Moral Equivalence?

People are always dumping on the USA about Iraq: the Big MEAN Americans beating up on the little Iraqis.

I don't doubt there are some accidental deaths of civilians and perhaps even the occasional excessive force.

However, if the USA wanted to be like the Romans of old, they would just send in the B-52s and level Fallujah and not risk a single Marine life. Instead, the US Marines are holding their fire hoping against hope that they won't have to go in house to house to root out the several thousand insurgents in Fallujah.

Place your bets: what do you think these radicals would do if they had a small American town surrounded?

Here is the latest in Yahoo! News. Negotiations are ongoing and I'm hoping for the best but ready for the worst.

Hopefully, moderate elements of Iraqi society will rise up and say to the ones who want to fight to the death: NO, rather, we will rebuild a life here and now and for our children and not die in a blaze of Jihadist glory.

Otherwise, the Marines will go in. And the thing that breaks me up is that they will risk their lives not just because they are going to get shot at but they will risk their lives because they will try their very best not to kill Iraqi civilians caught in the middle.

For those who say the USA is trying to be an imperialist power: we are sure doing a lousy job of it.

And maybe the reason why is that we aren't an imperialist power and are trying our best not to be. The result: a somewhat messy Iraq. But if in the end, we hand over the country to them and they build some semblance of a free nation then they will be far better off then they were with madman Hussein at the top.