Replies to post #238005 on Zeev's Turnips Talk Politics (ZTTP)

[moneynmetals]

Because we didn't have a game plan for after the ground war.

That's what happens when your presidential cabinet have no veterans of any service. To boot you have a draft dodging silver spoon for a president. We were doomed from the start.

The only one the did have was the honorable general Colin Powell. He did the smart thing and bail when he smelled the corruption. H will always be a class act in my book.

God Bless the troops
Semper Fi
MNM

[StephanieVanbryce]

.War Is a Conservative Entitlement Program..


...."..Some months ago, I heard someone seated at the lunch counter at a local diner argue that Saddam Hussein "had been thumbing his nose at the United Nations for 12 years." Wow! That’s a serious offense. Or is it? It sounds to me like Saddam may have been auditioning for a prime time speech at the last Republican National Convention. But think about this: Here was, to all appearances at least, an average Joe American, most likely not a member of the Council of Foreign Relations or the faculty at Harvard. Yet he was more willing to commit American armed forces to enforce United Nations resolutions than the United Nations was. Is that the Bush legacy?

Here’s another thing about arguing with the supporters of the Iraq War, which, by the way, is not good for your blood pressure. If you ask them straight out, they will admit that Iraq was not behind the 9/11 attacks. But it’s not long before they start arguing as though just the opposite were true: "They took out two of our buildings!" Yeah, but you just admitted Iraq didn’t do that.

"I don’t care! We had 9-11!"

Okay, let’s see now. The folks who attacked us on 9-11 were Arabs from the Middle East. Iraq is in the Middle East and it’s populated primarily by Arabs. Close enough for government work.

"I don’t care! We had 9-11!"

That means I guess that we are entitled to attack and invade and occupy wherever we want, because, aw, hell, it’s Bush’s planet, anyway. (The Bush theme song: "It’s my planet and I’ll bomb where I want to…"). Bush’s warmongering is not without its compassionate side, so in addition to more troops for Iraq, the Great Decider has decided we need to spend $1 billion on a jobs program for Iraq. And the liberals thought Bush wanted to destroy liberalism. Hell, he just wants to export and "outsource" it.

Indeed, the whole Bush war-making operation is an expression of a couple of features of liberalism that conservatives have been scoffing at for decades. One is the entitlement mentality. Let’s face it folks, war has become the conservatives’ favorite entitlement program. We are entitled to a war of our own choosing. Why? Because we were attacked on 9-11. (Besides, isn’t good for the old economy?)



http://www.lewrockwell.com/kenny/kenny47.html

[BOREALIS]

The Senate: The Republican Revolt
How close is Bush to losing his own party?

By Richard Wolffe, Holly Bailey and Eleanor Clift
Newsweek

Jan. 22, 2007 issue - Last Tuesday afternoon, a day before President George W. Bush went on TV to explain his decision to send more troops to Iraq, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called his Republican colleagues together for a private talk. Several GOP senators had already come out against the plan. McConnell, Bush's closest Senate supporter on Iraq, hoped to keep others from defecting. He urged his colleagues to stand together at least until Bush had the chance to speak to the country. After the meeting, the senators went outside the room to display their unity to waiting reporters. McConnell said he thought more troops were just the thing to "give us a chance to succeed." He then stepped aside so the other senators could second his sentiments. No one came forward. McConnell's eye fell on Trent Lott. "Trent?" McConnell said, motioning him toward the microphone. "I don't think I have anything to add," said Lott.

Bush expected at least a handful of Republican senators—critics like Chuck Hagel and George Voinovich—to run from a troop increase. But the White House was surprised when even pro-war senators, including Sam Brownback and Lisa Murkowski, came out against the plan. Other prominent senators, including Lott and John Warner, the senior Republican on the Armed Services Committee, have been quiet. They aren't bashing the idea, but they aren't promoting it either. Warner and Richard Lugar, the ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, are contemplating a resolution to draw bipartisan support for the recommendations of the Iraq Study Group report.

Senior administration officials, who declined to speak on the record about private deliberations, say the president knows he has to show real improvements in Iraq within two or three months or risk losing even more GOP support. "All the talking points aren't going to make the difference," says a senior aide. "What matters is what happens ... on the streets and the neighborhoods of Baghdad."

A former senior Bush aide who is still close to the White House says if things don't improve, a delegation of Republican senators could one day show up in the Oval Office to tell Bush that the party is no longer with him and the war must end—much like Sen. William Fulbright's forcefully urging Lyndon Johnson to bring the Vietnam War to a close. (Last week Warner told NEWSWEEK he "wouldn't hesitate" to tell Bush if he came to believe Bush's policy was failing.) Bush's challenge isn't just to take control of Baghdad, but to win back control of his party. "Before this, the president's credibility was hanging by a thread," says the former aide. "After this, I don't know. It may be lost."

© 2007 Newsweek, Inc. |


http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16610773/site/newsweek/