Posted on: Monday, December 27, 2004

COMMENTARY

By David Polhemus
Advertiser Staff Writer

As the most self-avowedly business-friendly president since Calvin Coolidge, it's only natural that President George W. Bush would pledge to run government like a business.

Government will function better, he says, when it's run like a business. It will be more accountable. It will concentrate on the bottom line. It will be more results-oriented.

But businesses have developed sophisticated ways to measure their results, such as cost-benefit analysis. Business ventures are subject to targets and benchmarks going in, and when they underperform, there's no dithering or agonizing over changing course or even pulling the plug.

If government were run like a business, President Bush would have presented the American people, two years ago, with a clear set of criteria for judging the progress of the war in Iraq. That didn't seem necessary at the time; recall our expectation of a flower-strewn welcome.

Without objective criteria, there is little agreement today on the fundamental question: Are we winning or losing?

Bearing on this question are some fairly unassailable considerations:

First, the original rationale for the war was wrong. The intelligence was wrong. The estimates of required troop strength were wrong. The predictions about the response of the Iraqi people were wrong.

Has anyone been held accountable?

Second, the cost estimates were wrong. Besides $200 billion of crippling debt for our children and grandchildren, there are more than 1,300 Americans dead, some 10,300 wounded, and possibly 100,000 Iraqis dead. Some unpleasant news: The Army and Marine Corps cannot sustain global readiness at their current level of combat operations much longer without being supplemented by a draft. And we've staked our nation's credibility on the outcome.

Who's watching our bottom line?

Third, how do we define success? At one time Bush promised a showcase democracy rising almost spontaneously in the absence of Saddam Hussein, which would catalyze a dramatic transformation of the entire region. Today many would settle for a new Iraqi government that represents all population groups and can defend itself. Secular modernity and women's rights are beginning to look like wishful thinking.

Is this what we call results-oriented?

The escalating mayhem in Iraq begs the question: How can Iraqi voters expect to be protected at 9,000 voting precincts when U.S. soldiers in Mosul — one of the most stable cities in Iraq until a month ago — aren't safe as they sit down to lunch? The American public, meanwhile, appears increasingly worried about the course of events in Iraq and wondering where the exit is.

The message from the White House last week didn't suggest a light at the end of the tunnel. The first round of elections on Jan. 30 should not be expected to reduce violence, it said; troop reductions in substantial numbers should not be expected in 2005.

There appears to be very little sentiment in the United States for the "cut and run" option, even though a majority of Americans now believe the war was a mistake. Few Americans wish to leave Iraqis worse off, in some ways at least, than they were under Saddam.

But a movement to replace Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is gaining traction, not among liberals who opposed the war in the first place or who were offended by his role in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, but among hawks who feel he hasn't done enough to win the war.

President Bush urges us to "stay the course," but it's not clear that doing more of the same thing is likely to produce different results. Perhaps it's time to examine some alternative strategies — a new course.

Make no mistake. The battle in Iraq is between people who badly want to make democracy work for them (even if they disagree over what that would mean) and those who will stop at nothing to prevent it. We've tried to support the right side in this mess, even if hasn't always been clear to Iraqis.

This job is far bigger, far tougher than Bush anticipated, although he had stern warnings from the diplomatic and intelligence communities. The question now is not whether it's worthwhile bringing democracy to Iraq — of course it is. What remains to be determined is whether — given the limitations of our resources in light of our other global obligations — it's achievable.

For starters, it's unrealistic to expect Americans to support the present rate of casualties over the long term — certainly not for the decade we fought in Vietnam. Yet experts in the Pentagon say the Iraqi occupation could last that long.

There's no doubting American compassion and idealism. But what's needed is a fearless and searching assessment, based on facts rather than wishful thinking, of where we stand in Iraq. Is it a bottomless quagmire or are we witnessing the darkness before a great dawning?

In that regard, at least, perhaps it's too bad government isn't run more like a business.

David Polhemus is an Advertiser editorial writer. Reach him at dpolhemus@honoluluadvertiser.com.