[link|http://washtimes.com/commentary/20030826-092629-5614r.htm|Isn't it just awful?]

Excerpt:

Mr. Rahim said. "A general who previously served in Kosovo said things are happening in Iraq after three months that didn't happen after 12 months in Kosovo."
"There is another Iraq the media virtually ignore," wrote Marine Lance Cpl. John Guardino. "It has been a model of success. The streets are safe, petty and violent crime are low, water and electrical services are almost universally available, and ordinary Iraqis are beginning to clean up and rebuild their neighborhoods.... A deep level of mutual trust and respect has developed between the Marines and the populace here in central and southern Iraq."
The bombing of the U.N. complex and the earlier bombing of the Jordanian Embassy actually are indications the United States is succeeding in Iraq.
The original strategy of the terrorists was what might be called the Mogadishu strategy. Kill a few Americans, and they will leave, as they did in Somalia in 1993.
The terrorists killed a few Americans, and we didn't leave. And the terrorists discovered a downside to attacking Americans. Americans shoot back.

I say:

All this handwringing over postwar Iraq doesn't square with either facts or logic. Could it just be... wishful thinking?

By the way, the Mogadishu strategy certainly did work... once. When Clinton was in charge. At least Clinton did better with Kosovo. [link|http://www.srpska-mreza.com/ddj/Kosovo/articles/WP-Krauthammer.html|Not as well as his supporters pretend], but better. He had to, in order to detract from that Monica scandal. What's great about this president is you don't have to blow him to get him to do something about that mess out there.

Note: this doesn't make Dubya a great president. It merely makes him an adequate one, as far as foreign policy is concerned. He meets the minimum requirements, that's all. But that in itself is a huge improvement over his predecessor. He's not as good as either of the Roosevelts, or even Reagan, but he's way better than Clinton. And that's enough for now.

What the terrorists and their friends need to grasp is that the Clinton era is over. It was a historical aberration, a lamentable period of weakness and self-indulgence after we (pre-Clinton) won that nasty Cold War and reaped the economic boom that came with that. Well, we had a hell of a hangover in early 2000 when the economic bill came due. Then these bastards attacked us - again - when we looked weak and wobbly. They didn't grasp that a new sort of man was in charge now, that a different, stronger side of the American character was becoming dominant. Now they're paying, and they're not gonna get off cheap this time.

Never confuse Clintonism with America.

This is going about as well as Germany after Hitler was defeated, and that ain't bad. It's going way better than Mogadishu - or way worse, depending on which side you're on.

Say, which side is that?