Turning the corner in Iraq?

Today, Jordan pledged to send troops to Iraq if asked by the interim government. If we ever turn the corner in Iraq and fix this mess, we might just look back upon today as the turning point. Arab participation in the pacification of the insurgency would be amazing...

Of course, the down side of this could be an insurgence of terror within relatively moderate Jordan.

Fahrenheit Review

Here's one from Richard Cohen.

Kristof on Bush

Please, everyone: CALM DOWN!!! You're making fools of yourselves!

Bush ad

...Implicitly compares Kerry to Hitler?

Iowa Political Market

It's time for another visit to the Iowa Political Stock Market, the market where outcome futures are sold like stocks. Right now the market has Bush worth 54 cents and Kerry worth 46 cents. That's a pretty big lead for Bush. This market is usually a fairly accurate picture of where the race stands - it accounted for Arnold's huge jump in the California race well before the polls accounted for it. However, I'm a bit surprised that it has Bush so far ahead.

I suppose the logic is this:

1. The economy will continue to recover marvelously. Bush can run on this issue if and only if:

2. The media's depiction of the situation in Iraq improves. If chaos breaks out in Iraq, will the media care? If terrorists or insurgents kill 30 Iraqis per day, will the media care? Doubtful. If Allawi uses Saddam-lite tactics and cracks down on his citizenry, will the media care? Probably not. After all, Kerry has been arguing for stability over democracy for a while now. Who knows, maybe Allawi is taking cues directly from Kerry.

At this point, the only issue that could derail Bush is the Abu Ghraib scandal. If the additional pictures and accounts come out, that would bury Bush. In fact, I would wager that many in the media are waiting until closer to the election to bring them out.

Anyway - I'm obviously jumping the gun in bashing the media. Despite what some nuts on the right ("but they reopened the schools!") would have you believe, the media has done a pretty good job covering news in Iraq in some fairly dangerous circumstances. And with 130,000 of our soldiers still in Iraq, they might stay and continue to cover the story. We'll see. But even if the situation becomes terrible, with Allawi in charge, this becomes a brown people problem, not an American problem. I doubt the American public will fault Bush much for what happens from here on out. As I pointed out a while ago, middle America could give a damn about the Iraqi people. Conservatives take this apathy one step further (I'm talking about the ones who think Abu Ghraib was just a fraternity prank). A deteriorating situation in Iraq might not hurt Bush as much as many think, especially since our troops will be moved into the background soon.

What am I trying to say? Right now Bush has about a 50/50 chance in November. If the Democrats had nominated a credible candidate whom we didn't have to hide away as much as possible, we'd be ahead by 10-15 points right now.

The money race

Right now John Kerry trails George W. Bush in the money race $214 million to $148 million. What's remarkable about these numbers is that Bush sought his nomination unopposed. If you add up all of the money that Democrats have raised in the past year, you get a total of $312 million.

I'm starting to wonder whether fundraising trend in Virginia is happening around the nation. Are business interests backing Kerry? After all, stability benefits businesses. Think about all of the instability the Bush Administration has created over the last few years - from the deficit (which threatens interest rates) to the war in Iraq (which threatens to destabilize our energy supply - how ironic is that?).

Kerry's strength as a candidate is that he exudes a boring/solid/tree-like presence. "Vote Kerry and vote for a return to stability" might be the sentiment of many business owners.

Perspective on the transfer of "sovereignty"

I've compiled a list of the most important articles regarding the transfer of sovereignty. Take a look:

Juan Cole

Iraq'd on Allawi's potential as a leader

Bush on "freedom" (from the AP):

ISTANBUL, June 28 — President Bush said today that coalition forces in Iraq would support a possible decision by the new Iraqi leadership to declare martial law to deal with escalating violence and terror attacks.

"Iraqis know what we know, that the best way to defend yourself is to go on the offensive," he said, speaking at a news conference with Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain.

You see, for Bush, freedom = martial law (as long as we're talking about brown people in a far away country that might cost him his reelection).

Good day in Iraq

"Sovereignty" was passed over to Allawi today in Iraq, two days early. The obvious question now isn't that obvious: Does this mean that the US media will withdraw from the country?

After all, when the job was "done" in Afghanistan, they quickly withdrew. Now that the job is "done" in Iraq, will the US military refuse protection? Isn't it in Bush's best interest to keep news from flowing out of Iraq?

Iraq exit strategy

This one could be the ticket.

Dick Cheney

Maureen Dowd HATES Dick Cheney.