Bad futures

Well. Clearly I was wrong to hate on the Inqy for running an inflated-threat headline. What are editors to do when the only copy out there is inflated-threat copy? F'rinstance: NSC's Stephen Hadley on Fox Sunday:

"Iran is very active in the southern part of Iraq. They are training Iraqis in Iran who come into Iraq and attack our forces, Iraqi forces, Iraqi civilians. There are movements of equipment. There's movements of funds,"

Note the specificity! Why, it's as if the Weekly Standard predicted this very thing! Prediction, agitation, rearguard defense when it all goes south, recrimination: the cycle of future-baiting! (Or "-bating," -- Eds.)

We here at Dark Steer solemnly promise never to predict futures that would have undesirable side-effects if enacted. We further promise never to be wrong about anything consequential. Nor will we pursue a foreign policy detrimental to Dark Steer's image/standing in the world.

But back to Steve's kool-aid! It gets really weird! Viz.:

"So we have illegal militia in the southern part of the country that really are acting as criminal elements that are pressing the people down there."

Did he say "pressin'"? Or "o-pressin'"? Is the problem that Basra is overrun with criminal gangs? Like the 28 mere hooligans summarily executed yesterday? Because that's good for SCIRI and Maliki; it means their political legitimacy is not questioned. But wait, he also called dem bways "illegal militia," trained by Iran -- though by whom in Iran, where in Iran, with what materiel in Iran, like the SecDef sez, "we just don't know." Militia, tho' constitute a political problem, not one of law and order, thus:

Iraq's cabinet ratcheted up the pressure on anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr by approving draft legislation barring political parties with militias from participating in coming provincial elections.

...and after all the fuss we made about this not being about upcoming elections, it turns out that Badr vs. Sadr II follows the same pattern as the first time around: shut down the press office, assassinate the leadership, move in on the neighborhoods. Then, sit back and scratch your heads when the radicals you tried to isolate sweep parliamentary elections. Did the routine work in Palestine in 2006? It ain't work in Paris in 1788 either...
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