Whenever somebody says “We can’t leave Iraq immediately!”, the person has to immediately present a realistic plan on whatever else they want to do with the country.

The plan will have to follow these guidelines:

• Use no more troops than the US can afford (that’s 200,000 without a draft)
• Don’t rely on other mythical sources of cannon fodder (Nato, Russia, China, Martians)
• Do not exceed our already overcharged spending limits (maybe another trillion dollars between friends)
• Do not use magical thinking (“The Syrians will fix it!”, “Iraq has 200,000 trained policemen”, “The oil will pay for it”, “Turkey will be ok with this”)
• Define success of your plan in less than ten words

Any takers?