Iraq & The Day After the Study Group Report

An Iraqi father cradles his fatally wounded daughter

Being a little slow on the upstart and morbidly optimistic in a cynical sort of way, I kept thinking yesterday -- and it occurred to me again this morning as the chickadees yapped at me while I went up a stepladder to fill the bird feeder -- that the Iraq Study Group had spoken and change was in the air.

There was an anticlimactic and almost slow-motion feeling about Wednesday. The ISG meets with The Decider at the White House. (Is change in the air?) The ISG goes to Capitol Hill. (Is change in the air?) The networks pre-empt the soaps for an ISG press conference. (Is change in the air?) ISG head honchos James Baker and Lee Hamilton appear on the evening news shows and "Larry King Live." (Is change in the air?)

Unfortunately, I was wrong. Change is not in the air.

Since I've been coblogging at The Moderate Voice, I have a new appreciation for bipartisanship-ness and the ISG has been a model of that all but passé concept. Even though the group's recommendations had been leaked for weeks and pretty much comported with what I thought they would be, I was hopeful.

Regretably, I was wrong. Change is not in the air.

The Decider is still president. The war in Iraq is still his war. The likelihood of him heeding theISG's clarion call is remote. And the little girl in the wrenching photo above this post is still dead.

Tragically, I was wrong. Change is not in the air.

(Photograph from Al-Arabiya TV)