What If...?

Wouldn't it be nice to just believe G. W. Bush and Iyad Allawi when they tell us that the war in Iraq is actually going much better than people think, that elections are on schedule for January and that Iraqis are overwhelmingly thankful to their "liberators"? If we could only believe it, we wouldn't need to worry any more about those horrible pictures on TV, those horrible stories in the papers, the endless debates, the loss of life and money and the international status quo. Wouldn't it be nice to just believe... believe... believe... zzzzzzzzz...

WAKE UP!!!

As Juan Cole angrily points out, the USA has a population approximately 11 times that of Iraq. Based on the latest figures, Iraq is facing the equivalent of a 9/11 every week.

"What if 3,300 Americans had died in car bombings, grenade and rocket attacks, machine gun spray, and aerial bombardment in the last week? That is a number greater than the deaths on Sept. 11, and if America were Iraq, it would be an ongoing, weekly or monthly toll.

And what if those deaths occurred all over the country, including in the capital of Washington, D.C., but mainly above the Mason-Dixon line, in Boston, Minneapolis, Salt Lake City, and San Francisco?

What if the grounds of the White House and the government buildings near the Mall were constantly taking mortar fire? What if almost nobody in the State Department at Foggy Bottom, the White House, or the Pentagon dared venture out of their buildings, and considered it dangerous to go over to Crystal City or Alexandria?

What if all the reporters for all the major television and print media were trapped in five-star hotels in Washington, D.C., and New York, unable to move more than a few blocks safely, and dependent on stringers to know what was happening in Oklahoma City and St. Louis? What if the only time they ventured into the Midwest was if they could be embedded in Army or National Guard units?

There are estimated to be some 25,000 guerrillas in Iraq engaged in concerted acts of violence. What if there were private armies totaling 275,000 men, armed with machine guns, assault rifles (legal again!), rocket-propelled grenades, and mortar launchers, hiding out in dangerous urban areas of cities all over the country? What if they completely controlled Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Salt Lake City, Las Vegas, Denver and Omaha, such that local police and federal troops could not go into those cities?

What if, during the past year, the secretary of state (Aqilah Hashemi), the president (Izzedine Salim), and the attorney general (Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim) had all been assassinated?

What if all the cities in the U.S. were wracked by a crime wave, with thousands of murders, kidnappings, burglaries, and carjackings in every major city every year?

What if the Air Force routinely (I mean daily or weekly) bombed Billings, Mont., Flint, Mich., Watts in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Anacostia in Washington, D.C., and other urban areas, attempting to target "safe houses" of "criminal gangs," but inevitably killing a lot of children and little old ladies?

What if, from time to time, the U.S. Army besieged Virginia Beach, killing hundreds of armed members of the Christian Soldiers? What if entire platoons of the Christian Soldiers militia holed up in Arlington National Cemetery, and were bombarded by U.S. Air Force warplanes daily, destroying thousands of graves and even pulverizing the Vietnam Memorial over on the Mall? What if the National Council of Churches had to call for a popular march of thousands of believers to converge on the National Cathedral to stop the U.S. Army from demolishing it to get at a rogue band of the Timothy McVeigh Memorial Brigades?

What if there were virtually no commercial air traffic in the country? What if many roads were highly dangerous, especially Interstate 95 from Richmond to Washington, D.C., and I-95 and I-91 up to Boston? If you got on I-95 anywhere along that over 500-mile stretch, you would risk being carjacked, kidnapped, or having your car sprayed with machine gun fire.

What if no one had electricity for much more than 10 hours a day, and often less? What if it went off at unpredictable times, causing factories to grind to a halt and air conditioning to fail in the middle of the summer in Houston and Miami? What if the Alaska pipeline were bombed and disabled at least monthly? What if unemployment hovered around 40%?

What if veterans of militia actions at Ruby Ridge and the Oklahoma City bombing were brought in to run the government on the theory that you need a tough guy in these times of crisis?"

P.S. I know I am quoting Juan Cole a lot lately, but the man is on fire, dammit! Does John Kerry need a new advisor?