It's a shame Al Gore is not running for office this time around. Right now when people are tired of cowboy tactics they only want somebody "president like" who is able to do the job. The reason people voted for GWB instead of him was probably becaused they were spoiled with Bill Clinton. It's the nature of mankind, we want chance and we want to try new things. Bush was the opposite to Clinton so he was chosen. People appreciated his simplicity, his good 'ol folk feeling, and guts. People got what they wanted and more. Al Gore has all the qualities a good president should have and they just don't seem to make them like him anymore; of all the candidates for '08 there seems to be no body who can match his caliber. Then again the next president in office needs to deal with one of the most difficult periods in US history in terms of Iraq. The next administration needs to pay for the mistakes of the current one and might even end up being blamed for them. I can see Al Gore smirking, sitting back in his couch, sipping scotch, looking at his nobel price and thinking: "Lets wait another four years".
I don't mean to disrespect George Bush because I like him too. He seems like he's got a nice heart but he probably got stuck at the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe he never really wanted to be president, maybe he was just trying to live up to his dad's expectations. Maybe he would have been a lot happier to be a rancher and just deal with his cattle, his land and eat Laura's homemade blue berry pie and BBQ. Because unless the president knows a lot himself, unless he has a strong intellect and can make his own decisions, unless he can choose the best advisors and know their hidden agendas, he is likely to be an easy prey for those around him who want to take advantage of him. Bush has most likely been the victim of advisors who were either not informed themselves about the situation in Iraq or had an hidden pro-war, pro-arms industry, pro-oil industry agenda. No body expected that the current situation would come about. Had they known, keeping Saddam Hussein in power and trying to make friends with him would have been a far better option.
Saddam Hussein was the lid on a pandora's box and when he was gone the shit hit the fan. Iraq is not one country but three countries: Kurdistan, Sunni Iraq and Shia Iraq. These three countries hate each other. The Kurds want independence, the Shias hate the Sunnis for what they did during Saddam's rule and the Sunnis are fighting for their lives. The situation is made further more sensitive by the fact that Iraq is surrounded by neighbours who all have major stakes in Iraq. Iran supports the Shias, the Saudis support the Sunnis and the Turks dread Kurdish independence more than anything else. This means that when Iraq has problems the whole region will be destabilized. Given the natural resources in this region it is also fair to say it has a major impact on the whole world. The Russians and the Chinese also have stakes there and will support whoever they think benifit them the most. If the US withdraws its troops, the building will collapse and the dust that amounts as it implodes will spread a dark cloud around the whole world.
This is what we know now. A lot of us didn't know it at the time of the Iraqi invasion. A lot of us couldn't predict this would happen, then again we were not the people ine power who made the decision. The people who made the decision should carefully have studied the ethnic make-up of Iraq, the internal opposition and the risks of ousting Saddam Hussein from power. Yet somehow the intelligence failed to get through to the top and now we are in the situation we are in today. That is why the president needs to be informed, needs to have strong intellect and analytical thinking. Needs to be able to rely on himself and not on advisors who know a lot more than him.
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