OIF may be over, but the Iraq war ain't

Lots of people are making this point, and I'm not going to pile on. But in light of Gunslinger and friend of the blog Mike Few's comments on my most recent post, I thought it was important enough to emphasize. I also wanted to highlight an email that Mike received yesterday from one of his old lieutenants who now has command in MND-N:

Hey sir, right after I saw the change in mission on tv, I gave a safety brief to a patrol, we went out the gate, and the lead truck got blown the f*ck up. I guess some dudes didn't get the memo that OIF is over.

Don't forget. And just in case I didn't make my point in the last post: don't forget that while your life in Washington and your worldview may feel different now, here on "day one of life with no Iraq War," the guy rolling out of the wire may disagree.

EDIT: You know, I changed my mind about that title just as soon as I posted it. I guess I'd say that in my mind, and in some big-picture sense, the war is basically over, and has been since a good while before the end of OIF. But violence in Iraq isn't finished, and probably won't be for a while. Nor is anti-American violence, though it's at comparably low levels.

And just as I'm finishing this up, a coworker pointed out to me a cartoon from this morning's Examiner that just about sums it all up.