The Unfathomable Depths of Government Imcompetence

The next time you find yourself wondering how the foreign policy of the U.S. has become so destructive and detached from reality, the next time you consider the disaster in Iraq, it helps to remember one simple fact: the people in charge of our government are profoundly, strikingly ignorant and incompetent. While examples abound of government waste and folly, perhaps the most disturbing show of ignorance has come from the countless government officials -- those in all branches of government entrusted with unimaginable power and authority over America's military expeditions and foreign policy -- who have plainly demonstrated their total ignorance of the most basic realities of the world.

Of course there was the catastrophic failure of virtually every official in the Bush administration -- who foolishly and ridiculously predicted that the war would be short and cheap, and that U.S. troops would be "greeted as liberators" -- to anticipate the bloody realities that would result from a war in Iraq. More recently, a number of congressional leaders publicly embarrassed themselves with their total ignorance of basic facts regarding the "War on Terror" and the war in Iraq. In an article by Jeff Stein that would be funny if it were not so tragic, Rep. Silvestre Reyes, incoming chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, demonstrated total ignorance of the difference between Shiites and Sunnis, and incorrectly identified al Qaeda as a mixed but predominantly Shiite organization. One could go on and on about the absolute idiocy of America's political "leaders" -- in fact I plan on doing so in a longer piece in the near future -- however for now it should suffice to read Stein's article and reflect on the inevitability of the bloodshed, chaos and failure that surround such an incompetent organization as the U.S. government.