Robert Scheer: Dream On, Condi

AlterNet. Posted February 15, 2006.

The rise of an anti-American like Moqtada al-Sadr shows how wide a defeat pro-Western forces have had in Iraq.

Condoleezza Rice is someone I knew to be a very bright scholar when we were both fellows in Stanford University's arms-control seminar. Yes, we differed on occasion, but I never had cause to doubt her ability to reason. Now, I do.

Confronted by ABC's George Stephanopoulos with the news that fiery Moqtada al-Sadr, whose Mahdi militia has twice engaged in fierce armed conflict with U.S. troops since the 2003 invasion, was the kingmaker in the selection of Iraq's next prime minister, Rice replied sanguinely, "Iraq is a complex place, there's a lot of voices."