Do You Believe in (Neocon) Magic?

Personally I don’t, but the neocons currently running middle eastern policy in the Bush administration sure do. The True Believers include Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense; Donald Rumsfeld, Douglas Feith, Lewis "Scooter" Libby, John R. Bolton, and Elliott Abrams, to name a few. And don’t forget that administration flack par excellance, Richard Perle, who resigned his unpaid chairmanship of a defense department advisory body after a dust-up over some lobbying. And then there’s the editorial staff of the Weekly Standard, the American Enterprise Institute and pretty much all the rightist cable TV gas-bags and print journalists working in and out of the New York/Washington DC area.

The current Iraq fiasco was originally brought to you largely because of their tireless efforts. After Bush was elected (or selected;--take your pick), the neocons moved into the White House and immediately started pushing their shamanistic ideology that taught, above-all the demonization of Saddam Hussein.

In their view, Saddam Hussein was behind everything that has ever gone wrong for the US in the middle east, starting with the toppling of the Shah of Iran during the Carter administration. In their opinion he had to go.

Of course, they never had any concrete evidence that Saddam Hussein was behind anything that happened in the Middle East, other than what was pretty obvious to everyone else;--his wars, his internal atrocities and his invasion of Kuwait. But the neocon witch doctors felt that somehow or another Saddam Hussein was a grave  danger to the US.

How they could think this? When the Israelis could knock out a Iraqi nuclear plant with only two aircraft, when Hussein fought a bloody winless war with Iran for eight years. When his   rag-tag army equipped with old Russian equipment was kicked out of Kuwait during the first Gulf War.  What were they thinking?

Still the neocons kept up their mantra asserting that Iraq was somehow a danger to the US and had to be invaded. It was an absurd belief, totally rooted in ideology and totally devoid of any factual basis. But of course, being believers in arcane magic, neocons just don't need facts. 

Which is pretty much why nobody paid much attention to them;--until 9/11.

Then, the shamans, taking advantage of the situation, started pushing their theories about Saddam Hussein and demanding pre-emptive war against Iraq.

The neocon witch-doctors were certain, (not withstanding CIA information to the contrary), that Iraq was  behind the 9/11 attacks.

In the end, the President Bush listened to his witch-doctors and invaded Iraq. With virtually no post-war planning. Why? Well, the neocons believed that magically things would sort themselves out in America's favor as soon as the troops entered Baghdad.

Arguments as to exactly how the Middle East and the Iraqis themselves would react to a US occupation were simply brushed aside;--neocon witchcraft simply didn’t allow such questions to be considered, let alone planned for. All we had to do was invade Iraq, and magically all problems would be solved. In fact, we were told all the problems of the Middle East would be magically solved to. 

We would invade, we were told, and magically millions of Iraqis would welcome us. The whole Iraqi population were going to welcome us in open arms and then, when the celebrations died down, they'd hasten to establish for themselves, a Jeffersonian democracy.

[The fact that the Iraqis have no experience in democracy and would probably choose either a theocrat or another secular dictator, if given half the chance, was and is ignored by the neocons, since it is not consistent with rightist shamanism.]

In the neocon view, things will happen in Iraq, more of less by themselves. Magically.

Take for example the handing over of “power” to a native Iraqi government. According to administration spokesmen, we are supposed to hand over power to somebody, or someone on June 30. To whom or to or what isn’t known precisely, and nobody in the administration seems to care. That's because, magically, things will just turn out OK.

The shaman’s and their PR spokesmen tell us no more troops are needed in Iraq, because, magically, the Iraqis themselves are more than happy to establish order.

Don't pay any attention to things you see on TV, they say.  Things are going to be just fine, say the neocon mages. Just you wait. Pretty soon now, they tell us every chance they get, magically, all the nations of the middle east, (that collection of autocrats, dictators and absolute monarchs,) will suddenly see the light of democracy and immediately dismantle their respective dictatorships, autarchies and absolute monarchies.

Yeah, right.

US policy towards Iraq was generated by people who believed that by getting rid of Saddam Hussein magically everything would turn out their way;--the US would be free of terrorism, Israel would be free of any threats to its existence and terrorism, as if my magic, would simply disappear. Disappear everywhere.

Of course the reality has been precisely the opposite, but this hasn’t (as of yet) caused the neocons to reconsider their basic beliefs.

Which only goes to show, that with neocons, any time there is a conflict between reality and neocon secular magic, magic wins every time.

The only problem is, that the necons have not come with a   way of magically stopping bullets, motor rounds, RPGs or suicide bombers.

Old fashioned real-life soldiers have to do that. 

Punditwalla--