Iraqi Prime Minister says U.S. troops can leave anytime

Okay, George, your move.

This is a golden opportunity to get out of Iraq.

Are you going to continue to hang on to Iraq as if it was your personal trophy? Are you going to hang on the ‘spoils of war’, the income producing opportunities that are making your ‘good ole buddies’ richer while American soldiers die?

Are you going to listen to reason and the demands of both the U.S. citizens and the Iraqi government and get out?

In Al-Maliki’s news conference, he referred to the political reforms that need to be made in Iraq as the reforms that ‘Washington wants’. Notice he did not refer to them as what Iraq wants.

They don’t want us there, George, get a clue. You cannot force them to want us there.

One of al-Maliki’s advisors, Shiite lawmaker Hassan al-Suneid, sharply criticized the U.S. military, saying it was committing human rights violations and embarrassing the Iraqi government through such tactics as building a wall around Baghdad's Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah and launching repeated raids on suspected Shiite militiamen in the capital's slum of Sadr City.

He also criticized U.S. overtures to Sunni groups in Anbar and Diyala provinces, encouraging former insurgents to join the fight against al Qaeda in Iraq. "These are gangs of killers," he said.

This view from a top advisor illustrates a major problem that will never be overcome. They hate each other. How can you possibly expect any success at attaining a ‘democracy’ among Iraqi citizens when they hate each other? These deep divisions within the Iraqi party are along religious lines, Shiite, Sunni, and Turkish Kurds and they do not want to get along. Religion is so deeply embedded in a persons character that it cannot be ‘overcome’ even with the force and will of an American military. You are trying to change centuries of hate and distrust. You are not going to win this, George.

You cannot turn Iraq into a mini America. Give up your quest to turn Iraq into a profit center for America, give up your quest to “Americanize’ Iraq, get out now.