AWAITING GENERAL PETRAEIOUAS' REPORT

Yes, this General with all of the vowels is slated to give a report to Congress. He will go into the benchmarks attained in Iraq, as outlined by the White House and by Congressional leaders. But he needn't bother. I could do it for him. Anyone following the news in Iraq could do it for him.

Last weekend, close to 1,800 Iraqi citizens were killed. That's 1,800 people, with more than a thousand bereaved spouses, several thousand grieving children, and various hundreds of anguished relatives. We hear these statistics and it is like hearing that a flock of birds died in Minnesota. Sad, but not sad enough to give us pause. Perhaps it is time we started to think of the Iraqi as people, not a country filled with terrorists, deserving death, and not worth a moment of our concern.

In fact, we seemed to have shown more outrage over the poor, imprisoned dogs drowned and hung by Michael Vick and his nefarious relatives than we do those slain in the Iraqi slaughter. Everyone I know was talking about those dogs, furious at Vick, wondering how any human being with an ounce of compassion in his heart could do that to these helpless creatures.

Yet we hear statistics about death and upheavals in Iraq, and we note them, shake our heads, and that's it. We don't even bother to sit down and write a letter to a Senator, or pick up a placard and march down Pennsylvania Avenue. We simply go on with our lives....while a bloodbath is taking place in a little country attacked by our own forces, an ethnic cleansing of sorts, as two tribes battle over religious differences and governmental inequality.

Not long ago, the only Kurds I knew about were in a nursery rhyme along with Whey. But Kurds are one of the tribes...or sects...in Iraq. Evidently they have the oilwells and want more oilwells. The Sunni, another tribe, have no oilwells, but in Saddam's time, they were the chosen group, since Saddam himself was Sunni. They are educated, it is said, and most of the doctors, professors, lawyers, etc., were Sunni. I say "were" because most of them are gone, having fled this godawful chaos that is Iraq.

The main group, the reigning group, is the Shia. These Shiites, as they are called, have control of the government. They are fundamentalist Islamics and even before the Election were busy pointing their fingers at the Sunni as sinners. Beauty parlors and saloons were wrecked. Women were attacked for not covering their heads and faces. One man was accosted and whipped because he did not wear a mustache and beard.

All Iraqi mosques seem to be sacred. Now, in this country, you might find an old ramshackle church in the countryside, needing a paint job, and as obscure as an old, rotting tree. But, in Iraq, the mosques are extremely sacred, with gold filigree and sacred images and historical meaning. These tribes like to enrage each other by bombing these mosques, keeping the feud going.

How Bush ever thought he could generate a Democracy in a country where one group, the Shia, are a vast majority, is anyone's guess. Because of sheer numbers, they are naturally going to win all democratic elections. Some other method might have worked, but evidently no one thought of a civil war breaking out. It was overlooked, just as a million other things are overlooked.

Anyway, this report...which I could write, without ever having set foot in Iraq...will go something like this.....

"There is great improvement in Iraq. This province is completely in our hands, thanks to our friendship with the formerly murderous Sunni, who are now fighting the always murderous Al Queda. Peace reigns in Fallujah.. a model community filled with gloriously happy people. Yes, there is progress, but we must all have patience, for it will take time and many, many billion more dollars, which we can borrow from China, unless we tick them off by complaining about them poisoning our dogfood and our children."

Do you see what a marvelous report I could write? I'm sure Congress would sit right there and hand me a blank check. The report goes on....

"When the Iraqi troops are ready, we will begin pulling out our troops. They are not ready yet. They weren't ready last year. They weren't ready the year before that or the year before that. We have hopes that, one of these years, they may be ready. For what, we don't know. They are slow learners, but a one of them has learned to pull a trigger. Of course, he shot himself in the foot, but at least he tried."

This report is so good, I may give myself a Pulitzer. How could Congress deny the facts I am carefully laying out. So, I will continue.

"The British have Cut and Run, the sneaks, leaving us to courageously carry on without them. They must be Democrats. We must carefully continue our Surge, which is trickling along very well. Now we have to find a political solution for Iraq. We must move very carefully and not lose our heads in this process. Heh. Heh. "

I think a little humor helps, don't you? Obviously, we have all gotten accustomed to our heads and would like to keep them attached. Using them might be another story, but then you can't use your head if it is rolling around in the sand, now, can you? Well, to carry on my report....

"President Bush has a clear strategy on how to proceed in Iraq. It is different than the old strategy and the strategy before that. Instead of Prayer Meeting before a battle, we will now hold it after the battle. Those who do not make it in the battle will be beyond prayer anyway. Another part of our new strategy will be to figure out a way to bomb Tehran while claiming victory in Iraq. The weapons are pointed in that direction, and all we have to do is push the button. But, we just can't think of a name for the attack. Shock and Awe has already been used. Surprise and Squeak? Zoom and Boom? Somehow, we have to make this decision very soon!"

Well, that's it for my report. I hope Congress realizes the hours of study it takes to write such a document. There's so much commotion around here, the only quiet place I could find is a toilet stall in order to have some peace while I was writing. The funniest thing happened. As I was sitting there, I saw a piece of paper on the floor...written in Arabic, of course. I leaned down to pick it up and my foot accidentally poked into the adjoining stall. Well, you guessed it! I am now under arrest and awaiting my fate. I guess I'll miss the General's report, after all!