Whenever I hear about the Iraq war on the "leftist" podcasts I listen to (other than Media Roots Radio) I always get hit with the usual suspects to blame - freakin' Hillary, the 'Democrat' party leadership (most rank-and-file congressional Ds voted against Iraq), or the uniquely evil super-genius Bush.
Why does no one ever dive into opinion polls at the time showing something like 70-80% of wypipo supported the invasion? It isn't even uniquely interesting to point out 'hypocrites' like Tucker Carlson, Donald Trump or Glenn Greenwald supported invading Iraq - because it would be really strange if they didn't. I do remember Bill Maher saying US troops would get their asses kicked in March 2003 but that was probably just part of his bit of being the ugly guy who gets booed
Yeah, Iraq basically became Galt's Gulch after 2006 and has been that way ever since. The small amount of socialized programs that existed are still being gutted to this day. Everything has been sold off to warlords and foreign interests. America got the oil, warlords got the infrastructure, housing is still free in a lot of places, but it's small and sucks. Power is still intermittent in a lot of places and all the more sustainable energy generation was scrapped for a return to burning oil and gas in generators.
The people are getting fed up though, and if the US finally steps out, we'll see a massive surge in revolutionary organizing. Most people hate ISIS and the US and the warlords. Without imperial backing, they won't be able to keep everyone down forever.
I really hope so. The people of Iraq have suffered so much, it would be amazing to see them thriving.