Marines return to Iraq, Bush returns to the ranch

William Rivers Pitt writes at Truthout.org:

Even maniacs need time to reload, but it is a rare quirk in history when they all run out at the same time, and anyone who has spent any time around wars will tell you that a sudden calm, for no reason, is almost always a time to get braced.-- Hunter S. Thompson, January 20, 1986

The First Marine Expeditionary Force, which took part in the initial invasion of Iraq more than two years ago, is suiting up for another deployment to the war zone. For many in this vaunted crew, it will be their third deployment to that country since all of this began.

And George W. Bush is heading off for another month-long vacation in Texas.

One thousand, seven hundred and eighty-four American soldiers have been killed in Iraq since the Marines first landed two years ago. Thirty nine of those deaths have taken place in the month of July. The civilian casualties in Iraq have skyrocketed. The man who has run the Baghdad morgue for the last 15 years, Faik Amin Baker, says, "Before the war we used to get maybe 250 bodies a month. Now it is 800 or 900 a month from the Baghdad area alone. The situation has worsened dramatically. We cannot cope."

And George is going on vacation, again.

Read it all.