Who Lost Georgia?

Or a lot of it?

In the wake of the Russian invasion, Georgia has been ripped and torn asunder. The tens of thousands of refugees who staggered out to Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital, took with them accounts of bombing, mass looting, kidnappings, shootings, arson and, on what thus far seems a smaller scale, of killing along ethnic lines. Russian troops and Ossetian looters roamed at will, conducting organized intimidation and ethnic cleansing. See the photographic evidence. The desires of the peoples of Abkhazia and South Ossettians to be independent of Georgia could have been negotiated by diplomacy sensitive to the wishes of all. But now it will be resolved at the cost of much bloodshed, destruction, and lingering enmity.

Who's responsible for this human tragedy?

I lay responsibility firmly at the feet of the BushenCheneyenMcCain (BCM)school of foreign policy:

• selective inattention to anything not starting with "I" and ending in "ran" or "raq"
• conduct of the diplomacy of non-diplomacy - otherwise known as maintaining a deaf ear

The lack of American prior restraint on Georgia President Mikhail Saakashvili is but the last in a long list of blunders of omission or commission by BCM. (It is reminiscent of Bush's lack of restraint on Ehud Olmert's attack on the Hezbollah two years ago.) What delusions was Saakashvili permitted or encouraged to entertain by his American advisors? That the USA would come to his aid if he bombarded and invaded South Ossetia? What about the self-delusions of our own BCM, committing the USA (since 2005) to the defense of Georgia when we have been up to our balls in two military occupations/wars which have over-taxed us militarily, economically, and diplomatically?

Wars are fought over differing perceptions of reality. Our misleaders are divorced from reality. And millions of my fellow Americans have not fully grasped the fact that, well into the 5th year of an occupation of Iraq, our country is no longer the leader of the free world. We are spent.

How humiliating it is, as an American, to see our leaders whining, complaining, and beseeching the Russians to behave themselves.

And so it was shocking to see the Russians ignore Condoleezza Rice's demands that they cease, desist and withdraw from hostile action in Georgia. And then she lectures them on being mired in the previous century's behavior. (Dr. Rice had to be the point 'man', because she was originally hired on as NSC director because Russia was her special area of expertise!) Why did she think she could reprimand the Russians for "Regime Change"? Who - in gawd's name - did she think would swallow such swill? Who in the world? We are not stupid.

How many of my fellow Americans are not so distracted by the Olympics to realize that their BCM government is talking loudly but carrying only a small stick? And a limp one at that?