Bollettino

"...war is at us, my black skin, war is at hand from today to tomorrow"-- Paul Bogle


In response to the perennial question War, what is it good for? we have an answer, from WSJ's Alan Murray. Murray writes a weekly column, Political Capital. In this week's column, he gives us a glimpse of the exciting work being done in D.C. Yes, it looks like Iraq is going to benefit not only from democracy, but from a speeded up version of the Reagan revolution!

Throwing off the trammels of the government. Letting the magic of the marketplace do its, uh, magic. Murray gives us historic scenes; Grover Norquist "working on intellectual property laws for a free Iraq.' Undersecretary Treasury secretary John Taylor drafting Iraq's new tax laws. Peter Fisher, yet another undersecretary, writing new securities laws. In fact, the Iraqi democracy has almost everything going for it, except Iraqis. This is a minor lacuna; no doubt, Chelabi is working on rubber stamping Grover's work. . Murray keeps his euphoria under control, but just barely... I mean, we are talking about Iraq becoming the Middle Eastern "Hong Kong!" Great things are in the offing, obviously.

Now, this could all be messed up. Natives have a tendency not to take the long view. Sure, they'll take our food and water, but then they get to resenting the American companies that are exclusively tapped to rebuild their country and begin skulking about with Uzis. As Grover Norquist would say, if he had the time, a free Iraq needs a transition period... yes, to gain the benefits of responsible freedom.

The ardor Murray describes is feverish, and a bit scary. Especially if you are an Iraqi with your own opinions about intellectual property law. Iraq's open moment will come and go before we see it.
D.C., of course, doesn't want us to see it. If the Democrats can shake off their apparent terminal state of stupor, maybe they should say something about that.