Another Iraq Cheerleader Throws in the towel

“It is now obvious that we are not midwifing democracy in Iraq. We are baby-sitting a civil war” and it’s time to “disengage.”
~Thomas Friedman

For the last two and a half years Tom Friedman has been telling us to give "stay the course" six more months. To be fair he has been critical of the way Rumsfeld and the administration waged the war but he remained a cheerleader. Well Think Progress reports that the flat earth does not include an American presence in Mesopotamia.

Three years of efforts to democratize Iraq are not working. That means “staying the course” is pointless, and it’s time to start thinking about Plan B — how we might disengage with the least damage possible.

And he admits that the Cheney/Bush Mideast "policy" has been a disaster.

Finally, the war in Iraq has so divided us at home and abroad that leaving, while bringing other problems, might also make it easier to build coalitions to deal with post-U.S. Iraq, Iran, Hezbollah and Syria. All these problems are connected. We need to deal with Iran and Syria, but from a position of strength — and that requires a broad coalition.

The longer we maintain a unilateral failing strategy in Iraq, the harder it will be to build such a coalition, and the stronger the enemies of freedom will become.

Welcome to the reality based community Tom. Why don't you drop by for a beer and I explain that the earth is actually an oblate spheroid.