Quote of the day: "Americans want the troops brought home. But they also know that it isn't likely to happen soon and that no matter when America leaves, Iraq could well become a more chaotic, violent place. They have learned that in the Middle East the U.S. has very little, if any, control over what might occur... Slowly backing out of Iraq is hardly inspiring and won't be likely to satisfy either the President or his opponents. It may look just as messy as what the U.S. is doing now. But a responsible retreat would limit U.S. casualties and move America out of a debilitating chapter that has now played out politically at home, if not militarily on the ground. In a world of bad options, a phased withdrawal is the least bad one out there."
This is a really, really great article about the situation in Iraq that actually asks the difficult questions: "What would a withdrawal look like? How might it work?" For instance, the idea that kept Congress up all night recently, that we could bring the majority of troops home within 120 days, is insane. The sheer amount of men and equipment we have in Iraq will take years to fully remove, even at a dead run.
As for your own, bad, drunk host, today I went to Target and bought a frame for my rejection letter, which I will post a picture of in a few days. Honestly, I'm sick as hell of uploading photos through Blogger so it might be slim pickins' for a little while. But I went to the library and splurged on 8 books which I'm going to try to read in the next 3 weeks. I realize that I'm roughly 15 weeks from heading home and I've neither written nor read nearly enough down here. So I'm going to remedy that as much as possible. I resurrected Phylloxera-- a wine-induced idea for a story about the precise moment you know a relationship is over-- and got a decent outline written and started filling in the gaps. It may not turn out too great, but it's a story that I really need to write, so it will be good for me and fuck everybody but me. I have to continually remind myself of that in the face of publication and the "big heaping plate of cocaine for the ego" that publication can be. I write for me and only me. If someone else can connect with it, fantastic. If not, they can eat my ass with a shrimp fork and steak knife, with a big frilly napkin on the side.
Drink Count: 7
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