Here's what I'm holding my breath for: The comparison between John McCain's meretricious and self-defeating photo op in Baghdad's marketplace and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's vile PR coup, which served as today's sad denouement to the British hostage crisis.
You know this is coming because all the clever diplomacy firsters have been sniffing around both stories all day. It's only a matter of time before they hit it a nice, steaming turd of moral equivalence.
Now what about McCain's trip to Iraq? What made his oh-so-cavalier stroll through the capital even more depressing is that his takeaway propaganda is rooted in fact. Things are improving in the Baghdad marketplace, as this report from ABC News nicely demonstrates without the flak jackets, rooftop snipers, armored SUVs and aerial assault cover.
Especially galling is to see a once brave dissenter from "national opinion," who convincingly said he'd rather win a war than a presidential election, reduced to such a spectacle as this: a ridiculously fortified campaign stop in the wrong country.
Worst of all is how the Iraqis must feel to know McCain's intentions have changed with his steadily declining place in the polls.
McCain Wrong on Iraq Security, Merchants Say – New York Times