Barrett Kalellis
Tuesday, May 25, 2004

For those old enough to remember, Brer Fox and Brer B’ar made a “baby” made of tar and placed it by the side of the road, hoping to trick Brer Rabbit into striking the thing when it didn’t answer the rabbit’s greeting.

“Sure ‘nuff,” Brer Rabbit took a swing at the tar baby and got all caught up in the black, sticky tar so he couldn’t even move. Fixin’ to have him for dinner, Brer Fox and Brer B’ar come along to taunt, leaving Brer Rabbit’s only escape to use his wits and outfox Brers Fox and B’ar.

It’s a shame because it’s a great symbol for George W. Bush, who came upon a tar baby named Iraq. Just as surely as Brer Rabbit, Brer Bush is trapped in the tar, thinking that with advice of his cocksure advisors, he could show this baby a thing or two.

Going into battle with the noblest of motives — to liberate Iraqis from an evil dictator and establish a free state smack dab in the middle of essentially medieval fiefdoms — he didn’t count on the fact that he is actually fighting two enemies. One is the group of terrorists and nationalist and religious factions that will do everything possible to drive Americans and their allies out of the Middle East altogether.

The second, and much more powerful adversary, is the growing number of disaffected, impatient, complacent and even isolationist Americans on the home front looking for the “quick fix.” Whipped to a panicky agitation by the mainstream liberal media and office-seeking Democrats, they are fearful of a protracted conflict that results in more casualties, increased denunciation by European press barons and the “Arab street,” followed by increased calls to “internationalize” the effort.

Every adversity or mistake that Americans are presently encountering in Iraq is endlessly replayed, dissected and challenged by news programs, on-air commentators and print pundits. In an election year, the political pressure to “get out” to relieve this anxiety-causing news is enormous.

Thus we see deadlines being uncomfortably set to “hand over” control of Iraq to an approved, indigenous Governing Council; a headlong rush into public investigations leading to courts martial after the Abu Ghraib prison scandal; a “Five-Part Plan” to assure the country that the Administration indeed has a workable objective.

The facts, however, are less sanguine: unless another Iraqi strongman presents himself, the country is presently ungovernable, and will be so after June 30, after which each member of the Governing Council will have a bulls-eye painted on his back. Since improvised explosive devices seem to be the weapons of choice among Arab terrorists, a few council members dispatched in this way will surely throw the whole group into disarray. Don’t depend on a newly reconstituted, inexperienced, ragtag Iraqi army to ride to the rescue.

Whatever might be said of the vile Saddam Hussein, he held the country together for 40 years by sheer force and brutality. It seems almost inconceivable that long-standing tribal, cultural and religious rivalries among Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds can be paved over with a hastily assembled ad hoc government based on a not as yet written “democratic” constitution.

What is more likely after a handover is that things will continue status quo ante. A war zone will still prevail, and assassinations might increase until the whole thing turns into a bloody civil war as each faction tries to gain power. And as we learned in Vietnam, TV-generation Americans and present-day politicians no longer have the stomachs for long wars by proxy against fanatical foes.

The only way to win what now has become a full-scale guerrilla war, ruthless and savage determination coupled with brilliant strategy, tireless effort and brilliant leadership are needed to rout those who continue hostilities.

To save himself from the tar baby, Brer Rabbit tricked Brer Fox and Brer B’ar into throwing him into a briar patch, which they thought would be worse. Once there, the canny rabbit only smiled at his adversaries, feeling right at home in his “laughing place.”

Poor Brer Bush, on the other hand, still bound to his tar baby, is looking for extrication and his own respite. As Election Day nears, the laughing place seems a distant prospect.

Barrett Kalellis is a Michigan-based columnist and writer whose articles appear regularly in various local and national print publications, and is a featured pundit for NewsMax.com and TownHall.com. He may be reached at kalellis@newsmax.com.