Okay, whatever spins your hat (or your helmet, as the now-famous photo of Pvts. Snow and Bartlett attested). But according to a cable leaked to the Washington Post and detailed in Editor and Publsher, the situation on the ground in the Green Zone is anything but moonlight and roses.
A PDF copy of the cable shows that it was sent to the SecState in Washington, D.C. from "AMEmbassy Baghdad" on June 6. The typed name at the very bottom is Khalilzad -- the name of the U.S. Ambassador, though it is not known if this means he wrote the memo or merely approved it.View the cable here.
The subject of the memo is: "Snapshots from the Office -- Public Affairs Staff Show Strains of Social Discord."
As a footnote in one of the 23 sections, the embassy relates, "An Arab newspaper editor told us he is preparing an extensive survey of ethnic cleansing, which he said is taking place in almost every Iraqi province, as political parties and their militiast are seemingly engaged in tit-for-tat reprisals all over Iraq."
[...]
The cable concludes that employees' "personal fears are reinforcing divisive sectarian or ethnic channels, despite talk of reconciliation by officials."
I didn't expect the president to come back from Iraq and say to the press in the Rose Garden that we are in deep shit and that life inside the Green Zone is like a replay of Berlin in April 1945. Remember, we're dealing with an administration that scorns the idea of a reality-based community. But who does it serve to come back and put on this show when it's obvious that the situation there is anything but inspiring unless you're Dante working on a sequel? And what kind of confidence does it inspire in our troops, our allies, and the American public when they hear this?
All they really want to know is what the hell did they sprinkle on the brownies on Air Force One.
