[Paul Atreides]

Iraq can still go wrong for a hundred Iraqi reasons

Wishful thinking.

[Arkie2]

I agree with this assesment. We're walking away from our problem there and it will bite us in the butt down the road.

[Free ThinkerNY]

The Left said, "Give the U.N. inspectors more time. There's no need to rush." Now they say, "Find WMD's immediately! Establish perfect democracy in Iraq overnight!" Typical Lefty hypocricy.

[Chi-townChief]

"Why doesn't Mr. Rumsfeld brief reporters every day about rebuilding Iraq, the way he did about destroying Saddam?"

Probably for the same reason that your newspaper's sports section doesn't cover the Jets and Giants daily during baseball season. Idiot !

[MinuteGal]

God, this columnist hates his country. Why isn't he over there lending a hand instead of pounding out criticisms in his comfy computer chair?

I'm waiting for a column from him that dumps on the shortcomings of his own NYT instead of our guys striving to do a job over in the Iraqi mare's nest.

Leni

[RightWhale]

We don't hear much about Bagdad, just little events and various little people complaining about little things as if these represent Bagdad life these days. Heard someone in the military admin saying that Bagdad is a mess and not because of the war. It is a mess due to neglect by Saddam's regieme for however many years. There's a lot of building to do. Who knows, it could end up being the most modern city in the ME. Right now, it's a mess and hearing about one more little looter is a waste of bandwidth. Let's hear about city utilities: electric grid, water and sewer, communication, markets, housing, city buses, the things that everybody needs in their city but no one seems to pay any attention to until they are a mess. Even news about the 30s art deco airport with avocado appliances would be better than interviews with rabble-rouser malcontents.

[cornelis]

But when Saddam vanished, so did his police and government. This created a power vacuum that we were not ready to fill. This unleashed the looting, which Donald Rumsfeld blithely dismissed with his infamous line: "Freedom is untidy. Free people are free to make mistakes and commit crimes and do bad things."

So there is a difference between liberating Iraq and liberating Europe?

[McGavin999]

Yes, it can, but it's not going to. He's right about getting a telephone system and television as soon as possible, but they also need electricity to run those TVs.

We probably should get some policemen in there as soon as possible, not just from the US but from the UK, Poland, Spain, and as many of the other countries as we can (The Aussies are busy in their own part of the world and we can't ask them)

They need to explain to the Iraqis that they don't want the old guys to come back because of the corruption and it's going to take some time to train new people. We need their help. Each local leader should get volunteers to help guard things to stop the looting.

[Grampa Dave]

More NY Slimes Blairification to make GW and his team look inept!

Jayson Blair at his peak of lying and slandering would have been proud to have written this Slimes POS!

[onedoug]

And Moses may well have been killed, as so many "liberated" Hebrews wanted to return to the "security" of slavery in Egypt. Two generations until they were ready to enter the Promised Land.

Yeah. Freedom is easy.