The Common Ills: Military responses when Barack ruled out a military solution?

Saturday, August 09, 2014

Military responses when Barack ruled out a military solution?

Doug Bandow (Forbes) offers, "President Barack Obama has become the fourth straight president to order military action in Iraq. His airstrikes destroyed American military equipment captured from the U.S.-supplied Iraqi army, which a decade ago American forces defeated and disarmed.
[. . .] Unless President Obama pulls back quickly, his administration risks becoming absorbed in another interminable, unnecessary war in Mesopotamia with unpredictable but almost certainly negative consequences."

The only thing Barack moved quickly on was to announce there are no time limits.

Darlene Superville (AP) reports he declared today that his assault on Iraq via aerial bombings "is going to take some time." This time?

Cue Carole King's Music album:

It's going to take some time this time
To get myself in shape
I really fell out of line this time
I really missed the gate --

Boy, did you ever, Barack.

He states he doesn't believe "we are going to solve this problem in weeks."

No, not in Iraq today.

Where Nouri's trying to seize a third term as prime minister.

Parliament meets tomorrow. Some in the press were announcing earlier this week that a prime minister would be named Thursday. They meant prime minister-designate because that is what the President names based on Parliament, not a prime minister. Once named, the person is supposed to have 30 days to put together a Cabinet -- that means a full Cabinet. Failure to do so is supposed to result in the president naming another person prime minister-designate and the process starting over.

Thursday came and went.

Did a prime minister-designate get named?

Nope.

Barack keeps insisting there is no military solution to Iraq's problems (I agree) yet he keeps offering military responses. US troops into Iraq as 'advisors.' Bombs dropped from the sky.

If there's no military solution, why are military responses all that Barack has to offer?

The violence continues. Some of today's?

National Iraqi News Agency reports 4 rebels were killed in a Jurf al-Sakhar battle, a Basra grenade attack on a wedding left over twenty people injured, a Baghdad sticky bombing left three people injured, a Baghdad roadside bombing left four people injured, 2 Kirkuk bombs left eleven people injured, the Ministry of the Peshmerga states they killed 12 rebles and injured two more, Kirkuk saw 16 rebels killed by the Peshmerga, the Iraqi military states they killed 3 suspects in Haditha, they also state they killed 22 suspects in Tikrit, they state they killed 25 in Anbar, and the corpse of a Zain company guard was found dumped in the streets of Basra.

The following community sites -- plus Jody Watley, Cindy Sheehan, Antiwar.com, Pacifica Evening News and Ms. magazine's blog -- updated: