Say Anything Blog

Here we go again.

Al Sadr, perpetual Shiite thorn in the side of, well, everybody who is trying to do anything constructive in Iraq, is once again playing the U.S., the western media, and the Iraqi government like a well tuned fiddle. This guy is a master of manipulation. Everytime he feels heat he makes noises like he wants to work and play well with others and he’s at it again. And everybody from Washington to my aunt’s cat are biting although not with the same gusto as in the past. The last time we had him back on his grimy heels he called a truce and we swallowed the bait hook,line, and sinker. This time, I think, we’re a bit more wary.

He’s not doing this because he cares about the future of his country. He’s doing for his own survival.

The recent changes in the tactical picture in Iraq haven’t gone unnoticed by Mookie and Company. The Sunnis are well and truly fed up with the bullying tactics of Al Qaeda and have entered into an uneasy alliance with the Maliki government and the U.S.. Al Qaeda is feeling the heat, too. They’ve moved from their previous hunting grounds in the population centers to less well defended markets and busy streets in the outlands. Mookie has been taking notes.

The media - eminently hostile to the Bush administration - has reluctantly been reporting that Al Qaeda is reeling and the Iraqi people, sick of watching their felllow Iraqis being blown into tiny moist pieces, are liking it more and more.

So, the focus and the stink of bad publicity is shifting to his Mahdi Army, which continues to rampage unchecked, sowing death and destruction in their wake. It’s a simple process of elimination.....if you got rid of one group that was causing trouble, why not get rid of another? If he didn’t call off his dogs he ran the risk of the Shiites doing what the Sunnis did: Ally themselves with the U.S.

And then where would Mookie be, poor thing?

The wild card in all of this is the whether or not Mookie actually has control of the thugs he’s armed and pumped for murder. We’ve seen this same caliber of killer the world over, the Balkans, Cambodia, and in a variety of African nations. Common killers, psychos, and bandits get together and in the name of “insurgency” kill, rob, and rape with impunity. It ain’t revolution. It’s organized gang warfare. And maybe they don’t want their little reindeer games to come to an end.

So...we’ll just have to see if Mookie controls them like he thinks he does.