[QUOTE="Hog"] [QUOTE="Charlie"] [QUOTE="Hog"] Civil wars are usually grisly.[/QUOTE] There was no civil war until the self-righteous and reckless Bush-Blair "Let's Fuck-up the World" factory went in. As Phil Launchbury and I and others have pointed out, the destruction of Iraq's virtually entire infrastructure [with the remarkably 'lucky' exception of the energy ministry] created total administrative chaos. That, cleverly allied with the understandable resentment towards the 'invaders', allowed anarchic street-rule to establish itself.[/QUOTE] So they will either be left as a working democracy or in the stoneage and unable to assist islamic terrorists in producing advanced weapon. Gets my vote. Iran next.[/QUOTE] Yebbut, isn't the very point that the terrorists don't need and, more dangerously, realise that they don't need advanced weapons? We are faced with the possibility of decades of low-level, random, decentralised, fanatical, imaginative, varied, reckless and ruthless acts of indiscriminate violence, each of which could be effected by individuals or tiny handfuls of crazies drawn from a pool of hundreds of millions of angry co-religionists. Makes 'our' job of keeping an eye on a relative handful of Irish protection-racketeers [on BOTH sides] masquerading as principled revolutionaries, and only more or less successfully even when we speak the same language as them, seem like an absolute doddle by comparison. [QUOTE] On a brighter note. It has been pointed out to me that the US economy could be in for a rather rough ride over the next 6-10 years. Rather a good time for the Republicans to take a back seat lol.[/QUOTE] Hmmm. Walking Corpse Reagan drives the already creaking budget into a massive deficit, spending the USSR into oblivion [okay, at least two cheers for that]. Daddy Bush increases the deficit, but at least he has the sense to get 'his' Iraq war funded by the Saudis even though he leaves the job unfinished. Shagger Clinton presides over a period of stability and prudence, despite the debilitating and undermining effects of impeachment and so on, leaving office with the budget in surplus decades ahead of all forecasts. Knucklehead Evangelist Bush squanders it all over again, with estimates running out to 0+bn for fiscal 2006. US economy woes are a direct consequence of them nurtuing the cuckoo in their nest, by cosying up to China. China has underwritten the alarming deficit, by buying US bonds, just as the Japanese were persuaded to do in the 80s. Trouble is, the Chinese will be rather more muscular and unfriendly 'bailiffs' when the time comes.