It appears that General Petreaus has pacified Iraq enough that it is dropping of the US political radar. There are other political pressures in America largely related to poor governance, inflation and wages not rising since the 1970s. America has survived bad Presidents before, it will again this time, but some of the external pressures are going to be harder to treat politically.

Global markets have meant that China and India, specifically, but numerous other nations too, are rising out of poverty and have increasing per capita wealth. This has had to be balanced by the loss of sharing in the global wealth by western middle classes. This is not a new process. Since the 1970s wages have been flat and families have adjusted by becoming two income, and more recently cashing out on the equity of their houses to make up for that loss in wage/salary increases.

There is an anxiety as to what the future will bring domestically. Internationally the US is not leaving Iraq anytime soon. Despite Bush's protestations of freedom and democracy the Iraqi Government is a colonial one. The power in Iraq is with the US military. There is not much in the way of national sovereignty there which was not the intent anyway. The US now sits on top of one of the largest oil reserves and in amongst all the other oil pumping countries of the Middle East. It now has a geographic as well as economic and political stake in Middle Eastern oil.
More reading: Tags, Iraq, American Politics
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