Daily Kos: Anatomy of A(nother) Fiasco

by billmon

Mon Aug 18, 2008 at 08:57:24 AM DT

Georgia, Georgia
No peace can I find.
Just an old sweet song
Keeps Georgia on my mind.

Stuart Gorrell and Hoagy Carmichael

It’s not like I really wanted to spend the weekend thinking about last week’s small war between Russia and the Caucasian republic of Georgia – not when I could have been watching women’s beach volleyball at the Olympics instead.

But ever since the obscure dispute over the breakaway province of South Ossetia suddenly flared into a good old fashioned Cold War crisis (putting the US – or at least John McCain – toe-to-toe with the Russkies) I’ve been trying to figure out exactly how America found itself obligated to defend the security and territorial integrity of a place name most Americans probably associate with peach trees and Scarlett O’Hara.