Bush-Halliburton et al are profiting at the expense of the US People, they are setting themselves up for comfortable directorships once their time in this awful government has come to an end.
I strongly believed that we should have finished Saddam in the first Gulf War, there was a popular uprising in the South, and had we supported it, I believe Iraq would be in a stronger position, the Iraqi people whould have trusted us for a start, but it was the French who held us back then, no doubt wanting a country to sell arms to once the "problem" had settled down. Iraq has not been "pacified" as you term it, because we went in on the wrong attitude, furthermore, mistakes were made in the way the invasion was handled, namely the complete dismantling of the Law and Order system at the time.
America and Ourselves are not a shining beacon of morality, and Islamic countries are also far from it, however, these being democracies, we all have a right to voice our opinions be they leftist, centrist or leaning to the right. America treats its friends well? My how memories fade, the lack of support (diplomatically or otherwise) in the Suez escapade. Or the fact that the Senate wanted nothing to do with Hitler's march on Europe, thank god for FDR during the Second World War, because very few men would have gone beyond the Isolationist mindset of America at the time.
I ask you TheManInTheMiddle, but have you ever been in a situation where you have been faced with an enemy's weapons, threatening to try you as a spy, put you in an Iranian prison for Seven years? If you have and you kept to name, rank, and number then congratulations, but if you are no more than another Armchair Warrior, then shut up. Or would you rather have opened fire with your rifle on the eight Iranian speedboats which outgunned you, facing a certain death, and an almost certain subsequent war.