Heavens Gate, Ishtar, Basic Instinct 2 -- all noted for being box office bombs. It is time to add the president's vaunted "surge" to the dubious list of cinematic flops that were unable to come close to recovering the production cost, let alone turn a profit.
What makes the surge unique, it is failed sequel on top of the numerous unsuccessful ventures offered up by this administration, financed by Congress. Shall we call the surge Shock and Awe 5? Or how about Mission Accomplished 3?
If we simply revisit November 2006, the Democrats reclaimed Congress, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was out, and everything was on hold until the Iraq Study Group made its findings known in December.
After the Iraq Study Group made its findings public, the president announced that some changes would be made in the Iraq strategy. What we got in January from the president was something that practically ignored the recommendations of study group, calling instead for 21,500 additional troops. Then, with the blind faith of the most loyal Chicago Cubs fan, the president told us, "Wait til September!"
Well, its September, the people have waited, and the only substantive change within the last 10 months has been the removal of Rumsfeld and the addition of 21,500 soldiers. New paint and fixtures does not change the reality that the foundation has structural damage.
Why do we continue to dance to the tune of post-9/11 fear and "Support the Troops?" Both, given the context in which they are mendaciously used, are nothing more than emotionally charged red herrings.
But we continue to use a WWII lexicon to define 21st century outcomes. In WWII, when allied forces took Berlin, forcing the remnants of the Nazi regime to hide in underground bunkers dining on cyanide, Germany soon surrendered. Likewise, after two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan, the Japanese soon surrendered as well.
If this is the measure, U.S. objectives in Iraq were accomplished in 2003.
An exegesis of General David Patraeus' Congressional testimony this week that the United States should be able to reduce troops from 160,000 to 130,000 by next summer is to conclude that Iraq's top military commander can only offer the possibility of returning to 2006 troop levels by 2008.
This is a circular effort that leads to more carnage without the possibility of reaching any conclusion. As impressive and knowledgeable as Gen. Patraeus may be, his testimony reflects military responses to political solutions.
Whatever limited reductions in violence that Gen. Patraeus can point to, does not change the reality that we are babysitting an artificially concocted country comprised primarily of three groups that do not want to coexist.
The Kurds want their own country, and there does not appear to be a Shia equivalent to Nelson Mandela who could offer an alternative to the primordial impulses of revenge that decades of Sunni discrimination predictably produced. It should therefore comes as no surprise that the Iraqi parliament has been unable to meet the vast majority of the benchmarks set by the Bush administration.
From a political science standpoint, domestically, it is absolutely fascinating to watch the president stay the course on a policy that 71 percent of the American people now oppose. He can get away with this for two reasons.
First, the votes are not there in Congress to get the president to change course. Without the veto-proof margins in both houses, the president still maintains the advantage.
Second, the president is not up for reelection. He is under no obligation to retroactively offer any mea culpa for the gravity of his mistakes. Iraq will be the problem for the 44th president to solve. In short, the cowardice of this president will be someone else's headache.
And should a Democrat win the presidency and begin troop withdrawals, it could quite possibly lead to Republican think tanks and revisionist historians creating another sequel for political gain: "How the Democrats Lost the War on Terror: Why they cannot be Trusted to Lead."
If post Vietnam is any indicator, this one surely has the potential to be a blockbuster.
Byron Williams is an Oakland pastor and syndicated columnist. E-mail him at byron@byronspeaks.com or leave a message at 510-208-6417.