Troops Withdrawing from Iraq As Obama Flutters In
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“So difficult it is to show the various meanings and imperfections of words when we have nothing else but
words to do it with,” wrote philosopher John Locke (1632-1704).
The Washington Post printed an article Monday obviously timed to coincide with Barack Obama’s arrival in Baghdad entitled “For ‘Surge’ Troops, Pride Mingles With Doubt … Soldiers Leave a More Secure Iraq but Are Unsure if Hard-Won Gains Will Hold.” It is long on editorial opinion, and story telling but short on news - if “news” means new facts. It does reports that “The soldiers, who came to Iraq as part of President Bush’s troop increase, began returning home last week” a fact that has been virtually unreported but is widely believed to have set the timing for Obama’s appearance there.
In a companion article the Post reported, “But after meeting for nearly an hour with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and other top U.S. and Iraqi officials, Obama declined to say what they had talked about.” This continues Obama’s kabuki-like silent movie strategy to give his writers time to perfect and teleprompt his speech for Euro-American audiences. So-far American main stream media have been surprisingly introspective after receiving sharp criticism for its stilted coverage of McCain versus its fawning and falling all over itself to promote Obama. In June, for instance: major TV network news developed 114 minutes to Obama to 45 minutes to McCain.
The discussion about troops in Iraq is undergoing a subtle shift in rhetoric with The U. S. and Iraq describing a withdrawal “horizon” (as far as the eye can see) rather than a time table (being a date certain). The former is fluid and includes situational analysis rather than circling a date on the calendar so enemies can hunker down, and wait. Most military people think that is an invitation for disaster.
Grammatolatry (gram-uh-TOL-uh-tree) noun: The worship of words: regard for the letter while ignoring the
spirit of something. From Greek gramma (letter) + -latry (worship). “The worship of words is more pernicious than the worship of images. Grammatolatry is the worst species of idolatry.”Robert Dale Owen; The Debatable Land Between This World And the Next; Trubner and Co; 1871. ip).