Modus operandi

When president Bush again compared Iraq to Vietnam it reminded me of the time he made fun of John Kerry's purple hearts and silver cross, as if they were Cracker-Jax prizes.

In order to deflect attention from his own war-time "champagne corps" stint and the holes in his service record, president Bush made light of John Kerry's service. The traditional media loved it and the Rush Limbaugh types enjoyed making fun of the man that served his country so admirably during time of war. Rush Limbaugh, of course, didn't serve due to boils on his backside, but that was deemed irrelevant.

I found the whole thing disgusting, but many of my fellow Americans seem to have deemed the strategy vote-worthy.

Should we be shocked that the president is comparing the Iraq war to Vietnam, which was a war that brought "agent orange", "napalm girl", "hippies", and "embassy rooftops" into the American lexicon?

The lessons of Vietnam are referred to as the Powell Doctrine. Colin Powell was marginalized and then tossed aside by the Bush administration in what was perhaps the most ignorant achievement of the Messiah of mismanagement.

The New York Times has written a feisty op-ed with attention paid to the Vietnam analogy. You can read it here.

I think all you need to know about Vietnam is this.

I think all you need to know about Iraq is this.

Democrats I suggest you do not get muddled or confused by the president's attempt to rewrite the past in order to reinterpret the present. What I suggest is that you glom onto his mistake for once and cement the analogy in the minds of Americans. If he wants to be proud of achieving a foreign policy disaster that is the equal of the Vietnam catastrophe then he is like the child crudely changing his F to an A on his report card. The A is not to be congratulated and treated as an achievement in this case is it?