The Iraqis have been given every chance to make a better life for themselves. When Hussein was deposed they had many options, they chose to blow each other up, to settle old scores and to live in chaos and savagery.

Still though, I don't know if Lugar should be saying it flat out isn't working (and from reading the article it doesn't seem like he did), but he's right that it can't continue indefinately. The "Surge" will continue till September and then there will be a strategy shift. Hopefully in between now and then we'll see more developments like in Anbar and Amiriyah.

Why does Lugar hate USA and love the terra-ists? He is saying cut and run.....how can he undercut the president like that....its just the MSM that sez the "surge" is not working....Bushed sez "if you are not with US then you are with the terra-ists".

"The Surge will continue to September and then we'll see a strategy shift...."

One that won't be essentially military in nature.

The last sentence of the article sums it all up. "...the proposals are intended to increase pressure on Bush and play up to voters frustrated with the war."

Lugar knows Cheney has no intention of shifting his Middle East policy. This statement was made for the benefit of voters frustrated with the way the "war on terror" has been handled. He's throwing us peons a bone to make us believe there's actually effective dissension in the ranks.

HA!

Lugar was, is, and will continue to be Cheney's butt boy on this; his bland statement does nothing to dissuade me of that opinion.

Lugar is a traitor and "with" the terra-ists.

Lugar:

Your career is soon to be over. Deal with it.

Lugar isn't enough. When Warner finally comes out for withdrawal, maybe in September, there might be enough votes to override a veto.

Lugar:

Your career is soon to be over. Deal with it.

Posted by I_N_Cognito


Did anyone even run against him in his last bid for reelection? Lugar is like Kennedy and a few other senators... as long as he wants the job, its his.

dont mistake frustration for democratic surrenderitus.

One by one, as the elected cocksmokers who support the President and his war realize they own the war along with the BushCo Crime Family, they will abandon the Iraq War in order to get re-elected. Remember that Russ Feingold (D-WI) was the ONLY senator against the war BEFORE it began. I sure hope it does not take another four years and another 3500 dead soldiers to end this.

One that won't be essentially military in nature.

Posted by Zed


Probably true... and probably the right course of action. Its time for the Iraqis to take the lead role and for us to pull our troops back and decrease their footprint in the country.

Hope on, John47

If a few more Rebublicans have guts (if that's not a total oxymoron) we might get out of there with just another 1000 American bodies on Bush and Cheney's watch, and on their consciences (another oxymoron) for the rest of their disgusting little lives.

""Its time for the Iraqis to take the lead role and for us to pull our troops back and decrease their footprint in the country.""

Oh, yes now let's pretend that the Iraqis are going to begin securing their own country because the political climate is finally recognizing the truth...Iraq is virtually ungovernable except by strong arm dictatorship.
Now, Republicans are going to begin the "declare victory and get out" dance.
The Bush supporters can try to play that game but this disaster is too large to just put lip stick on....it is going to be like napalm that sticks to the skin of those who supported it. The searing heat of the guilt for sending 3500 soldiers to die for nothing shall brand them so that they will always be recognizable as the stupid sheep who happily sacrificed the lives of other people's kids while demanding tax cuts for themselves.

Rob,

"We must not abandon our mission, but we must begin a transition where the Iraqi government and its neighbors play a larger role in stabilizing Iraq," Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, wrote in a letter to Bush.

How is this a new strategy? People have been saying this for months now. Voinovich just wants attention. And for nothing.

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!DANNI!!!!!!!!!!
!!


before I scrolled to the last post I thought......some liberal is going to say something about the right now going to 'see the light' because its getting around presidential election time.....and you did not disappoint.......

but that doesnt mean that I am clarvoyant.......you know though that if a person was 'clarevoyant' he should be able to conjure up the right spelling......

anyway......one more time.....dont mistake frustration and a desire to end it by winning it with surrender and leave it for the terrorists........

""anyway......one more time.....dont mistake frustration and a desire to end it by winning it with surrender and leave it for the terrorists........""

Hahahaha! Apparently you still think that Republicans are going to go willingly into the next election with the Albatross of Iraq hung around their necks. Clue BLT......they always place their hides above any other consideration. That's why they are called REpublicans.

How is this a new strategy? People have been saying this for months now. Voinovich just wants attention. And for nothing.

Posted by FormerLib


Its not new... and everyone saw this coming after bush's veto a couple months back... its just when you combine this with Lugar, you might have enough of the damn breaking away here that a majority of Republicans follow suit to better prepare for 2008.

Jeezus, I hate to say it --- please, if there are gods in heaven, forgive me --- but Rob's right. What's truly disgusting is that what the GOPiggies have on their mind --- and they better, if they're planning on political survival --- is the 2008 elections. Meanwhile, the murder and mayhem continues unabated.

Bush's definition of victory in Iraq is dependent on Iraqis embracing the government he's chosen for them. Why he's using the military to accomplish this is beyond me as there is nothing the military can do to make people who hate us want to become Jr. Americans. Pointing a gun at someone doesn't make them like you.

So sending more troops to the region and calling that a "plan" for accomplishig his stated goal was dishonest to begin with as Bush has no idea HOW the military is supposed to change the way Iraqis think. Basically, Bush has just sent people over there to be shot at without a fucking clue as to what they should do once they get there ....... AGAIN! You can't be more disrespectful to our military than to ask them to take this risk without even bothering to have a sensible plan in place for accomplishing a sensible goal. Judging by his actions, Bush just likes sending people to die for no reason and spending our money while doing it.

dont mistake frustration and a desire to end it by winning it with surrender and leave it for the terrorists....

If there was actually a way to end it by winning it, we would have won it and ended it already.

There isn't. Winning in Iraq is a fairy tale.
So the GOP is now finally frustrated that we haven't won yet. Before '08 they will admit the truth that winning is immpossible, and they'll cut their losses.

There is no end. Has Israel won against the Palestinians? Either we stay and bleed for 50 years, or we leave and give the terrorists their pyrrhic victory.

or we leave and give the terrorists their pyrrhic victory.

This false choice is still another canard foisted by the Bush sympathizers who still refuse to understand exactly who is going to control Iraq if/when we leave.

AQ are Sunnis, and they are in the minority. They have little power within the central government, and their own sect of Iraqis has tired of their bombing and violence and now joins us in eradicating the foreign jihadis from their midst.

The Shiites are the majority, and control the government and parliament. If/when we leave, AQ is as much a threat to their base of support as Saddam used to be. If we haven't finished the job, the Shiites will remove the remnants of AQ from their soil post haste.

AQ works against the interests of the Shiites and we Americans. Picturing our absence, they will be as fervently hunted by the Shiites as they currently are by Americans and their new Sunni partners. Bottom line: The day we leave Iraq as a force, AQ's days will be numbered for their immediate survival in Iraq. The Shiite militias will see to it. I don't know how anyone can claim this to be a victory when it was the Sunni/Shiite violence that drove our retreat, not AQ.

I said a pyrrhic victory. The AQ spin machine will claim victory as we leave and celebrate for 5 minutes before the Shities wipe them out.

There won't be an AQ victory, but they'll make enough noise that the GOP will tell us that they won when the Defeatocrats brought the troops home.

dont mistake frustration and a desire to end it by winning it with surrender and leave it for the terrorists........

Posted by bushlovertwo at 2007-06-27 09:51 AM | Reply

The sad part is that you actually beleive that the US can "win" in Iraq.

Define win.

Surging the troops has only surged the body bags returning home. So what is your grand strategy for "winning" in Iraq?

tony
so it's better to have the shias(iran) in charge after we leave -in the chaos after we leave no one will be in charge -and it will become a vast trainin ground for radical islam -of course we have nothin to fear from that-we will have a dem pres. and you no radical islam would not dare to attack them!
jasman

"so it's better to have the shias(iran) in charge after we leave -in the chaos after we leave no one will be in charge -and it will become a vast trainin ground for radical islam -of course we have nothin to fear from that-we will have a dem pres. and you no radical islam would not dare to attack them!"

That's the result of taking Saddam out of power. Its been done already. Short of forcing our troops to stay there indefinitely (which would literally kill our military) or killing everyone in Iraq and making the place uninhabitable for the next century, what can be done about it? There isn't a way to force Iraqis to become our friends. It was an incredibly naive plan that can't work and now the Iraqis, who hate us, are going to do with their country what they want.

Bush's plan for Iraq is like a giant pile of donkey crap. No matter how badly you want to undo the damage he's done, you can't put the shit back in the donkey.

so it's better to have the shias(iran) in charge after we leave -in the chaos after we leave no one will be in charge

it will become a vast trainin ground for radical islam

I have been saying for quite a while now that some sort of "withdrawl" is inevitable. So why not do it and get it over with. All this political crap just gets in the way of getting other things accomplished.

If we pull out and by some miracle the Iraqis figure it out and take care of themselves then all the better.

If we pull out and things go to hell in a handbasket then we can wait until they cut off the oil or nuke Isreal or do something else here in the States and then people will have the stomach to go over there and take care of things the way we should have in the first place.

In the mean time we can focus on other things here in the states.

SAWDUST

This war has been a mighty big distraction from more important issues.

Maybe that's what they had in mind all along.....

Surge not working?

repeat after me...

Stay the Course!

We have already invested too much to change course now...

rinse and repeat...

This entire line of "Wait 'til September" is so that the Cheerleader-In-Chief can take his 5 weeks of vacation around August and not have to think about anything.

Kinda like the other 47 weeks of the year.

George Bush, having found the new puppy isn't working out the way he hoped, drives it to the country and leaves it on the side of the road.

If he drinks enough near beer, he'll start beating his wife.