Karma ('kär-m&), Noun. 1:

Sniper Attacks Adding to Peril of U.S. Troops
- NY Times

I'm sorry... the town of what? KARMA? Really? Did Iraqi insurgents rename this town for this story specifically?

I'm going to preface this whole diatribe by saying that I don't support either side in this conflict... and that I think we should all just give peace a chance... and that green Gatorade really is the best tasting flavour. But despite my best hopes, wishes and beliefs people are still going to buy the purple stuff and I, in turn, will complain about it.

That said, the U.S. Armed Forces have developed a very special style of war that it has worked hard to perfect. It started somewhere around Vietnam and involves bombing the shit out of "enemy territory" from a few miles up and then sending in an elite team of corn-fed commandos to clean up what's still breathing.

On paper, this idea works harder than an emigrated Iraqi surgeon driving a New York cab. They can minimize casualties early on while dealing a crushing blow to a technologically-retarded ground force. In practice however, well who am I to say it's failing miserably but it's certainly taking a hell of a lot longer than it should or was planned to.

So what have Iraqi insurgents done to fight back against a better trained and better equipped foe? They've decided to fight with what they have... a membership to blockbuster. It's clear to me that some high-ranking insurgent rented a copy of the 1994 movie Sniper (and it's red-headed stepchild of a sequel) and has now gleaned every piece of information Tom Berenger has to offer. How else could they possibly know to shoot at a vital organ?

"They have also developed cunning methods of mobility and concealment, including firing from shooting platforms and hidden ports within cars." Hidden ports in cars you say? I wonder where they learned how to do something as dastardly as that? Maybe if the US tails every white van in the Washington area they'll get to the bottom of it.

In any event, it seems to me that this article (despite being extremely lengthy in typical NYT style) seems to gloss over the fact that the US has been using snipers for the same type of killing since WW2. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if they invented it in the first place. Maybe if everyone went back to the "don't shoot till you see the whites of his eyes" style of fighting, there would be a higher value put on the lives they're spending so much money trying to end. At the very least, they'd save some cash on cluster bombs and white phosphorus.