Bush: Saddam to blame for Iraq's instability

Live, from Bizarroworld! It's President Bush!

President Bush said Wednesday that Saddam Hussein, not continued U.S. involvement in Iraq, is responsible for ongoing sectarian violence that is threatening the formation of a democratic government.

In his third speech this month to bolster public support for the war, Bush worked to counter critics who say the U.S. presence in the wartorn nation is fueling the insurgency.

Bush said that Saddam was a tyrant and used violence to exacerbate sectarian divisions to keep himself in power, and that as a result, deep tensions persist to this day.

And here I thought it was pretty obvious that, like the former Yugoslavia, having a brutal autocrat in charge tended to quell religious violence. And, you know, a power vacuum at the top tended to unleash those forces.