Pres. Bush begins his second term in office next month after 
narrowly defeating democratic challenger John Kerry in the 
November election. But little has changed with regard to how 
Americans feel about their president. They remain deeply divided.

According to an Associate Press poll taken this month the sharpest 
division concerns how the president is handling the war in Iraq. 
Americans are split 50/50 on whether or not we should have gone to 
war with Iraq. 

Hindsight is, of course, 20/20. And if we had known then what we 
know now, that more than 1,000 Americans have died, that 
terrorists have not been halted, and that the Iraqi people still 
don’t like us very much, perhaps the popular support of the war at 
the time would have collapsed entirely.

As it is, we’re over there. And there is little we can do but 
finish the job. But the poll shows that many Americans don’t 
believe Bush is doing a very good job of finishing it. He was 
great at starting it; finishing it has him a little puzzled.

Not surprisingly, a solid majority of Americans do not believe 
that Iraq will ever have a stable democratic government. Only 47 
percent of those surveyed said they believe a stable government is 
likely. 

And of those who believe achieving stability there is unlikely, 
the majority are college-educated urbanites who own a home, 
meaning those who have the most faith in Bush’s abilities are 
lower-educated country folk who rent. Don’t blame me; that’s what 
the survey showed.

Personally, I believe the 47 percent who hold out hope that Iraq 
will form a stable, democratic government are deluding themselves, 
just like Bush. We’re talking about a third-world, Arab nation 
full of Islamic people who have known nothing but a tyrannical 
dictator most of their lives. They wouldn’t know what to do with a 
democracy if one were bestowed upon them, (which, in fact, is 
actually what’s happening).

One of my elementary school teachers once told me something that 
still sticks with me, because I believe it’s true. She said that 
if you took 100 Americans and stranded them on a deserted island, 
they would eventually elect a leader. But if you took 100 
communists or 100 people from any other form of dictatorial 
government and stranded them, they would wait for someone to step 
forth as their leader, someone with the strongest type-A 
personality I guess.

The Iraqi people are waiting to be lead. They don’t want Saddam 
and they don’t want to be mistreated. But deep down, they don’t 
really want democracy either. And there is little chance they will 
get it.

Even if they do manage to pull off an election next month, the 
government will be far from stable. The rebel forces and 
terrorists won’t let it stand. And no matter what we do over there, 
we will never be able to stamp out suicide bombers and the kind of 
terrorism the Islamic nations tend to breed. They are like 
cockroaches. Even a nuclear holocaust wouldn’t extinguish them.

So Bush can go ahead and play his little Iraqi war games and 
continue to put more and more Americans in harms way. He can send 
in more troops and extend the tour of duty of others. He can 
continue to speak his rhetoric and threaten the enemy. But, in the 
end, the best he will be able to achieve is a Vietnam-like draw. 
And we all know how that eventually turned out.

It’s not that I’m being cynical. I’m just trying to relay the 
situation as realistically as possible. I hope I’m wrong.