Woo hoo! Finally, the President is listening to the people of the United States!
President Bush has announced that he will reduce troop levels in Iraq!
By next summer.
To the pre-Surge level.
If certain conditions are met.
So, in other words, when it became clear that a majority of Americans wanted the 130,000 troops in Iraq brought home, the President sent 30,000 additional troops to Iraq (the "Surge"). Now he's finally saying he will bring the troops home, but only 30,000 and in another eleven months or so, and only if the Iraqis get their act together. Yeah, okay. That sounds like what we wanted.
Maybe we should use the Brer Rabbit trick and tell him we want all the troops sent to Iraq. Seems to me his natural response would be to bring them home.
5 comments:
It's called "leadership". If you want to go back to a nation run by the whims of the latest polls, feel free to keep voting Democrat.
Oh, I forgot, no worry there. :-)
Seriously, I might disagree with the way elements of the Iraq war have been handled, but I still admire Bush's character. He knows what he believes to be right, and sticks with it. I find that somewhat preferable to pandering to the whims of polls. And remember that I used to be a pollster for a living.
Leadership? Character?
This has nothing to do with polls. Iraq is a disaster and Bush is just doing what he's done ever since he was elected; hold a position without regards to reality and stubbornly insist he's right, regardless of the facts. He's not exhibiting character, he's exhibiting mental illness.
It's made even more tragic because of the lies the administration told to get us into this quagmire. And the strategy now is simple delay. If there are still 130,000 troops in Iraq next summer, Bush needs only delay another six months and then the next President has to deal with it. He can't even take responsibility for cleaning up his own disasters.
I read an interesting article by a fella who used to be in these administration meetings, and he relayed a story about Bush that sums him up perfectly. They were trying to figure out where they could pull 100K troops from quickly to get them into Iraq at a moments notice. One person suggested Sweden, and Bush said, "No, they're neutral. They don't have an army." The writer corrected him gently, saying that the president must have been thinking of Switzerland, who actually does have an army, but that Sweden had troops they could possibly send. Bush replied with, "No, it's Sweden. They're neutral." And the matter was dropped. A couple weeks later, Bush saw the writer at a social function, and said to him, "You were right. Sweden isn't the neutral one."
Bush relies on faith, both in God and in his own instinct, to make decisions, and refuses to listen to anyone who might tell him otherwise. This is not character. This is a stubborn moron.
Agree with the comments about Bush in general (character!?) but the situation is more complicated than simply staying or going. The fact is, we created this mess in Iraq and we have some responsibility to not just abandon the Iraqis to their fate. In that sense, it's a bit disingenous for Democrats to talk about "bringing the troops home" when, in all likelihood they know it's not going to happen overnight anyway. The liberal antiwar groups simply are sticking their head in the sand and pretending that there won't be any consequences from withdrawing. Don't get me wrong; the war is a disaster and Bush is an idiot, but the way out now is not so simple.
I agree that it's a difficult situation because we messed it up and to just leave would create chaos. Clearly, many people will die without the protection we provide. I don't think the "liberal antiwar groups" don't realize that.
However, people are dying with us there, so since most Iraqis don't want us there and we don't want to be there, at some point we have to get the heck out. Either way, it's going to be a mess.
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