The briar patch

An editorial in today’s NY Times concludes,

Another Republican resolution, proposed by Sen. John McCain, gives the appearance of moving in that more promising direction by ticking off a series of policy benchmarks and then urging the Iraqi government to meet them. But listing benchmarks is one thing. It is another to spell out real consequences for not meeting them, like the withdrawal of American military support. …

Senators need to acknowledge the reality of four years of failed presidential leadership on Iraq and enact a set of binding benchmarks. These should require the hard steps toward national reconciliation that the Iraqi prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki continues to evade and that the White House refuses to insist on.

It’s as if they still haven’t caught on that the mistake was invading Iraq in the first place. They seem to think that withdrawing US troops, exactly what almost every Iraqi has been demanding for the past two years or more, is some kind of threat. They insist that the ventriloquist make demands of the dummy and extract compliance with Br’er Rabbit threats? Is it some bizarre willful cluelessness? Or do they really think people will fall for their bullshit? They couldn’t? Nobody’s that dumb, are they?