It should come in a brown wrapper

FOR a couple of days last week, the political complexities and sectarian murders in Iraq were finally off the TV screens. Instead, the networks showed spectacular pictures – provided by the Pentagon – of square-jawed soldiers jumping out of helicopters with their Iraqi buddies and going into action against al-Qaeda fighters in what was billed as the biggest air assault since the invasion in 2003.
[. . .]
As Operation Swarmer fizzled to a close yesterday, it became clear that the biggest air assault since 2003 wasn’t really such a knock-out blow against terrorism after all. 50 helicopters and 1500 troops managed to find just one insurgent and a few weapons caches, according to an Iraqi official. Nearly 50 people were detained, but many were quickly released. Sunni politicians complained that the operation showed a reliance on military solutions when what was needed was political answers.

-- Nick Meo, "3 Years Of War: Iraq Eyewitness: It will take more than media-friendly air assaults to save the country from civil war," Scotland's Sunday Herald.

So as the American support for the illegal war continues to crater, while the war pornographers take to the airwaves, bookstores and newspapers to promote 'strategy' mis-steps, Bully Boy just happens to have a new photo-op version of Operation Happy Talk.

"See," the combo seems to imply, "we've learned from our failures, now we work together."

About as convincing as the psyops operation where we (and a handful of Chalabi flunkies) pulled down the statue of Saddam.

Pornography can be defined as "the depiction of erotic behavior (as in pictures and writing" intended to cause sexual excitement" (Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary). War pornography? The depiction of military strategies (as in fluff and coulda-shoulda-woulda) intended to distract from the larger issue of the validity of a war.

That's what book author and New York Times "reporter" Michael Gordon peddles. It's not a "war," after all, it's "a policy decision" he maintained on Democracy Now! ("Michael Gordon and General Bernard Trainor on the Inside Story of the Invasion and Occupation of Iraq"). Therefore, he didn't "have a dog in this fight."

Not having a dog in the fight (or a functioning brain) allows him to wax on about strategy as though Iraq was populated with toy soldiers and it was all a game.

War pornographers get so excited, so juiced, at the thought of intoning on how this battle should have been staged, how many troops should have been here, what equipment should have been there, that they overlook/ignore the fact that there are people involved. Like a snuff film addict, they just want to blow their wad and they really don't care who got hurt for them to reach climax.

Bully Boy can't argue that everything's gone as planned and gone well. The reality is something even he can't avoid this time. So look for the new roll out: Mistakes were made, but we've learned.

And look for the war pornographers to pick up on that. To treat that as the issue. Professional busy bodies like Thomas Friedman will jump into the fray. The sound of their own voice and the opportunity to dispense their own conventional wisdom is too great a lure for them to resist pontificating at length.

However, that's not really the issue, is it? The issue is whether we should continue the illegal war or bring the troops home.

Look for the war pornographers to flash glimpes of strategy at you to try to interest you in their circle jerk. Look for it and avoid it.