The Bush Administration has been doing its best to paint a happy face on the Iraq occupation but reality keeps getting in the way. The New York Times reports today that even in Mosul, a city 'once so promising,' the current American military 'crackdown is draining away much of the goodwill that remains.' Earlier this month a leaked CIA report [3] warned that resistance to the US occupation is growing among ordinary Iraqis, leading to a new US plan to speed up transfer of power to Iraqis. But the plan 'to turn over power in Iraq more quickly was thrown into disarray on Wednesday when the country's most powerful cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, made public his opposition to a
proposal for indirect elections.' How bad has it gotten for the Bush Administration? Even long-time CIA and Pentagon operative Ahmad Chalabi [4] is accusing Bush of letting his re-election concerns determine policy [5] in Iraq, saying 'The whole thing was set up so President Bush could come to the
airport in October [2004] for a ceremony to congratulate the new Iraqi government. When you work backwards from that, you understand the dates the Americans were insisting on.' " President Bush's surprise Thanksgiving visit in Iraq with 600 soldiers lasted less than a few hours, including a very brief meeting with Chalabi [6], under severe secrecy [7] for his own security.