Just when you thought the cynicism of the Bush Administration had reached its zenith, they somehow manage to outdo themselves.
Mr. Bush’s National Security Adviser, Stephen J. Hadley, said in an interview on “Meet the Press” on NBC that the White House has sufficient money under its control to deploy the troops as planned, and he suggested that once the troops are in place, Congress would be reluctant to cut off funding.
“I think once they get in harm’s way, Congress’s tradition is to support those troops,” Mr. Hadley said.
Just to be clear. What Hadley is saying is that if Bush does not get the open cheque book he is demanding from Congress for the Iraq war, his administration is prepared to put young American women and men in “harms way” to force the continuation of such funding. This in itself does not come as much of a surprise, but to frankly admit it is beyond the pale.
This is not just an ugly and cynical piece of political exploitation but it has to be the sickest and most repugnant manipulation that has ever been publicly acknowledged by any administration of any Western Government.
What is surprising however is that none of the right wing blogs has had anything to say about it since Daily Kos raised the issue. War supporters, who have cried out in indignation against the proposal to cut funding for the ever worsening disaster in Iraq, are silent.
The paradox about the war lovers is that while they demand that others “support the troops”, they are the ones who are in fact sacrificing the troops, using the troops, and casting aside the lives of troops to salvage their ideology.