the forgotten american dead: rural america paying the ultimate price in iraq

Easier said than done. It's been more than three years and the majority of people still don't have electricity on a regular basis. I read a story about how reconstruction officials were picked on politics, not merit. Now, there's too much violence and chaos to take on a large-scale reconstruction effort. Just an all-around fuck up.

 

I'm not sure, but leaving in eight months or a year won't fix it. That's why I have to agree with the president on this one. My only question is, why aren't we sending 50,000 or 100,000 more? To Baghdad. Give 'em 75,000 troops and six months to fix their shit. Then, bring the extra home with six month deadlines following -- 50,000 a pop until there ain't no more there.

 

And the next time President Stupid's fans tell you that Congress has no role, and start talking about him as Churchill, remember what Churchill said in 1942, when the British Empire was coming apart, and it looked like the Germans were headed to Whirehall:

"Since my return to this country, I have come to the conclusion that I must ask to be sustained by a Vote of Confidence from the House of Commons. This is a thoroughly normal, constitutional, democratic procedure. A Debate on the war has been asked for. I have arranged it in the fullest and freest manner for three whole days."

That is how you do it.

 

Absolutely, Congress has a role. If they'd cut the purse strings, we could be on our way home tomorrow.

 

President Stupid. Not bad. Guess which board liberal has a new nickname, Fenian.

 

You and me, bags.

 

dog, I'm a Republican. What you posted was very well-done. I agree with all of it, save for the above portion.

Was it Bush's fault that this was the perception before this? Did he say it would be in and out? How did that perception come about?

I don't ever remember Bush saying this was going to be easy, nor do I remember any Republicans saying it was going to be easy.

Maybe I just missed it. But it wasn't ever going to be easy, right?

Like I said, I agree it's a mess, and I posted on a thread a few days ago that I feel bad that people like Yawn are giving Republicans a bad name.

But it was never going to be easy.

 

Cheney, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld all said it would be easy, in so many words.

You don't recall "over in a week" or "greeted as liberators"?

 

I can certainly remember phrases like greeted as liberators.

Over in a week? I don't remember stuff like that.

I'm in agreement it's a tough situation.

 

But, as has been pointed out, we don't have 100,000 troops to send. To anywhere.

We're stretched thin as it is. Our soldiers are still fighting -- and dying -- in Afghanistan. We don't have the manpower to make that plan work.

 

Just from memory, I remember Kenneth Adelman saying that Iraq would be a cakewalk and Rumsfeld saying he thought the insurgency would be over in a matter of weeks. In any case, here's what the Downing Street Memos say:
"There was little discussion in Washington of the aftermath after military action.”

 

From ThinkProgress: (http://thinkprogress.org/the-architects-where-are-they-now/)

Prior to the war, Rumsfeld repeatedly suggested the war in Iraq would be short and swift. He said, “The Gulf War in the 1990s lasted five days on the ground. I can’t tell you if the use of force in Iraq today would last five days, or five weeks, or five months, but it certainly isn’t going to last any longer than that.” He also said, “It is unknowable how long that conflict will last. It could last six days, six weeks. I doubt six months.” [Rumsfeld, 11/14/02; USA Today, 4/1/03]

Wolfowitz said the U.S. would be greeted as liberators, that Iraqi oil money for pay for the reconstruction, and that Gen. Eric Shinseki’s estimate that several hundred thousand troops would be needed was “wildly off the mark.” [Washington Post, 12/8/05]
“We are dealing with a country that can really finance its own reconstruction and relatively soon.” [Wolfowitz, 3/27/03]

Among a host of false pre-war statements, Dick Cheney claimed that Iraq may have had a role in 9/11, stating that it was “pretty well confirmed” that 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta met with Iraqi intelligence officials. Cheney also claimed that Saddam was “in fact reconstituting his nuclear program” and that the U.S. would be “greeted as liberators.”

“And a year from now, I’ll be very surprised if there is not some grand square in Baghdad that is named after President Bush. There is no doubt that, with the exception of a very small number of people close to a vicious regime, the people of Iraq have been liberated and they understand that they’ve been liberated. And it is getting easier every day for Iraqis to express that sense of liberation.” [Richard Perle, 9/22/03]