George Will spends most of the year fronting for the Right and corporate government, but with Christmas coming, he's remembered conservatism. Even fairness.
Will writes (Newsweek, 12/22):
"The war with Iraq went well, aside from the detail that the reason for it - weapons of mass destruction - has been elusive."
I guess he figures it's not too late to persuade Santa that he is a truthful boy.
An adult would have added that Paul Wolfowitz, a leading author of the Iraq scenario, has said the WMD story was useful but not the reason we initiated the war.
We also know Will's holiday truth-telling has limits. He makes no mention of the other fabrication used to justify the war - one that many Americans believe - that Hussein was in cahoots with alQaeda.
Well, maybe George is so full of Christmas love he'd rather not deal with too many of the prevarications out of the White House and Pentagon.
For at the end of that exploration lies horror and guilt. So many young American soldiers dead or maimed. So many innocent Iraqis, too. Sacrified to serve what? Wilsonian idealism? Re-election? Oil reserves? Contracts for friends of W?
I don't suppose it matters to the dead.