John McCain's attempt to sell his US presidential candidacy on the basis that he backed the troop surge initiated last year is comical - or tragic. He supported an unnecessary and disastrous war. He backed the administration's misguided occupation policies for years. And he wants to keep troops in Iraq for 100 years or more.
Yes, things in Iraq finally got better after they got worse - much worse than Senator McCain ever imagined. But thousands of Americans and tens or hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are dead. Tens of thousands in both nations are injured or maimed.
Millions of Iraqis are refugees. Iran has been greatly strengthened. America's international reputation has been savaged. And the US Treasury will bleed for decades to come. Yet he believes that his support for the Iraq war is a reason to vote for him!
This demonstrates Senator McCain's lack of sound strategic judgment. Indeed, we should not be surprised when he thoughtlessly jokes about bombing Iran, blithely proposes attacking North Korea and cheerfully pushes for confrontation with nuclear-armed Russia over peripheral issues in the Caucasus.
Further evidence of his poor judgment is the fact he believed in the free lunch promised by the Bush administration. Former deputy defence secretary Paul Wolfowitz predicted the war would pay for itself.
Yet, the Congressional Research Service believes the Iraq war is now costing about US$9.8 billion a month. So far, Congress has authorised total expenditure of US$656 billion for the Iraq imbroglio. The cost will soon outpace that of Vietnam, currently second only to the second world war.