Once again, I'm not cynical enough about the Beltway cesspool.

The crass and craven willingness to evade responsibility and accountability would be beyond belief if we had not already experienced six long years of it:

From troops on the ground to members of Congress, Americans the Beltway 500 increasingly blame the continuing violence and destruction in Iraq on the people most affected by it: the Iraqis. ... Members of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group have debated how much to blame Iraqis for not performing civic duties.

So much for Powell's "Pottery Barn" rule.

Beyond belief. You'd think our ruling class couldn't manage to find a new way to further depreciate America's moral authority, but Lordy, they have.

Quite simply, this is behavior unworthy of parents of a badly behaving six-year-old, let alone a great power, let alone "a shining city on a hill."

We've all seen parents like this:

Little Georgie throws a tantrum in the Pottery Barn and takes down a whole table of glassware. Then the parents close ranks and mau mau the floorwalker, blaming the store because the table wasn't screwed to the floor, it shouldn't have had glassware on it, the lighting was bad, the store shouldn't be open when little Georgie's blood sugar is low, and besides, look at him, isn't he cute? Et cetera.

Anything but stand up, be accountable, take responsibility, and pay for the damage. No, no, they're entitled.

Although I supposed blaming the Iraqis is somewhat less obnoxious than the Dolchstoßlegende (stab in the back) theory. Let the blamefest begin:

"It is the first manifestation of a 'Who lost Iraq?' argument that will likely rage for years to come," said Bruce Hoffman, a Georgetown University expert on terrorism who has worked as a U.S. government consultant in Iraq.

Gosh, I don't know! Who could it be? Jesus...

NOTE There are plenty of Democratic quotes in that story (Carl Levin, Evan Bayh) Sweet Jeebus, Dems! Why blame the Iraqis?! Since it's their war, blame the Republicans! I don't know which pisses me off more: The stupidity, or the unwillingness to go for the throat--even after victory!

UPDATE Since the Times, for some insane reason, believes its columnists are so important they need to get hidden behind the Orange Door, I didn't see this amazing admission by Friedman today until I bought the dead tree edition (and after I gave this post its headline--another case of low-lifes imitating art, I suppose):

[FRIEDMAN] On Feb 12, 2003, before the war, I wrote a column offering what I called my "pottery store" rule for Iraq: "You break it, you own it." It was not an argument against the war, but rather a cautionary note about the need to do it with allies, because transforming Iraq would be such a huge undertaking. (Colin Powell later picked up on this and used the phrase to try get Bush to act with more caution, but Bush did not heed Mr. Powell's advice.

But my Pottery Barn rule was wrong, because Iraq was already pretty broken before we got there.

How, erm, unserious.

But if Friedman was wrong, and Iraq could not be fixed, then Friedman was wrong to advocate the war. And so was the entire Beltway 500, since Friedman's "Pottery Barn" meme went through like grass through a goose. Thanks, Tom. Thanks a bunch. Thanks for being pig ignorant. Enjoy your cocktail weinies.

Of course, you will read Freidman's column in vain to find any sign that he is willing to take responsibility for his catastrophic cheerleading for Bush, and for the war. (We might want to stop calling Iraq Bush's war, and start calling it The Beltway 500's war.)

The Beltway 500 is intellectually and morally bankrupt. They are unserious. We have a ruling class that is as unserious, as frivolous, as arrogant, and as ignorant as the Czar's advisors in the last days of the Romanovs, or the clowns round Kaiser Wilhelm before World War I.

The Beltway 500: Always wrong about everything.