You might be interested in knowing that the so-called“war on terror” is over. Official U.S. government pressreleases are now using the term “global struggle againstviolent extremism” instead. Of course, a lot of peopleare still using the more catchy phrase — less of amouthful and sounds more macho — but what can one expectfrom yahoos.

The acronym isn’t too cute, either; GSAVEsounds more like a shopping promotion than an importantgovernment campaign, but then we do live in a societyruled by the business class. Personally I would renamethe term the “struggle against violence and globalextremism,” not that it makes much sense, but the acronym — SAVAGE — is fitting because whatever it is they are up todown there in the American Reich, it certainly isn’t verycivilized.

There never really has been a “war against terrorism.”At best, what we have been seeing is a “war betweenterrorists,” with roots that go back centuries, and withthe current policies being pursued by the U.S. and itssubordinate allies, one that is likely to go forward foryears yet to come.

On PBS last month U.S. Secretary ofState, Condoleezza Rice, reacted negatively to asuggestion that U.S. policies were creating terrorists andprattled the usual propaganda about the U.S. being attackedwithout provocation, and so on and so forth. For a personwith as much education as Ms. Rice has, either she skippedeverything to do with history, or she is putting out abig lie, take your pick.

Could it be in Ms. Rice’s view that the U.S. occupation of Iraq and the actions of foreigntroops there are pleasing to the Iraqis who don’t mind atall their friends and families being killed by theforeigners, their homes invaded and searched, and thosedetained being brutalized and even murdered in custody?Perhaps Ms. Rice’s schedule is so busy that she never hasoccasion to read the avalanche of stories coming out ofIraq every day. Or, perhaps she only sees the warm andfuzzy ones crafted by her government.

Aside from the personal violence, I don’t suppose that Ms.Rice might consider that many Iraqis are less thangrateful that their economy has been taken over by U.S.corporations and that U.S. imposed policies give Americans,not Iraqis, power over public versus private models ofownership of resources, access to oil and control ofreconstruction.

Does she believe that they areoverjoyed that the U.S. has lifted from them the burden ofdeciding laws governing banking, investment, patents,copyrights, media and more? Or is it that she knowsexactly what is going on and finds it more useful to spina fairy tale for public consumption, knowing full wellthat the public would never support the unvarnishedtruth.

A couple of giant steps down the intellectual ladder fromMs. Rice we find President Bush running around, desperateto stem the tide of rising disillusion with his policies,and counter the growing popularity of a grieving mothercamped out next to his Texas ranch. The current strategyis to liken the present situation with that of WWII in anattempt to fan the flames of patriotism.

Unfortunately,if one dwells much on WWII and the period before, Bush’spolicies deserve comparison to the German invasion ofPoland or the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. Weapons ofmass destruction in Iraq share a relationship with Polishtroops attacking the Germans to start WWII in Europe.

In an address in Salt Lake City this week Bush usedphrases like “total victory,” “great sacrifice” and“freedom,” and waved the bogeyman of Islamic worlddomination to justify his foreign adventures that arekilling thousands of U.S. service men and women, not tomention all of the collateral damage. He made a point ofcriticizing the Taliban and their treatment of women, andsaid that the U.S. would accept nothing less than acomplete victory over the Islamist ideology.

What hedidn’t say was that the U.S. has now apparently tossed inthe towel on this point and is negotiating inclusion ofIslamic law in the new Iraqi constitution. Protection ofwomen, it seems, plays well in Salt Lake, but notBaghdad.

A growing number of U.S. leaders are calling for thePresident to set a time table for withdrawing from Iraq.The government’s response is to say that such a timetable would benefit the insurgents who would just waitthem out. Probably true, but also irrelevant. The factis that time table or no, time is on the side of theinsurgents who have little to lose and who can wait farmuch longer than the Americans.

No matter how you look at it, Bush has dragged hiscountry into a stinking swamp where he should have neverhave gone. For Canadians, every day that this messcontinues is a day that we all should be thankful thatPrime Minister Jean Chrétien had the good sense to keep us out of it.

Canadians should also be thankful that enough of them hadthe good sense not to elect enough Stockwell Days andStephen Harpers and their war party to government, or wewould be stuck there now, dying for nothing.