Willful Suspension of Disbelief

I'm not going to rehash the whole “zomg, Bush just used a Vietnam analogy, weren't we not supposed to do that, my mind is imploding!” of the past week that's mercifully vanished into the ethers thanks to my recent troubles. I will say that I do find the constant groping of war supporters for a historical analogy to be a sign of their growing desperation. History is going to say they were wrong (Not that they'll be held accountable, of course, because that's just not how things work.) and history said they were wrong all along. But, yeah, the President trying to cite

John Dower in support of the war is beyond incredible. Just, as the man says, they're living “in a fantasy world”.

The book Mr. Yglesias mentions, by the way, is one that's been on my coffee table, so to speak, silently accusing me of abandoning it midstream. It's quite good, I'm just unable to stay focused on any one tome long enough to finish it these days. But in a better world, he'd be the sort of person who's advice we'd have heeded long ago.