Ron Paul raising questions about Iraq.

Ron Paul today pointed out the absurdity in U.S. foreign policy, which is certainly rooting its ugly head in Iraq, in the testimony of Crocker and Petraeus before the House International Committee. It's really quite perturbing that many in the pro-Iraq War crowd are touting the surge as some sort of a justification for the war in the first place. Five years and $800 billion (after this year, if the appropriations are approved by Congress, which they will be) later, where, exactly, has it gotten us? Al-Qaeda's strength now is estimated to be as great or greater than before 9/11, according to the N.I.E.. Afghanistan is a mess, now that we have pulled resources out. (Not that going in and starting a nation-building project was the smart thing to do in the first place, as Scheuer points out in Imperial Hubris, but still.) We're up to $9.2 trillion in debt, mostly because of fighting two wars at once, while the dollar is sinking and CPI is up 4% for 2007, the highest it's been since the oil spike of 1991 during the Persian Gulf War. (To both of which war has contributed.) And now Hezbollah has declared its intention to begin targeting Americans. (Nevermind that attacks domestically are still a serious threat, with our non-secured borders.)

Besides, the point of the surge was not to improve security in Iraq, although prospects are far from certain on this end, given that leaders of key Sunni militias that we are depending on have been assassinated in recent months, that a "labor strike" may be emerging (due to members complaining of "not being paid enough"; at least they are learning capitalism and collective bargaining, right?), and whole host of other problems on the horizon. The point of the surge was to facilitate political reconciliation to avoid, at least in the short-mid term, the prospect of a civil, and perhaps even regional, war. Given that Sunni militias are being given free reign; that they are aiming to "stem Iran;" that Turkey is engaged in a simmering situation with the Kurds in the north; that al-Sadr continues to behave belligerently (and that Maliki is responding belligerently), and that Iran is undermining al-Sadr within his own militia in a move that could ignite one of the most destabilizing forces in the country; the prospects for avoiding civil/regional war are dim.

On related note, it's really quite disturbing that any military or diplomatic official will refuse to state flat out that the executive branch has no Constitutional authority to launch an offensive against Iran.

Anyhow, it's viewing time: