Reckless driving

At first glance, Route 27, which winds its way into the Hamptons, and Route Irish, which winds it way into Baghdad, appear to have nothing in common. But they do. On both roads, today's vehicle of choice is the Humvee. Needless to say, it serves vastly different purposes in each place.Humvee-bashing has become a favorite sport on the left because these monsters consume too much fuel. But Humvees merit criticism from the right, too. Far from paying tribute to the troops driving them in Iraq--one of the many purposes that aficionados say their Humvees serve--the vehicle's function as an icon of ostentatious wealth pays them a gratuitous insult. According to Martin Padgett, the author of Hummer: How a Little Truck Company Hit the Big Time, Thanks to Saddam, Schwarzenegger, and GM, buyers "see themselves as dare-takers. The risk that they take might not be driving a convoy in Iraq. It might be making a huge stock sale, but they picture themselves in the same level of risk." Needless to say, this is completely deluded. To begin with, the Humvee's purpose in Iraq is to reduce risk. But, even with extra armor, driving around Iraq in a Humvee carries with it dangers that driving around, say, Amagansett does not. The distance between the war in Iraq and the absence of any trace of it at home, which owning a Humvee is somehow meant to close, is in fact epitomized by it. Only in a nation that has been completely insulated from war's effects could a vehicle of war become a trophy for the rich. It's not enough that those who most enjoy the benefits and freedoms of this country serve it the least. Now they've made leisure rides out of the war machines used by those who serve. The reluctance to abide any constraint on personal autonomy, the conflation of rights and duties--it's all there in one vehicle. Want to make America a better place? Buy a Suburban. The Kurds aren't Shia fans. Hostile Makeover By Spencer Ackerman Irbil, Iraq--What happened to Adel Abdul Mahdi? Less than a month ago, Mahdi was the odds-on favorite to become Iraq's next prime minister. As the largest party in the next parliament, the Shia superbloc known as the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA) has wide latitude to choose the prime minister, and Mahdi was the choice of his party, the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (sciri), which was thought to be the dominant faction within the UIA. Throughout January, Kurdish notables had suggested to reporters that they would prefer a Mahdi premiership to another term for Ibrahim Jafari, whom they consider a theocrat and, worse, a weakling. But whatever Kurdish goodwill Mahdi possessed wasn't enough. Last week, followers of radical cleric Moqtada Al Sadr rallied just enough support for Jafari to earn him a renomination as prime minister, thereby preventing a victory by Sadr's opponents in sciri. The Kurds weren't happy with the Shia's choice--and, increasingly, they aren't happy with the Shia. Around Kurdistan, there's a surprising amount of hostility toward the Shia, with whom the Kurds formed the last government. Some even intimate that it wouldn't be such an awful thing if the Sunnis--who oppressed the Kurds for generations--returned to power. Ahmed Penjweny, a prominent Irbil cleric who served as a parliamentarian in Baghdad during the interim assembly, tells me, "The Shia are simple and ignorant. They can't rule Iraq. Only the Sunnis can." Clearly, Shia like Mahdi who look to the Kurdish north for governing partners should probably expect an icier reception than they've gotten in the past.

By Lawrence F. Kaplan