Bush's War In Iraq Fits The Very Definition(S) of a QUAGMIRE...

[DistressedAmerican]

I was making this graphic. So, looked it up.

From my trusty Webster's College Dictionary:

quag-mire - Noun
1) An area of mire or boggy ground whose surface yields under tread.
2) A situation where extraction is difficult.

Now look at this shot from the "Main Front" of The War Aginst Terror (TWAT), Iraq and tell me it does not meet both definitions!

As always kick it if you dig it!

[rkc3]

1. The War Against Terror - that's pretty good.

I could see bush running around - We're winning TW$T - but that would piss off his base.

[Amonester]

2. HIGHLY RADIO-ACTIVE AREA

TONS OF DEPLETED URANIUM PARTICULES IN EVERY BREATHE THEY TAKE!

...anyting new? aWoL said he's "catapulting" the propaganda!

:scared:

[DistressedAmerican]

8. We Will Be Killing Iraqis Long After We Leave (If We Ever Do)!

By the time we get out Goegre and Dick's spoiled spawn will have spent up a lot of that war profiteer money. Then we'll see another run for president!

[Igel]

3. I don't think I agree with the second definition, or at least.

limiting myself to just those two. I've used the word for (1) and (2), but they're not the definitions I use for "quagmire" as applied to Vietnam.

I think as important as "difficult to get out of" is a meaning derived from the first definition "a situation in which traction is difficult to gain, and therefore the progress necessary for an acceptable exit from the situation is unobtainable."

I've gotten in lots of situations that were hard to get out of, but they were hardly quagmires since I was making progress; and I've been in quagmires that had easy exits, but which were all unacceptable to me.

On the other hand, English is noted for accepting wide variation in usage, so maybe my definition is just an outlier.

[htuttle]

4. Maybe it's more like a Monkey Trap than a quagmire, then

From an old children's fable from India:

The way you catch a monkey is quite simple. What you do is put a large, heavy jar with a mango or banana in it out in the open. The jar has a very small neck. Soon enough, a monkey will come along and stick his hand inside to grab the fruit. When he tries to draw his hand out he can't. The hand with the fruit is too large for the neck of the jar. The monkey could easily let go of the bait and escape, but they never do. Even when he sees the catcher with his net, he'll jump up and down and squeal ferociously, but he won't let go of the fruit. He simply can't. It's quite beyond his power. No one knows why, but that's the way it is, and that's how they catch the monkey.

All Bush has to do is let go of the fruit (the privatization of Iraq's resources), but he won't because it's not his nature.

:shrug:

[DistressedAmerican]

5. Great Analogy!

[DistressedAmerican]

6. kick

[DistressedAmerican]

7. ...

[DistressedAmerican]

9. Evening Kick!

[DistressedAmerican]

10. ...

[DistressedAmerican]

11. One More Try...

[DistressedAmerican]

12. Late Night