The US military is getting out of the way of the Iraqis who want to take out their own trash.

I hope that this sends a message to the jihadists all over the Arab world. I suspect that it will also make for a more pro-American and anti-Arab-dictatorship government in Iraq when one is eventually formed. They'll remember who their friends, and enemies, were for at least a generation.

Boy, that Marine light colonel does have an unfortunate last name, though, doesn't he?

Maybe the name was a blessing in disguise, and forced him to be the kind of tough guy who would end up a Marine officer, something like the narrator of Johnny Cash's "Boy Named Sue". And who can forget the British officer in Afghanistan (a Colonel, I think) named Tom Chicken? That's got to be an even worse name for a soldier.

I remember reading about Col. Chicken. I thought at the time how fortunate he was not to be in the U.S. Army, since the Royals' insignia for colonel doesn't include a bird.

One of my buddies in the Army once told me that he knew of a soldier with the name "Fauconet" and it was pronounced more-or-less as a Frenchman would pronouce it: FAH-kun-eh. Needless to say, it got corrupted into "F*ckin' A".

And then there are jawbreakers-- there was an NCO I knew whose name was "Feuchtwanger", and known to everyone as "Sergeant Fish".....