Playing for time - President Bush on the 4th anniversary of the Iraq War.

Today, President Bush marked the fourth anniversary of the Iraq war with a five minute address. It was notable ( as with many of the President's recent speeches) for it's perfunctory, matter-of-fact tone..almost as if he couldn't wait to deliver his bit and leave.

The president started by reiterating what he felt had been accomplished in Iraq - the toppling of Saddam Hussein and `the threat his regime posed to the Middle East and to the world' and the Iraqi elections and constitution.

The president talked about Iraq's democratic leaders that `are now working to build a free society that upholds the rule of law, that respects the rights of its people, that provides them security and is an ally in the war on terror.'

He neglected to mention that what they're really building is an Islamist republic based on sharia and a Shiite government that is ethnically cleansing its Sunnis..and as for being an ally in what the president persists in calling ` a war on terror' perhaps he hasn't been paying attention to what al-Maliki, al Sadr and the majority of the present Iraqi government are saying about their desire to bond with their jihad buddies in Iran.

The president went on to talk about the surge strategy:

"... our most important mission is helping the Iraqis secure their capital...so with our help, Iraq's government is carrying out an aggressive plan to secure Baghdad. And we're continuing to train the Iraqi security forces so that they ultimately take full responsibility for the security of their own people."

Hey, it's been 4 years and billions of dollars later and we're still `training' these people? What ever happened to the thousands of Iraqis we've already supposedly trained?

President Bush went on to discuss conversations he's had with al-Maliki and General Petraeus, that `good progress has been made but that {...} success will take months, not days or weeks."

As one of those signs of progress, the president had the stones to mention the Kurds signing on to a deal that will distribute their oil revenues throughout the rest of Iraq, a direct violation of the sovereignty agreement they signed - but a recognition of reality by the Kurds that the US is on the way out and that they need to grease the Shiite wheels in order to survive in the new Iraq.

The president then went on to discuss some of the current legislation bouncing around congress that would tie the emergency funding for the war that the president wants to a timetable for withdrawal or to special interest legislation, and `pork' spending for various Democrat congressional districts:

"..They have a responsibility to ensure that this bill provides the funds and the flexibility that our troops need to accomplish their mission. They have a responsibility to pass a clean bill that does not use funding for our troops as leverage to get special interest spending for their districts. And they have a responsibility to get this bill to my desk without strings and without delay."

No argument there, Mr. President - but how much of this money is actually for US troops and how much of it is funds for Iraqi aid, baksheesh and `nation building'? And again, aren't we entitled to an in depth accounting of where the money we spent so far has gone? Or would that perhaps reveal some uncomfortable truths about our `democratic ally in the war on terror?'

The president wound up by again saying that victory in Iraq is vital to American security, that a premature withdrawal would result in a violent bloodbath that would end with the terrorists emerging with a safe haven in Iraq to replace the one they had in Afghanistan...and essentially asking his fellow Americans, one more time, to stay the course.

Well and good...but if this is true, why are we essentially turning a blind eye to the Shiite ethnic cleansing and marginalization of the Sunnis? Why did the president OK the immigration of thousands of Iraqi Sunnis into the US, if what's being built there is as the president said `a free society that upholds the rule of law'? Why would it be necessary for the Sunnis to flee this democratic paradise? Why have 3.5 million Iraqis left already? And if the government of Iraq is going to become `an ally in the war on terror', why is the government so friendly to Iran, a country Bush admits is the biggest sponsor of Islamic terrorism in the region?

Ok...no one is going to ask President Bush these kind of pointed questions, and maybe it wouldn't be fair to. But a little more candor would be nice.

Fact is, the president's conditions for `victory' - a democratic Iraq that is stable and is an ally of the US in the War Against Jihad is an impossible scenario. Maybe, if we had secured the country properly, put a strict US military government in place and not allowed the Shiites and their Iran backed militias to take power - but not at this point.

It may end up being stable, but it will neither be democratic or an ally against jihad for America, not unless Iran is suddenly out of the picture, and maybe not even then. If we really wanted a democratic ally in the War against Jihad, we had the Kurds - except for the fact that it would upset `Our Eternal Friends' the Saudis.

We've made a deal with the Shiites for a reasonably graceful exit in exchange for a chunk of aid money and allowing them to continue to consolidate their hold on the country.

Perhaps the president feels he just can't come out and admit that just now, but it would be nice if he came with some other, more credible way of explaining it to the American people instead of these transparent distortions.

In fact, it would help quite a bit.