i'm just askin'

christy hardin smith (aka "reddhedd") at firedoglake asks one of those little innocuous questions that get frequently lost in all the flash and thunder and smoke and mirrors:

if things in iraq are going so swimmingly, why is it that no us official ever makes an announced visit there? why did condi and rummy sneak into town like thieves in the night if it’s all flowers and candy and good news in the colonies? i mean, honestly, we are a sovereign nation supposedly sending members of our administration into the territory of another soverign nation, right? since when have we sneaked into britain or russia or even trinidad and tobago? why all the tiptoeing into iraq? perhaps because they would rather be alive — since things are not going all that swimmingly? i’m just saying.