This is a Civil War

From 60 Minutes‘ little gabfest with El Pollo Loco:

Reporter: Do you think you owe the Iraqi people an apology for not doing a better job?

Bush: That we didn’t do a better job or they didn’t do a better job?

Reporter: Well, that the United States did not do a better job in providing security after the invasion.

Bush: Not at all. I am proud of the efforts we did. We liberated that country from a tyrant. I think the Iraqi people owe the American people a huge debt of gratitude, and I believe most Iraqis express that. I mean, the people understand that we’ve endured great sacrifice to help them. That’s the problem here in America. They wonder whether or not there is a gratitude level that’s significant enough in Iraq.

Damn those arrogant brown bast*rds in Iraq! How can they not be grateful for all we’ve done to for them?

From the Associated Press:

The United Nations said Tuesday that more than 34,000 Iraqi civilians were killed in sectarian violence last year, nearly three times the number reported dead by the Iraqi government.

[snip]

Gianni Magazzeni, the chief of the U.N. Assistance Mission for
Iraq in Baghdad, said 34,452 civilians were killed and 36,685 were wounded last year.

[snip]

The U.N. report also said that 30,842 people were detained in the country as of Dec. 31, including 14,534 in detention facilities run by U.S.-led multinational forces.

[snip]

At least 470,094 people throughout Iraq have been forced to leave their homes since the bombing in Samarra, according to the report.

It’d Be Funny, Except…

Photo from Popular Mechanics

Most of us think the Bush misAdministration is so incompetent they’d couldn’t find their way out of a paper bag even with a detailed map, a GPS, and a sign that says, “EXIT.”

Proof, in multiple forms, has been shown – over and over again – but this beats all: The DoD’s been selling spare F-14 parts to the only other country that still flies the F-14s: Iran.

Seems the Defense Department – under the ‘leadership’ of Donald Rumsfeld – was having a few garage sales, getting rid of spare parts that weren’t needed after the F-14s were deep-sixed by the F/A-18 Hornet.

From the Associated Press:

The U.S. military has sold forbidden equipment at least a half-dozen times to middlemen for countries — including

Iran and China — who exploited security flaws in the Defense Department’s surplus auctions. The sales include fighter jet parts and missile components.

In one case, federal investigators said, the contraband made it to Iran, a country President Bush branded part of an “axis of evil.”

[snip]

Right Item, Right Time, Right Place, Right Price, Every Time. Best Value Solutions for America’s Warfighters,” the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service says on its Web site, calling itself “the place to obtain original U.S. Government surplus property.”

Federal investigators are increasingly anxious that Iran is within easy reach of a top priority on its shopping list: parts for the precious fleet of F-14 “Tomcat” fighter jets the United States let Iran buy in the 1970s when it was an ally.

[snip]

The Pentagon recently retired its Tomcats and is shipping tens of thousands of spare parts to its surplus office — the Defense Reutilization and Marketing Service — where they could be sold in public auctions. Iran is the only other country flying F-14s.

“It stands to reason Iran will be even more aggressive in seeking F-14 parts,” said Stephen Bogni, head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s arms export investigations. Iran can only produce about 15 percent of the parts itself, he said.

[snip]

The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, found it alarmingly easy to acquire sensitive surplus. Last year, its agents bought $1.1 million worth — including rocket launchers, body armor and surveillance antennas — by driving onto a base and posing as defense contractors.

“They helped us load our van,” Kutz said. Investigators used a fake identity to access a surplus Web site operated by a Pentagon contractor and bought still more, including a dozen microcircuits used on F-14 fighters.

The undercover buyers received phone calls from the Defense Department asking why they had no Social Security number or credit history, but they deflected the questions by presenting a phony utility bill and claiming to be an identity theft victim.

Hey, idiots! If Iran is the only country in the world still flying F-14s, doesn’t it stand to reason that you shouldn’t be putting the parts for them up for sale?