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another piece of the puzzle missing, which is - simply - that Bush is completely barking.

All of the 'No they won't' arguments boil down to 'Because there will be bad consequences.'

But this is only true for people who relate to the world rationally, and Bush clearly doesn't. The consequences were obvious before going into Iraq, and that hasn't stopped him. They were obvious before the current surge, and that hasn't stopped him either.

You'll have to look very hard indeed to find an awareness of consequences in any of the foreign and domestic policy and planning decisions made by the Bush misadministration.

With a hat tip to Godwin, Bush is now moving into Hitler territory, far outside the bounds of rationality. Most of Hitler's decisions were clearly bad ones too. They eventually went beyond bad and became suicidal, both for him and his country. The fact they were obviously bad to anyone with half a braincell didn't stop him making them.

And that's how dictators work. Personal power and the ability to break things and throw them around are more important to them than anything else, because it supports their narcissistic delusions of being a Very Important Person in the verdict of history.

Consequences beyond that don't play any part in their decision making.

Of course there will be a constitutional crisis if Iran is attacked. And lots of other bad things will happen too.

But I'm guessing Bush is mad enough that he'll either try to suspend the constitution in time of war, or at least assign himself some extra war powers. Or he believes that sheer momentum will let him brazen it out once a few carriers are burning.

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sat Jan 13th, 2007 at 06:40:47 AM EST
I have always believed that Cheney is in fact the real power in the US, and Bush essentially a puppet.

Cheney's agenda is rational, in its way, and predicated purely upon US energy security.

I think he is rationally playing the biggest of all poker games, and I think - now that Iraq did not go the way he hoped - he is bluffing.

I don't buy any of the Bush as mad dictator stuff.

"The future is already here -- it's just not very evenly distributed" William Gibson

by ChrisCook (cojockathotmaildotcom) on Sat Jan 13th, 2007 at 07:55:59 AM EST
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I'm not sure either of them are particularly sane.

The problem for the 'They're not crazy enough' argument is that there's so little evidence to support it. Foreign and domestic policy in the US has already been a banquet of psychosis over the last six years.

So I think it's more realistic to expect more of the same than a sudden 'Oops - that was silly - I think we should all act like adults now.'

by ThatBritGuy (thatbritguy (at) googlemail.com) on Sat Jan 13th, 2007 at 12:34:50 PM EST
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