Who’s trying to use the war in Iraq for political gain, the Bush Administration or the insurgents?

“It’s my belief that they’re very sensitive of the fact that we have got an election scheduled,” Vice President Dick Cheney said of the insurgency yesterday on Fox News. “Their basic proposition that they can break the will of the American people.”

Oh yeah, and it’s just a coincidence that Saddam Hussein’s verdict will be delivered on November 5. “Shouldn’t that raise a few eyebrows somewhere?” our own Tom Engelhardt wrote earlier this month.

The Bush Administration has a long and documented history of politicizing the war in Iraq. They marketed the war after Labor Day in 2002 to swing the midterms to Republicans. They delayed major assaults on insurgent strongholds until after the ’04 election. So delivering a death sentence to Saddam two days before election day certainly wouldn’t be out of character.

And since the Administration consistently confuses the insurgency with Al Qaeda, who do you suppose bin Laden is really rooting for in ’06?

President Bush bungled the war in Afghanistan, failed to capture bin Laden in Tora Bora and played straight into bin Laden’s hands by invading Iraq and turning a secular Muslim country into an Islamic extremist breeding ground. If Al Qaeda had their way, the US would probably stay in Iraq forever.

Bin Laden’s pre-election videotape in ’04 is widely credited with swinging the election towards Bush. So Osama, if you’re reading this blog in your wireless equipped underground cave, I have a special message for you. Please sit this election out.