Gyroscope
A newsletter
for those unmoved by spin.
No. 44, June 28, 2004
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Gyroscope A newsletter
for those unmoved by spin. |
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| by John Nordin |
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Exchanging
documents in a bunker
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This will be the week for quotes with unattributed sources ....
Well, give them points for doing it two days early to avoid the insurgent attacks. And nice how Bremer left town within the hour, getting while the getting was good. Probably won't be invited back to retire on the Iraqi coast. It's symbolic turnover, at this point - a hidden, private handover done totally in Secret. Good model for teaching them how to do democracy. But what if the new interim government decides to make it more than symbolic? Decides to exercise some authority? Will they become our enemy as well?
The thrust of the press report was the emerging separation of the opposition in Iraq into two groups: a terrorist group bombing ordinary Iraqi people and a political opposition organizing itself more like a guerilla group. In this latter group are the senior religious leaders including al Sadr who we mismanaged into a leader. What Democracy Now was pointing to was that this split meant the emergence of a real, widespread, popular - and respectable - opposition that could enter politics and fight against the provisional government. Doubtless the US will try to call them all terrorists. This will lead to the further truth of another quote I do not know the origin of.
They all do. It's worth remembering that when the Black citizens of Montgomery Alabama organized that pivotal bus protest in 1954 that all they were asking for was that the dividing line between white and black in the bus be flexible so blacks didn't have to stand when there were empty seats. But the pigheaded in power reasoning that "give them an inch and they'll take a mile" held firm to the rules and were promptly run over by history. Our pigheadedness in Iraq turned a minor and lightly regarded cleric, al Sadr into a hero of the people. Doubtless we have more mismanagement yet to come.
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