Pssst, it was called Operation Iraqi FREEDOM!

Via Polipundit.

This is sweet. Jon Stewart understands. He moans. But he understands.

Stewart: But what do you make of–here’s my dilemma, if you will. I don’t care for the way these guys conduct themselves–and this is just you and I talking, no cameras here [audience laughter]. But boy, when you see the Lebanese take to the streets and all that, and you go, “Oh my God, this is working,” and I begin to wonder, is it–is the way that they handled it really–it’s sort of like, “Uh, OK, my daddy hits me, but look how tough I’m getting.” You know what I mean? Like, you don’t like the method, but maybe–wrong analogy, is that, uh–?

[Nancy Soderberg, author of “The Superpower Myth: The Use and Misuse of American Might”]: Well, I think, you know, as a Democrat, you don’t want anything nice to happen to the Republicans, and you don’t want them to have progress. But as an American, you hope good things would happen. I think the way to look at it is, they can’t credit for every good thing that happens, but they need to be able to manage it. I think what’s happening in Lebanon is great, but it’s not necessarily directly related to the fact that we went into Iraq militarily.

Stewart: Do you think that the people of Lebanon would have had, sort of, the courage of their conviction, having not seen–not only the invasion but the election which followed? It’s almost as though that the Iraqi election has emboldened this crazy–something’s going on over there. I’m smelling something.

Soderberg: I think partly what’s going on is the country next door, Syria, has been controlling them for decades, and they [the Syrians] were dumb enough to blow up the former prime minister of Lebanon in Beirut, and they’re–people are sort of sick of that, and saying, “Wait a minute, that’s a stretch too far.” So part of what’s going on is they’re just protesting that. But I think there is a wave of change going on, and if we can help ride it though the second term of the Bush administration, more power to them.

Stewart: Do you think they’re the guys to–do they understand what they’ve unleashed? Because at a certain point, I almost feel like, if they had just come out at the very beginning and said, “Here’s my plan: I’m going to invade Iraq. We’ll get rid of a bad guy because that will drain the swamp”–if they hadn’t done the whole “nuclear cloud,” you know, if they hadn’t scared the pants off of everybody, and just said straight up, honestly, what was going on, I think I’d almost–I’d have no cognitive dissonance, no mixed feelings.

Soderberg: The truth always helps in these things, I have to say. But I think that there is also going on in the Middle East peace process–they may well have a chance to do a historic deal with the Palestinians and the Israelis. These guys could really pull off a whole–

Stewart: This could be unbelievable!

Soderberg:—series of Nobel Peace Prizes here, which–it may well work. I think that, um, it’s–

Stewart: [buries head in hands] Oh my God! [audience laughter] He’s got, you know, here’s–

Soderberg: It’s scary for Democrats, I have to say.

Stewart: He’s gonna be a great–pretty soon, Republicans are gonna be like, “Reagan was nothing compared to this guy.” Like, my kid’s gonna go to a high school named after him, I just know it.

Heh. The end of this exchange was troubling though, very troubling. If I were still a Democrat, it would trouble me, because it reminds me of an exchange I saw between Linda Vestor and Ellen Ratner at the start of the Iraq war, wherein Ratner said “we’ll just have to hope things go badly and we can get back into the White House!”

Stewart: [crossing fingers] Iran and North Korea, that’s true, that is true [audience laughter]. No, it’s–it is–I absolutely agree with you, this is–this is the most difficult thing for me to–because, I think, I don’t care for the tactics, I don’t care for this, the weird arrogance, the setting up. But I gotta say, I haven’t seen results like this ever in that region.
Soderberg: Well wait. It hasn’t actually gotten very far. I mean, we’ve had–
Stewart: Oh, I’m shallow! I’m very shallow!
Soderberg: There’s always hope that this might not work. (Via commentor FRED at Polipundit)

It’s very, very sad. Pathetic and maybe even evil, when you root for more death and destruction because it is politically expedient.

PS. Hattip to a Jonah correspondent at The Corner for reminding me – and the world, that the whole operation was never called “Operation Iraqi WMD” but “Iraqi Freedom.”

All I know is…I can’t remember the last time I saw a poll on the president’s approval numbers.