Iraq Reconstruction Parallels w/DOGE

[Mad_Machine76]

I've brought this up in a few places here and there on social media (without much of a response), but does what's going on right now with Musk and DOGE seem a lot like what was happening in Iraq with the post-invasion reconstruction? The wanton firing of civil servants, looting of government agencies, the mysteriously constituted and opaque "Coalition Provisional Authority (nobody could figure out who exactly was in charge of that either)," massive corruption, etc. I'm sure other people can probably make some other parallels that I'm not thinking of right now but, considering how the miscreants pretty much got away with it last time, I wouldn't be surprised if notes weren't taken by the perpetrators of that looting for this very moment here in this country.......

Thoughts, opinions?

[al_liberal]

1. De-Baathifaction

JD said as much in an interview.

[Mad_Machine76]

3. I saw that

and wasn't surprised TBH

[SharonAnn]

2. Yes! I do remember. And wildly inexperienced people tasked with complicated jobs.

And like the Fed response to Hurricane Katrina! Incompetence, theft, and leaving chaos in thei wake when the GOP team left.

[Mad_Machine76]

4. Ooh Good one!

College kids were in Iraq too

[genxlib]

5. This

It is the young radical partisans being given free reign that reminds me the most of Iraq. It's the arrogance that goes with the 'move-fast-and-break-things' crowd that stands out as similar for me.

I am constantly reminded of this quote from a 2004 article appearing in the New York Times Magazine.

The aide said that guys like me were 'in what we call the reality-based community,' which he defined as people who 'believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.' [...] 'That's not the way the world really works anymore,' he continued. 'We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors...and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do'.