And honestly: Being a worse commander than GWB is hard to achieve. Most of the current problems in Iraq, Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan just come from the fact, that the USA needed to invade Iraq without a reason and before having defeated the real enemy first. Bin Laden is not caught yet. And I doubt a president Bush will be in office when he gets caught.
You seem to have forgotten how things really happened.
Iraq:
You might recall that Iraq was subject to being invaded again ever since the end of my war in 1991. The war actually never ended--all that "No Fly Zone" enforcement, which most folks never heard about. Anyway, there were UN resolutions passed in 1991 to that effect. More recently, Saddam was showing every indication of being back in the WMD business, so MORE UN resolutions were passed authorizing an invasion of Iraq if Saddam didn't come clean on the WMD issue. These actually weren't necessary because the 1991 resolutions covered this case, but Bush went to the trouble of getting fresh resolutions to make everybody happy. Saddam didn't comply, so we invaded, with the full authority of the UN.
The UN then immediately claimed we'd acted on our own, in a typical display of UN moral bankruptcy. And of course, the Germans, French, and Russians played leading roles in that. Turns out this was because of the massive "Oil For Food" corruption scandal that was lining UN and Euro leaders' pockets, and removing Saddam would end this sweet deal for them. Says wonders about the character the UN, Europe, and Russian, doesn't it?
As it turns out, there weren't any WMDs in Iraq, but it wasn't just the US that thought there were. That was a widely held belief, and many folks still say the things got shipped to Syria before the invasion, although I'm not so sure. However, it was because the believe was widely shared that the UN passed the resolutions at all. And besides, why would Saddam pretend he had them, risking invasion, if he didn't have them?
As for Iraq's sectarian troubles, that's the fault of the people (mostly Brits IIRC, but all Euros of some sort) who carved up the Ottoman Empire after WW1. They drew arbitrary lines on the map creating artificial countries without regard for ethnic territories. Thus, they created the whole of today's Middle East problems.
But anyway, Iraq seems to be coming to a successful conclusion. And you can't argue that the world's worse off without Saddam in it, even if he didn't have any WMDs.
Iran:
You can't blame this one on Bush at all. That place went nuts in the 1970s under the Carter administration, and hasn't changed since except to want to be a nuclear power. Which Russia is aiding and abetting, instead of trying to prevent, while at the same time threatening to invade Poland if she deploys a missile defense system which in part would protect Poland from Iranian missiles. Gotta love the Russians for that.
Pakistan:
This place has been in turmoil ever since the Brits bailed on India. You can't even blame this on the US, let alone Bush.
Afghanistan:
IIRC, this place was systematically smashed from end to end by the Russians back in the 1980s and nobody (not the US, not Europe) cared enough to patch the place up afterwards. So it reverted to anarchy and brigandage, and a home for the likes of Bin Laden. We're trying to fix that now, with some very grudging help from a few other folks. And the only reason we get any help there at all is because Afghanistan wasn't filling crooked UN and Euro politician pockets with billions in oil graft money.
Bin Laden:
It would be nice if he was dead, but for the past few years he might as well have been. We've totally smashed his organization and completely removed him from a position to do us harm. However, there are a bunch of other crazies willing to fill his shoes. We've taken down a lot of them, too.
The fact of the matter, however, is that all these crazies exist due to governments like Syria, Iran, and Saddam's Iraq willing to arm, train, and equip them. The only way to stop that is to change those governments, because decades of finger-wagging and half-hearted UN sanctions have completely failed to make a difference. Which is as good a reason as any for invading Iraq, bringing us full circle.
Summary:
Seems to me ALL the problems in that whole part of the world are the result of decades, if not centuries, of European and/or Russian imperialism, meddling, bungling, outright criminality, and failure to face up to the consequences thereof. And now that we're trying to clean up your mess, you say the whole thing is our fault. Specifically, the fault of Bush. It's disgusting. How can you all look at yourselves in the mirror?
). But here we are. I'm going to have to do some reading on her, I've never heard of her until today, sadly. Should be interesting to see where she stands on the issues.
