Little Hawk makes a valid point re: Iraq. Nations and history are a flow---like water going down a stream. The land changes over the years. For better or worse.

I think another question is more pertinent than "what if we left"---should we be there in the first place.   We have created our own quagmire built on a lie by ---as John Prine says in song--"...by some cowboy from Texas who starts a war in Iraq". NOw we are paying the price.

Like Israel---leave an area (Gaza) and all hell breaks loose by all the people jockeying for their piece of power. Saddam was a horror---but not our problem.    We surely did not do much in other areas where genocide goes on---and have no oil. So---it is hypocrisy to say things like---building democracy because we want the area to be a better place (that is after the inanity of the WMDs, the 9/11 involvement by Saddam, etc;)

One has to say that this administration has pretty well ruined any decent international relations and foreign policy situations that have been created over many years----or as Maureen Dowd so well states today in the NYT---to W this is one big keg party.

To digress---what a sad sight to see him with a mouth full of food talking to Tony Blair using his expletives---like a good ole boy would. Can you picture FDR, HST, even LBJ that gross (in public)---not even slick Willie.   They have and had class that represented us in a positive light. We have the head of the frat house now and his food fights involve weaponry.

Bill Hahn