by Brian Tobin

Created on: October 30, 2008   Last Updated: February 24, 2009

The answer to this question is simple. An economic axiom simply states that if you broke it, you own it. Few would debate that the U.S. broke Iraq. Whatever altruistic reasons may pertain to our breaking Iraq, we now own it. It is the responsibility of the United States to now fix Iraq as best it can. Recent studies conservatively estimate that 1.2 million Iraqis have been killed since the American intervention. Darker motives such as no bid contracts and massive government payments to private contractors to the contrary not-with-standing, Americans must believe in the basic goodness of its leadership and its policies. To do otherwise would betray our heritage and our legacy. We are "The City upon a Hill." Ironically, a self-professed born-again Christian president led us into this moral morass. He authorized what may be the greatest foreign policy blunder in U.S. history. America must now pick up the pieces by helping to repair the surviving Iraqi we have terribly damaged. Two million more Iraqis have fled the country entirely. For the most part, Iraqi refugees cannot go home again.

The first step would be to get out of Iraq as quickly and prudently as possible. The so-called "surge" has merely bought a little time by buying off gunmen so that we have sufficient resources to insure that there need not be another scene like the last helicopter from Saigon in 1975. To understand the complexity of the situation which we have created, a thorough reading of George Packer's seminal book, "The Assassin's Gate: America in Iraq" should be mandatory reading for all public officials. The Madhi Army of Shia mullah Moqtada al-Sadr, for instance, was a power in 2004. Its view was that all the violence in Iraq is the doing of 'Jews, Americans, British, and Wahhabi (Sunni) (268).' This Army is still a power today. Such events as the "honor" killings of young women buttressed by the deeply-held religious biases that transcend any notion of Western secular civilization have such a strong hold on Iraqi society that any notion of Wilsonian democracy will likely never get much more than lip service from the Iraqi people.

The next step would be to help those we can help. The power that is gone today is that of the middle class. Businessmen, doctors, engineers, teachers, and professional of all stripe have simply fled 'WE MUST GO OUT OF IRAQ! We must travel! We must see America! Can you give us hope? A a young woman named Assel who was a computer programmer at Baghdad University pleaded

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