After disappointing citizen protests on March 18th marking the 3rd Anniversary of the war in Iraq, President Bush ran a press release to the majority of the population of America that has spoken in poll after poll to want US troops out of Iraq.

Fuck you.
And the Iraqis.

Emboldened by lower than expected anti-war turnouts across the country on March 18, today Bush promised to not pull troops out at all, stating that the issue of withdrawal will be decided by future presidents. The Right will take this tough talk theater as good political melodrama, one of the reasons they like Bush to begin with. The Left will look at this as more arrogance, as they are so fund of calling it, by the Bush administration.
I think we’d do well to remember that everything these guys do comes out of a playbook. You think Bush is sent out there to wing it? In everything presidential administrations do, our reaction is factored in. Duh. So what is this?

The anti-war left plans nationwide protests across the country. While March 18 international protests are huge, domestic turnout was pretty much a bust. Bush could have made his statements before March 18. I mean today is only the 22nd of March. Instead he waits until we do our thing then he gives the anti-war Left a collective fuck you.
Marching in the cold? Fuck you.
Standing in the rain? Fuck you.
Got thousands of people on the streets? Fuck you.
Even the troops in Iraq want to come home? Fuck all of you.
National level Dems will typically not respond. All of this will have a cumulative demoralizing effect on the anti-war Left and the country as a whole, which wants the war to end. The corporatocracy seeks everyone opportunity to nurture the culture of futility. So that is a natural angle for them. Constant convincing that everything we do is useless.

SUBMIT! Go turn on the WWE or something. Leave everything else to us.

The other, less obvious angle is the ’08 setup. This will give the country, which (even with the fake elections) certainly will not see a Republican prez in ‘08, all the more reason to run full speed into the arms of Hillary who is certain to wait until Americans are pulling their hair out then offer a promise to ‘fix’ Iraq. The ’08 version of Howard Dean will translate ‘fix’ into ‘end’ corralling the anti-war folks back into electoral politics for yet another cycle. Once the election is over, the war will continue, New Clintonites will hail how much better Hillary is than Bush, even if she’s not perfect.
I mean, can’t you hear it now? I can.

Bush promises not to leave Iraq. The ’08 election die has been cast. Now all we have left to do is wait for the new Dean to show up and for Hillary to declare her ‘Presidential Iraq Strategy’ which won’t come until Iraqis under the US death machine are screaming even louder than they are now. If that’s even possible.

The only thing that could derail this plan is if Bush was impeached over Iraq, not the wiretapping. We’ll see.