"run away! run away!"

[arkansasbob]

does anyone find it ironic that many of the people (john kerry, et al) who were saying we didn't have enough soldiers on the ground in iraq in 2004 are the same ones saying we have too many now? and some of them (john murtha, et al) are now saying we should pull out all together. the democrats would like nothing more than for us to pull out without finishing the job. then they can take credit for getting our boys home and blame the republicans for overthowing saddam and leaving the region in chaos. at the same time it is not in george bush's best political interest to keep troops in iraq because of all the political heat he is taking over it. for this reason, my biggest fear is that we will pull out too soon, rendering pointless all the hard work that has been done over there. with the political tide swinging toward a pullout, the only thing ensuring that we do it right is integrity and desire to do what is best for the future. and we all know how good politicians typically are on those two counts. so rather than following murtha's (sounds kinda like arthur) advice and hopping on his imaginary horse and running away, i hope bush pulls out the holy hand granade, counts to five -- er, three -- and blows that viscious little bunny all to bits.

[saltydawg]

The only thing we are running away from is GWB's stupidity.

[saltydawg]

Rep. Murtha is thought to be conveying a message from the military's top leadership. In other words, the Iraq situation cannot be resolved with US military force and all we are doing is degrading our army and marine and reserve forces.

For every insurgent we kill, 2 appear to take his place.

Are you one of these republicans who think we are winning in Iraq because your beloved leader never seems to say that we are, only that we must continue to smash our head against the wall.

[arkansasbob]

Rep. Murtha is thought to be conveying a message from the military's top leadership. In other words, the Iraq situation cannot be resolved with US military force and all we are doing is degrading our army and marine and reserve forces.

For every insurgent we kill, 2 appear to take his place.

Are you one of these republicans who think we are winning in Iraq because your beloved leader never seems to say that we are, only that we must continue to smash our head against the wall.

thought by whom? mr. murtha, like mr. kerry, was against the war, before he was for it, before he was against it again. is that the message from our military leadership? i would have thought our military leadership would be able to communicate directly to their commander-in-chief, rather than having to use some obscure representative as a go-between.

i am not really a republican, salty. more of an anti-democrat. i consider myself a libertarian with morals. i have plenty of critcism for mr. bush, but very little of it has anything to do with the war in iraq. i will, however, have some criticism for him if he cuts and runs for the sake of his own short-term political interest. that is the only way to ensure failure in iraq and the war on terror.

[dhussdawg]

i am not really a republican, salty. more of an anti-democrat. i consider myself a libertarian with morals. i have plenty of critcism for mr. bush, but very little of it has anything to do with the war in iraq. i will, however, have some criticism for him if he cuts and runs for the sake of his own short-term political interest. that is the only way to ensure failure in iraq and the war on terror.

Yeh, i will lose a ton of respect for him also. I hate how politics is ran. I could never be a politician because if i had an idea that I knew was good, but wasnt all that popular, I would have to tell the majority to piss off. Because let's get honest, for the most part the majority doesnt know any better. They are naive to many things. We need politicians that will clean house (ie-cut spending on worthless crap, quit being bribed, etc.). It wont ever happen because many people in politics are selfish pieces of garbage, along with many people that are getting those handouts that would be cut. The American Way has been skewed to think that cheating and not earning your living is okay too.

[CARTEK]

The Epilogue in Murtha's book, which came out about a year ago, specifically stated that we should not have a timetable for withdrawal and that we should plan to stay in Iraq to ensure that the vacuum left by Saddam's exit was not filled civil unrest. What has chenged in the last year?

[dhussdawg]

The Epilogue in Murtha's book, which came out about a year ago, specifically stated that we should not have a timetable for withdrawal and that we should plan to stay in Iraq to ensure that the vacuum left by Saddam's exit was not filled civil unrest. What has chenged in the last year?

He started taking advice from Salty.

[saltydawg]

He started taking advice from Salty.

What has changed in the last year? Look at the number of soldiers and marines killed in Iraq as well as the ability of our ground troops to conduct combat operations in another theater of operations.

Obviously, the top military leadership knows that trying to talk sense to GWB is a waste of time. Truly sad when the Commander in Chief has to quote a 2 star general to support his position.

The fact that Murtha changed his position should wake some of you guys from your blissful slumber.

[CARTEK]

While any US loss of life is too much, 2000 deaths (with about 50% the result of an event other than battlefield-related) in 32 months is astonishingly low. In fact, I do not think anyone would have ever predicted that losses would have been this low.

[Bill Pup60]

JACK MURTHA EDITION

Much of the media treated U.S. Rep. Jack Murtha's call for an immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq as something of a major defection of a once-staunch war supporter. That's not true, of course; Mr. Murtha has been a critic of the prosecution of the war for at least two years, as a look at the record of the Pennsylvania Democrat shows.
n "U.S. and coalition troops have done all they can in Iraq. It's time for a change in direction."
— Murtha at last week's Capitol Hill news conference. j
n "We cannot prevail in this war as it is going today.... We either have to mobilize or we have to get out. ... I know what affects (our troops). They want to be taken care of and they're not being taken care of."
— Murtha, at a May 6, 2004, news conference.
n "You can't fire the president ... but somebody recom­mended this policy to him and he took the recommenda­tion. Somebody has to be held responsible and (the presi­dent) has got to make the decision who it was."

— Murtha, speaking about postwar planning,
on Sept. 15, 2003, as reported by The New
York Times the next day.

[arkansasbob]

The fact that Murtha changed his position should wake some of you guys from your blissful slumber.

wake up, salty! he apparently changed his position again today, voting down his own proposal.

[aubunique]

If W would go over and lead the soldiers on patrol in the streets, he could gain a lot of respect. But persisting in sending others into an obviously unwinnable conflict doesn't draw much support. He is in an untenable situation that someone with more intelligence will have to guide him out of.

If I were to spend much time reading a thread on the Iraq War, the thread would have to involve various thoughtful plans to "complete the mission."

Criticizing the critics of the current situation doesn't make anything good happen.

[arkansasbob]

If W would go over and lead the soldiers on patrol in the streets, he could gain a lot of respect. But persisting in sending others into an obviously unwinnable conflict doesn't draw much support. He is in an untenable situation that someone with more intelligence will have to guide him out of.

If I were to spend much time reading a thread on the Iraq War, the thread would have to involve various thoughtful plans to "complete the mission."

Criticizing the critics of the current situation doesn't make anything good happen.

criticizing a president for not patrolling the streets with soldiers makes even less happen. a plan is great if you are working with things you have some control over. what do you want bush to do? put out a plan and send a copy to the terrorists? maybe they could have a conference call: "as you can see on the third page, mr. zarquowi (sp?), it says here that you guys quit fighting after about six months. then we start bringing troops home and ya'll slowly fade away. any questions?"

[aubunique]

Reread my whole post. I don't know the solution but would appreciate the opportunity to read some proposals that show thought.

The absurd amount of criticism of Clinton caused me to avoid criticizing Bush. So I don't waste much time on that.

But given the situation, what do we do?

Is there a way to appease a group of people able to recruit suicide bombers?

Such people do not fear losing their lives or having their friends and countrymen killed. So what approach should our nation take to the situation?

Those who were adults during the Vietnam War can see the similarities, and this enemy appears to be a lot less sane. Religion has become a part of the political equation. A Christian nation would be handicapped by Jesus' philosophy.

Peace appears to have become a curse word in our society once again.

[aubunique]

"If W would go over and lead the soldiers on patrol in the streets, he could gain a lot of respect."

Read that carefully. It IS a fact. Maybe you choose to interpret it as criticism, but it simply is a fact. Americans tend to want a return for sacrifices such as the lives of our young people (and the permanent reduction of capacity to enjoy life of many more), the waste of resources, the diminution of our nation's credibility, etc. So the time to have won the war seems to a high percentage of Americans to be long past.
ALL of us want the killing to end, I believe, including the president. But who is to advise him?