Hiatt concludes the Editorial with a typically self-righteous decree:

Successful counterterrorism requires providing security for the civilian population, economic reconstruction and the brokering of political accords -- in other words, nation-building. That's as true in Somalia as it is in Iraq.

Nation-building, bomb by bomb, bullet by bullet, street by street, corpse by corpse.

Cheers,

Fred Hiatt and his fellow armchair commandos are a bunch of cocktail-swiggin' chickenhawks.

I'm sorry they can't be herded into Iraq, marched into a "hot" area, and left there to fight.

I suspect you'd hear their screams to end the war clear back at AIPAC and AEI!

"Commando Hillary" Clinton, that gallant trooper who defied sniper fire in that "hot" LZ, said on "This Week" that she has no apologies for her statement that she'd obliterate Iran if it attacked Israel. Mrs. Clinton, it's clear that the Israel Lobby/Zionist crowd is getting its money's worth from you!

In the first place, I see no indications that any sector of US political culture except the far Left has really faced up to the issue of implicit racism. I say 'implicit' because explicit racism is very properly condemned, but the WAY in which it is condemned contains a subtext, to the effect that it is cruel to make explicit the actual and concrete position of inferiority in which US Blacks are trapped - and the only explanation for this subtextual nuance is a widespread assumption that US Blacks DESERVE inferior status, which in turn is derived from a sense of cultural and geopolitical superiority, on which all US citizens are encouraged to rely, as a means of evading the horror of their real global actions over the entire span of their history. To say, well, Rowan, you're a Brit, we learned white supremacist imperialism from you, is true but irrelevant - the USA purports to be 'better than that,' and it isn't. The second point is that white supremacism is maintained largely via a mystifying proxy which is (a) religious rather than explicitly racial, and (b) Jewish rather than Christian - Christianity being re-written as supportive of Jewish global rights as progenitors of 'Western values.' Sorry to have to say that, because I am deeply in love with the Jewish people, no point in my trying to hide that.

When the war began, seeing the death of a child in a photo like the one in the post was, while tragic, somewhat abstract. I could imagine the anger and despair I would feel at the death of my child, but it was only imagination.

Now, when seeing that photo, I felt it.

If someone suggested I could get $2500 for the death of my daughter, you know what I'd do? I'd tear their eyes out with my teeth. The father of that child has just become someone's mortal enemy, probably ours.

We need to get out of Iraq.

If the Iraqis want to fight each other to the death, so be it. We should not be a part of it. Those who argue that we should keep fighting there should give up their U.S. citizenship, move over to Iraq, and join one of the militias.

Instead, why not withdrawl from the role of world arms dealer?

Why not do both?

I get zero benefit from my taxes paying to kill people, no matter how many bloodthirsty assholes try to convince me otherwise.

You correctly spelled "d-e-m-o-c-r-a-c-y-" and or "f-r-e-e-d-o-m" as "m-o-n-e-y". You must be a lib-rul so-schul-ist.

Iraqi women and children are thanking you from their graves.

How I long for the days when we had a real Foreign Service department that made well-thought-out recommendations and plans. Then engaged with the people in spirited debate. Or am I mis-remembering?

Replacing that (perhaps, imaginary) process with a Wing-Nut echo chamber does not seem to be serving us very well. The credence given to half-baked ideas of people who worship the noise and blast of mega-weapons is not in proportion to their wisdom. Power never comes from the mouth of a gun for long enough.

'Kill everyone else' sounds about 5 or 10,000 years out-of-date.

As one with a Murder of Crows on a phone-line between Washington and Smalltown, USA, Fred Hiatt squats grotesquely upon the channels of communication between our Public Servants and ourselves. It's another symptom of a plague of journalists pontificating policy on matters political and civil when the only thing they should be doing is analyzing events through reasoned assessment of carefully-sought facts. Fred Hiatt (like Bill Kristol) is wasting our time and soiling the Forum in this act of public "masturbation." They have no business dictating public policy, or stamping existing policy with either a seal of approval or dismissal.

The best use of journalism is to present evidence and analysis in a thorough discussion of careful research. Perhaps after doing this, one may be entitled to put forth reasoned conclusions. Instead, such journalists as he are just another crop of hired talking heads sprouting from the tree of corporate greed and public manipulation that so ruthlessly squanders the wealth of nations to provide its masters with modern-day castles in removed places; removed from the soiled masses whom they loath, yet upon whom they depend for all that they enjoy in life. How thin and transparent is the posturing and prancing of that whole culture of parasitism. Perhaps they deserve pity more than wrath, but still, it is unacceptable behavior that ought to be declared for what it is, as you and others have done here in this blog for some time now.

Fred Hiatt, YOUR TYPICAL STUPID WHITE MAN AND HEGEMONIC DEMAGOGUE

IS UNINFORMED, CRIMINALLY LACKING IN COMMON DECENCY AND SENSE, THE DUMB DOG!!!!!

HE IS A Bush-McPAIN ANUS-SUCKING DUPE

AS WELL AS A BOMBASTIC IMBECILE STUPE!!!!!

AND IN THE ILLEGAL INVASION AND OCCUPATION OF Iraq MACHINE JUST A LITTLE COG!!!!!

No, just an American who occasionally makes typos.

A leftist radical, eh?

I'm impressed!

You can believe what you like. It doesn't make it possible, probable or advisable.

Dimwit.

"Hey repugs...

"The withdrawal of the US from the role of world policeman...

Instead, why not withdrawl from the role of world arms dealer?

"The United States is the largest supplier of weapons to developing nations, delivering more than $9.6 billion in arms to Near East and Asian countries last year. The U.S. sales to the developing countries helped boost worldwide weapons sales to the highest level since 2000, a congressional study says. The total worldwide value of all agreements to sell arms last year was close to $37 billion, and nearly 59 percent of the agreements were to sell weapons to developing nations, according to the Congressional Research Service report. The weapons being sold range from ammunition to tanks, combat aircraft, missiles and submarines.

"Oh, silly me. Money is involved. Money trumps all.

-- kuhnigget Sunday, May 4, 2008 07:18 AM"

You correctly spelled "d-e-m-o-c-r-a-c-y-" and or "f-r-e-e-d-o-m" as "m-o-n-e-y". You must be a lib-rul so-schul-ist.