Bush Bombs at the UN

There's not much to say about Bush's speech to the UN that is not very well said in this article from AlterNet. Bush had a wonderful chance to adopt a new position but of course he didn't take it. No surprises there. In fact, I was expecting him to take an even more aggressive approach and set up an emotionally-charged US versus UN drama for US public consumption. But perhaps that would have been too much of a political gamble.

Meanwhile, the NY Times gives a good overview of the current situation in Iraq. Perhaps it is a little optimistic, but perhaps relentless pessimism is a bit unhealthy, even when dealing with rogues like Bush!

Speaking of optimism, new polls show that all the leading Democrat contenders are now rating as highly, or nearly as high as Bush. Just as the US public starts to turn on Bush and his gang of neo-con nincompoops, another old friend is also turning on him. Ahmed Chalibi, the hand-picked puppet leader of Iraq's illegitimate governing council, is trying to persuade Congress to save billions of dollars by handing control of Iraq to him. That's the problem when you're working with snakes. As soon as you take your foot off their head, they turn around and bite you.

As "Riverbend" reports in her Baghdad Burning blog today, Chalabi's point is painfully true - Iraqis can and should be doing a lot - if not all - of the reconstruction work. They should at least be handing out the contracts to people other than Haliburton, KGR and Co.

Chalabi is playing a dangerous game, jockeying for increased power while trying to keep on the right side of the US. Widely unknown and/or unpopular in Iraq, Chalabi knows he needs to keep US soldiers in the country or his fellow Iraqis will blow his head off!