Just when I think I'm Done With Iraq, They Keep Pulling Me Back In!"

I don't mean for this blog to live and die by the Iraqi war, but sometimes one cannot help but comment on the ballyhooed opinons of Thomas Friedman. His op/ed piece today, about how conservatives understimate the cost of a war in Iraq boded well, I thought, considering he was trying to balance his last interesting, if not altogether convincing, piece from earlier in the week. Alas, whereas I was simply disagreeable to that one, the vapidity of this one beggars belief, let alone an opinion to its content. No exaggeration, it very well might be one of the most banal perspectives on a war I've encountered in quite some time (and I live in Britain, where you only really hear the same shrill "NOOOOOOOO!" over and over again). Friedman's two-sided perspective is, obviously, supposed to offer a modicum of complexity and nuance to an issue that has, sadly, been missing from the official voices we hear from Washington (and London). However, the danger of such an approach is, when it is not done well you end up using many more words than necessary to say absolutely nothing at all.

On the bright side, at least this time he's not advocating war for oil.