Verbosities

GW, why should we love thee? Let us count the ways....

He has defeated Saddam Hussein in Iraq.

He has defeated the terroristz in Iraq.

The crazies bitch about his goodness, but here is the final nail in their coffin....

He has defeated global warming in Iraq.

Al Gore and his sissy carbon tax can suck it. Let's have George invade the sun and take care of this issue for good. Tony Blair can ride along as advisor, that is, if he can get vacation time approved from JPMorgan.

[/sarcasm]

Can someone please explain to me why Congress has decided that steroids in baseball is the biggest issue to them? Seriously. Getting Roger Clemens to testify about getting poked in the butt is more important that immigration, Iraq, or health care? This is why the good people of California and Virginia elected Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman and Republic Rep. Tom Davis. To tell us that athletes are using performance enhancing drugs.

Thanks.

Wall Street Journal>The Surge Worked

After years of mismanagement of the war, many people had grave doubts about
whether success in Iraq was possible. In Congress, opposition to the surge from
antiwar members was swift and severe. They insisted that Iraq was already
"lost," and that there was nothing left to do but accept our defeat and
retreat.
In fact, they could not have been more wrong. And had we heeded
their calls for retreat, Iraq today would be a country in chaos: a failed state
in the heart of the Middle East, overrun by al Qaeda and Iran.
Instead,
conditions in that country have been utterly transformed from those of a year
ago, as a consequence of the surge. Whereas, a year ago, al Qaeda in Iraq was
entrenched in Anbar province and Baghdad, now the forces of Islamist extremism
are facing their single greatest and most humiliating defeat since the loss of
Afghanistan in 2001. Thanks to the surge, the Sunni Arabs who once constituted
the insurgency's core of support in Iraq have been empowered to rise up against
the suicide bombers and fanatics in their midst -- prompting Osama bin Laden to
call them "traitors."
As al Qaeda has been beaten back, violence across the
country has dropped dramatically. The number of car bombings, sectarian murders
and suicide attacks has been slashed. American casualties have also fallen
sharply, decreasing in each of the past four months.

It pains the defeatist leaders of Congress to admit that the surge has been successful. It pains pundits in the blogosphere that the surge has worked. The response is anywhere from denial to the twisting of the purpose of the surge. Unlike what some claim, the purpose of the surge was to quell violence and give the Iraqi government the space they needed to achieve political reconciliation, not to suddenly mark items of a list.

Political progress has been slow. And although al Qaeda and the other
extremists in Iraq have been dealt a critical blow, they will strike back at the
Iraqi people and us if we give them the chance, as our generals on the ground
continue to warn us.
The question we face, on the first anniversary of the surge, is no longer
whether the president's decision a year ago was the right one, or if the
counterinsurgency strategy developed by Gen. Petraeus is working. It is.
The
question now is where we go from here to sustain the progress we have achieved
-- and in particular, how soon can more of our troops come home, based on the
success of the surge.

To suggest the United States pull all troops out of Iraq based on your platform for running for office is dangerous. To pander to the nutroots for votes stating your will bring the troops home immediately is shortsighted and will cause more problems for our country in the long run. It is irresponsible and simply, an incorrect decision. Please do not fool yourselves into listening to Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi. Their goal is power and to win elections, not to govern our country. Fact is, they were all for the recommendations of the Iraqi Study Group (a surge in troops, training police and army units) until parts were actually implemented. Instead of standing by their words, they saw defeat was slipping through their hands and that meaurable success was being achieved. At least Murtha was finally able to admit he was wrong.

As the authors- John McCain and Joseph Lieberman- state, the question is how many people can come back home to their families. As much as Nancy Pelosi drools on about Republicans liking war, she fails to realize everyone wants our troops to come home. Some of us know when the time is right. When the job is done.

And it should not be left to Congress to determine when these drawdowns are to be done. Again, McCain and Lieberman hit the nail on the head:

As the surge should have taught us by now, troop numbers matter in Iraq. We
should adjust those numbers based on conditions on the ground and the
recommendations of our commanders in Iraq -- first and foremost, Gen. Petraeus,
who above all others has proven that he knows how to steer this war to a
successful outcome.

Gen. Petraeus has done an admirable job. Those who criticized the man in September without listening to what he had to say or read his reports owe him an apology. Yes, I am looking at you Hillary Clinton.