consulted the playbook of history, we might've taken a hint from Britain and the USSR.
Come to think of it, using the literary analogy, the Iraq attack is actually more like the psychedelic vision of the poet W.B.Yeats, than anything. It is an artistic thing, relying on symbols, like that of the eagle (for Yeats, it was a falcon) flying high. But like Yeats' tethered bird, America is really just flying in circles, round and round. Who is the falconer who holds the string?
posted by rangeragainstwar at 5:02 PM
6 Comments:
And don't forget Malaki is cozying up to the Baathists.
The Baathists are gonna be there a lot longer than the Americans. The future of Iraq should and will be in Iraqi hands. I don't care what they do, as long as they're not being funded by U.S. tax dollars, and my soldiers are not dying needlessly. Glad you're still with me.
The Baathists are actually the most rational players in the area, and have been for a long time. Syria is one of the few remaining secular countries around, along with Lebanon. (please check the hezbollah demonstration outside the government headquarters, it has turned into a week long street-party!). All of Iraqis christians are running to Syria, not Israel.
Turning and turning in the widening gyre;
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; The center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.
I had forgotten Yeats until I read your reference to him! What an appropriate and disturbing commentary for our times!
GunShowJoe
Thanks, Joe--glad you found the Yeats quote fitting. Anytime you see references anywhere from the theatre to Gregorian chant, it's probably me putting in my two cents worth (much to Jim's chagrin.) He's your hardcore tactician; I'm the social scientist/pop culture maven.
I do find some of Yeats' works esp. appropos, esp. The Second Coming. In fact, look for a piece soon extended from that thought.
cheers,
Lisa
Lisa -- You and Jim sound like a perfect match! GSJ
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