Iraq? Honestly, who really knows? It has the odor of sweeping trouble under the rug, but...... Putting some of the bad guys back in charge has precident: in 1948 Germany after WWII, things were bad. There was no economy other than the coal mining sector and the American fueled black market. The country was slowly starving to death. On one day in January 1948 only one cow entered the city of Frankfurt to feed 600,000 people. After two years of watching and waiting for things to get better it was finally decided to allow former Nazi businessmen back into the economy because nobody else could run things. Sometimes you have to hold your nose and do what obviously has to be done.

Three months after allowing the former Nazis back into the economy and running things there was a currency reform that eliminated the black market in one day. The German economy grew for thirty years, thanks in no small part to the former Nazis running their factories and businesses. So in Iraq "former" Baathist army guys are now running things. I'm turning blue from holding my breath. In checking the Iraq blogs, they don't know either. Checking the soldier blogs, ditto. Of course all the assholes in Washington and New York who write columns know everything. Wretchard, on the other hand, has a pretty complex view of what is going on. Increasingly I am suspecting the real identity of this "Clark Kent" of the web is a military guy of some note and vast tactical and strategic experience and education. What he sees seems very complicated, but makes sense. Go there. Whatever, Bush is taking a major re-election risk right now and I'm willing to turn blue for a while to see how it turns out.