All Politics is Local

July 14, 2004

Josh Marshall describes this Newsweek article (Politics, Iraqi Style) as "A cautiously optimistic take on the new Iraqi interim government that is well worth reading."

All it shows is that the months of US occupation didn't even reach the standard of basic competency:

A first priority of the new government is to make the capital city safe and restore public services. That's obviously what you'd want to do, right?  But Proconsul L. Paul Bremer, based in the American city-within-the-city known as the Green Zone, lived in a world of self-serving denial every bit as delusional as that of his betters in Washington. His constant blather about free markets and democracy, mouthed in Iraq but meant to be heard inside the Beltway, was matched by a persistent failure to stabilize and revitalize Baghdad itself.

While ideology can help to create a philosophy of governing, it can not be the only influence. Instead of competently administering, the Governing Council appears to have attempted to impose a Soviet-like method of governing by ideology-- where simply announcing that Iraq had free markets would create an orderly, democratic society-- without actually understanding Iraq.

Posted by Andrew Raff at July 14, 2004 1:59 PM