Or else…what?

Last night, I read Mark Coffey’s take on Bush’s speech and (if you’ll read the first comment) let him know that I wasn’t so enthusiastic about Bush’s warning to Syria and Iran. I felt the threat was toothless and most of the address was unspecific and uninspiring. John Derbyshire hits the nail on the head:

The central and most glaring contradiction is the implied threat to walk away... Yoked to the ringing declaration that, of course, we can't walk away. So-o-o-o:

—-We can't leave Iraq without a victory.
—-Unless Maliki & Co. get their act together, we can't achieve victory.
—-If Maliki & Co. don't get their act together, we'll leave.

It's been a while since I studied classical logic, but it seems to me that this syllogism leaks like a sieve.

My greatest fear is that Iraq has now become a cause celebre in the Middle East, much like Afghanistan and Chechnya beforehand: it’s a rallying call for Islamo-nutters all the world over. If so, it means sectarian violence forever, a Baathist and Shiite dance to the death. Until Maliki discovers some way to fight the militias, there will be no end to the American presence in Iraq. We’ve backed ourselves into a corner where the only thing worse than staying is leaving; which means we're going to muddle through, constantly re-assessing the security situation.