BULLY BOY PRESS & CEDRIC'S BIG MIX -- THE KOOL AID TABLE
PROFESSIONAL OVEREATER MICHAEL MOORE HASN'T BEEN BATHING IN HIS TIME AWAY. NO, HE'S BEEN WORKING ON A NEW MOVIE.
NOT WITH ACTORS BECAUSE REAL ACTORS COULD UPSTAGE HIM AND MOORE MUST BE THE STAR OF EVERY ONE OF HIS FILMS.
HE'S CALLING IT A "DOCUMENTARY" BUT HIS GRASP OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE HAS NEVER BEEN THAT STRONG.
REACHED FOR COMMENT BY THESE REPORTERS, MOORE INSISTED THE FILM WOULD BE MASSIVE AND THEN ASKED IF WE WERE PLANNING ON FINISHING OUR FRIES OR COULD HE HAVE THEM AND WHAT ABOUT THAT SLICE OF PIE?
Day 209 of The Mosul Slog.
Back in October, when it began, it was supposed to take a few weeks.
209 days later, it still continues.
And it's not even the biggest issue in Iraq.
Let's again note Ben Connable, Natash Lander and Kimberly Jackson's "Beating the Islamic State: Selecting a New Strategy for Iraq and Syria" (RAND CORPORATION):
Root Causes Can Be Bypassed or Suppressed, But Doing So Ensures Lasting Instability
- Failure to address root causes may mean that instability and violence will outlast any individual armed group. Yet there is little appetite for the effort required to address root causes in Iraq and Syria. Current strategy has thus taken a middle-ground approach that does not truly reflect U.S. understanding of irregular war.
- The research centered on the two prominent theories about root causes in Iraq and Syria, disenfranchisement and the effects of ethnosectarian discord. While the latter does have an influence, but the deeper cause in these two countries is disenfranchisement from the central governments and from the protections they should be providing their entire populations.
- Debate over what to do about disenfranchisement is growing; this report argues shifting toward political action while maintaining military pressure against IS.
And among the key findings:
Sectarianism is destroying Iraq.
And has been destroying Iraq.
And it's the issue that never gets dealt with.
Remember the 18 benchmarks the White House created in 2007 to measure success in Iraq?
Most people appear to have forgotten them.
CNN noted in September 2007, "The benchmarks were created by lawmakers as part of a $120 billion war-spending bill passed in May, which asked the GAO -- the investigative arm of Congress -- to give a definitive answer as to whether each benchmark was met or not, instead of reporting partial progress."
One of the benchmarks was national reconciliation.
And ten years later, that's still not happened.
Ten years later, it's still the biggest threat to security in Iraq.
Ten years later, ISIS is being fought because of it and ISIS took root in Iraq because of it.
RECOMMENDED: "Iraq snapshot"
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