first of all, it's a compromise as they were going to take two months off ... not to mention that to capitulate to "our" demands (Cheney seems to be big on this) would cause loss of face and credibility.

The Iraqi parliament has been telling us for MONTHS now that they intended to take August off.... It's not a surprise ... all of the various pressures that could be wielded, have been.

Then there's the "urgent" work they might do this August, if only ... it's the same "urgent" work they have made no progress at over the last 9 months or year or 18 months ... it's that oil revenue sharing bill that, again, is seen as "our" bill, and is pretty universally hated, except by the Kurds who benefit from 12 years of American support of their Autonomy and would be just as happy to susceed except "we" don't want them to so they just might lose "our" military support when TURKEY (with justification) invades them.

Anyway, the idea is parliament should do this while Baghdad is all nice and peaceful ... with the surge and all ... except it's not nice and peaceful and its 130 degrees and even the Green Zone is taking casualities.

Oh, the other "big" legislative effort they're supposed to be working on is "provincial elections" ... but with so many Iraqis having either fled the country all together or internally displaced ... these longawaited provincial elections likely to make a mockery (another mockery, after that first election) of d.e.m.o.c.r.a.c.y. ... particularly since they are supposed to "boost sunni participation" ... except the sunni are the population most in flight ...

these blowhards (and I've seen "how could they" comments coming from all sides) need to be told to find something else to bother about ... like the contempt of congress and the "surge" ...

Sheesh, directing all this outrage at the Iraqi parliament (which is in a constant state of ebb and flow and can't meet a quorum MOST days, even when the weather is temperate) ... well, it's a lot of hot air, imho.

I would have missed the LATimes article (they often do surprisingly good work, imho) and I doubt I'd have had the stomach for the Marine courtmarshall "all Iraqi males are the enemy ..." stories.

More of the reasons why we have to get the hell out ... all the way out of Iraq and most of the region. We have had our fingers in the pie for 15 or so years already, much much longer if you look at Egypt and Iran. Our credibility has sucked forever.

Seems to me that on-the-ground news has been thin for days now ... wonder how "the surge" is doing.

Have heard nothing from our friends and endeavors in the Russian 'stans for months...

and "we're" pissed off that Russia's pissed off

... but maybe I've just failed to pay attention.

Thanks again!

I suspect the only reason there has been no military coup in Iraq is that we disbanded the army ... while considered a massive blunder in "securing the victory" of the invasion, it likely also left us stuck with this bastardized democracy and pretty much illegitimate parliament and constitution.

I've been unable to find out when this whole "election" charade will need to be repeated to fulfill the "democratic process" (oddly the CIA World Handbook does not include length of terms), but that will be a genuine test of whether this "democracy" cobbled together under US demand despite an obvious lack of foundation, any glimmer of a "spirit of cooperation", etc. can eventually earn anything approaching legitimacy. It's always the first "hand-off" (or second election) that's the tricky part.

As for the Saudis, when people claim that our invasion of Iraq was instigated, aided and abetted to benefit Israel in oh so many ways (as long as blowback is left out of the equation) ... I think of the Saudis and Gulf War I ... and this should be of equal concern regarding any invasion/strike on Iraq ... cui buono, indeed.

One of the things Saudi Arabia "gained" from our invasion of Iraq was our departure from Saudi bases .... (except for some training and maintenance of the Saudi forces, irrc)

This was one of Bin Laden's primary complaints wrt the House of Saud, that they permitted the presence of infidels in the kingdom ... bases we were permitted since the run-up to GWI

Baghdad fell 04/09/2003; we announced we would "decamp" on 04/29/2003 ... and we were withdrawn by the end of August ...

www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/04/29/sprj.irq.saudi.us/