There were plenty of smoking holes left after the Shitkicker-in-Chief retired to a life of Texas Rangers baseball games and interviews about how swell it was being President. Everything from the big league economic pooch-screwing to an erosion of civil rights so complete we’re barely left with a ground down pencil nub haunts us. The Big O is responsible now, by virtue of being at the wrong place at the wrong time, but it is still an unusually big burden to bear. The screeching flock of Republican albatrosses around his neck nipping his ass doesn’t help either.

But among those towering monuments to crapitude stand the twin Wars of Error, Iraq and Afghanistan. And being monuments to crapitude, the Big Guy doesn’t want to talk about them. Neither does Mittens. He has enough unanswerable tax questions to flub.

Iraq is now subdued and peaceful – if by peaceful you mean Saturday night on the wrong side of Detroit’s 8-Mile. People still die by the score, infrastructure is an iffy thing, and the politicos still debate the size of the erstwhile President’s desk. If it weren’t for betting on suicide bombers, there’d be no recreation at all. In fact, we’re still footing their bill as they sit on piles of cash and steal what we send.

Sweet deal. I bet Mittens would like to get in on that.

The Withdrawal Capital of the World, Afghanistan, is a bigger mess by the day. Afghan police blow themselves up so often each policeman has a second policeman as a minder topped by a platoon of Green Berets just to keep the death toll down.

Yep. Spreading the fruits of democracy is a thankless job – especially when Hamid Karzai steals anything not nailed down while whining he needs more than the steady stream of bullion already headed his way.

Yes, it is the economy stupid. Yes, people need work and health care, and educations, and tons of other stuff. Yet, we have plenty of time to talk seriously about some ‘moran’ who wouldn’t recognize rape if he dropped the soap at San Q.

It is deplorable.

Tens of thousands of Americans are fighting to keep someone else’s country free…well, at least freer than…oh hell, let’s face it, they aren’t accomplishing a damn thing. Plus, the money we’re spending to keep Karzai in goatskin caps and fashionable capes could pay for a lot of that stuff people need. Worse, people die for the chance to lord it over a bunch of people living a cargo-cult life in a rock-strewn hellhole.

Barry and Mittens, please drop that next campaign stop for a donut and Lardburger Supreme. Stop trying to keep your under-minions from pissing off Rage Against the Machine or schooling them not to use “keep ya’ll in chains” as a metaphor while talking to a large group of African Americans. Pull over, jump out of the old Forked Tongue Express RV, and talk…just a little, about why people have to die and why we should have to pay for it.

It is a reasonable question and people expect a reasonable answer, even if history shows we’ll never get it.

Cross posted at The Omnipotent Poobah Speaks! More than politics, more than pop culture & humor