The Whole Thing

...faellt mir nichts ein.

Regarding Saddam, now in custody, nothing occurs to me at all - at least nothing that won't already have been said or posted or shouted - or messaged from the barrel of an AK-47 aimed into the air. I'm happy to let the Iraqis, the CPA, the US military, President Bush, the anchors, the correspondents, the experts, and whoever else have the floor while I sit back and soak up the details that emerge about this long-awaited event.

Current Discussion: Iraqis will finish off the Baath Party

With a hit by Instapundit and an inspiration from Alaa at Healing Iraq, Dale Amon's suggestion on the already-popular Samizdata site that Iraqis will finish off the Baath Party, and should simply be allowed to do so, has already started some useful discussion. One respondent, RAS, in the post's comment section, makes the sensible argument that, instead of backing the "rats" into a corner, the Coalition should be offering the Iraqi resistance some reasonable calculation from self-interest leading them to surrender or leave the field. In theory, they may eventually see the Coalition as offering them a better chance for survival (in some instances even prosperity) than their fellow Iraqis. My own take, in the post's comments section, extends the same line of argumentation advanced in "Already Over," and also looks to the calculation from self-interest that the Bush Doctrine has been seeking to impress upon Iraqis, Palestinians, and the entire Muslim world.

Current Discussion...

Some unusually well-informed and articulate participants on both sides of the Iraq war debate, and from across the political spectrum, can be encountered in the comments section accompanying this post at Harry's Place. Some of the familiar leftist rhetoric being employed - "decadent ruling class" and so on - fills me with nostalgia...

Contemplating follow-up here on some arguments advanced by members of the pro- and anti-war left - mainly under the heading of the continuity of American strategy before and after 9/11.