Today, the House voted on a bill that would require the withdrawl of troops from Iraq. This move was pushed by Democrats, who pushed strongly for this, and proved narrowly victorious. The vote was divided almost straight by party, with it wining 218 to 212 votes.
The bill could still be over turned or veto'd, I believe, but today is a victory for our troops in Iraq.
House speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, stated, "The American people have lost faith in the president's conduct of this war. The American people see the reality of the war, the president does not."
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Comments: 56
And oddly enough the vast majority of people saying this are saying it form the comfort of their couches rather then from the battlefield. It's easy to talk about such things as duty and sacrifice when you're not the one that has to go and do it.
The war in Iraq is between the Sunnis and the Shi'a wich some al-Queda suicide bombers pitching in to help the Sunnis. The US is stuck in the middle of a civil war so the US is basically a police force that al-Maliki is using as his private army without actually training the Iraqi troops or police force, forcing the US to do everything for him so he can get revenge on the Sunnis.
But feh... who needs facts? Quick little talking point quotes stolen from political shills paid to opine in partisan publications are so much easier to toss around.
Israel has kept Palestine cornered and under its total control for some 40 years. How many times have Fatah and Hamas declared victory over Israel? And how many times has al-Queda said that it's winning the war in Iraq? About as many times as Cheney said that the insurgency is in its last throws in the past two years. People need to pay less attention to empty rhetoric. Or quote it for that matter.
I can see the future when just one terriorist starts on our land. He can kill thousands of people in one day without trying. Think when many of them are loose on us and start praying to YOUR GOD! I have been praying to mind and crying for the future dead.
Also, if you actually look it up, most terrorist attacks in the last 10 years came from homegrown terrorists, terrorists that came from disenfranchised minorities in their countries and embraced a militant ideology. So while the troops are fighting a few guys from al-Queda helping Sunni insurgents, it's no guarantee that someone in oh say... Houston won't download plans for a bomb from an al-Queda website and blow up a bus or a metro station or do damage to a Fortune 500 company's office.
When it comes to loose organization of homicidal fanatics, you're not 100% safe anywhere although your odds of being killed by a terrorist are less then being killed by a serial killer. And you're more likely to be struck by lightning twice then to be killed by a serial killer. See National Safety Council report below.
http://www.nsc.org/lrs/statinfo/odds.htm
You seem as if you want the American people to be seen as week and hypocritical. Also, the war in Iraq was to get rid of Saddam and set up a new government. That was accomplished. Now, Iraq is back to ethnic cleansing itself and the only safe place to be in Iraq is Kurdistan where the Kurds are doing extremely well with no US troops and no civil warfare.
The US simply made no plans to deal with the Sunni/Shi'a conflict and neither party really wants to come up with a real plan. Hence we have this insipid tug of war in Congress and White House punctuated by empty, meaningless (although very, very venomous and offensive) rhetoric.
Can you at least feign a sense of perspective?
Our terriorist are just waiting for their call to react, and I believe the only thing that is keeping them quiet is the expendurers of their Iraq fighting and waiting for us to just quit and leave. They know history, where we don't. At least we never seem to learn from it. Just with the training one soldier has he can do more damage to our country then we are doing in all Iraq. I would have a ball if distroying this country was my aim, as it is just completely unprepared. In stead of fighting among ourselves, we should be getting readyfor the the time we need to all be a defense force just to save ourselves. My book Hurricane Recovery/The Peoples' Village Plan, tries to open the eyes of even non-technical people because I feel we are waiting for disasters of all kinds just like sitting ducks.
So you insist on saying over and over again. I see this as a demand for a change. Being stubborn doesn't make anyone brave or consistent. Yes, consistency is good but if you're consistently wrong... time to change things up and get some debates going about what will really work.
"We are not willing to stand up for what is right."
Well what's right depends on who you ask. There are so few universal standards of what's right and what's wrong across the world that you would be amazed. Using emotional rhetoric ripped from the mouth or pen of a political shill pleasing the loyal masses isn't going to win you any points or prove your points.
"We may have completed our initial goals, but that does not mean we should abandon an entire nation and its people."
No, but we should make them accountable. This bill does a poor job of it and there's quite a ways to go before it becomes an actual, viable plan for holding the Shi'a in power responsible for running their own country, but it some sort of a rudimentary start. In its present form however, I don't think it should pass. It goes very light on what the milestones and objectives really are.
"There is nothing good or just in running away from our problems, which this bill wants us to do."
Well ideally we would know what we would be getting into in the first place...
The issue is that the war can't continue forever and just because Bush and his loyal clutch of worshipers are convinced that they're on the verge of some sort of huge breakthrough (as they have been for the last 3.5 years), doesn't mean that we should just trust the same people who insist that they're the only ones who can run this war right (even though virtually every one of them is a draft dodger with zero military experience) and any person who critiques them is a dirty traitor working for al-Queda.
By smearing those who disagree with their current strategy in shit, the leadership of the GOP has itself caused the war in Iraq to become a PR disaster and brought the whole conflict to a "my way or the highway" pissing match. We're at a loss for a more flexible solution because one isn't even allowed to be discussed anymore, tossed by the wayside into an absolutist partisan shell by people who can't even conceive that the world isn't divided between "conservatives" and liberals and there are other people with other ideas out there. In fact, those people are the majority of the public.
"Leaving will only turn Iraq into another Somalia, and it will come back to haunt us, just like Somalia did."
I'm inclined to agree in some way. If the US just ups and leaves, Iraq will continue its ethnic cleansing leaving only the Kurds in relative safety in the region and in the next 20 to 30 years after the withdrawal, the US will have to come back again to break it up. I doubt that al-Queda will take over because the Shi'a in power hate the Sunni militant group and there are enough Sunnis left to be antagonistic of Iran.
You can believe that all you want, but if what you're telling me is right, then attack in Madrid, London, Pakistan, Jordan and Saudi Arabia shouldn't have happened. In fact, terrorist attacks all over the world are going at the same rate as they have before the war in Iraq. If you think that al-Qeuda is like a centralized, organized military... Well you simply don't understand how they work.
Anyone with a credit card that has a $3,000 limit came become a very effective suicide bomber. Or just has $3,000 in the bank, enough to make a simple bomb according to plans on terrorist websites.
Beliefs are not facts and I prefer to use actual facts.
This should be a very effective message.
Unfortunately, this President does not listen well.
I'm glad that this vote passed.
Put up, or shut up. I demand peace. You want war? Go fight it yourself.
By listing "win" as one of the three ideas you've heard of you're once again proving that you simply don't understand or try to understand what goes on in Iraq and just go by whatever pundit or politico you worship tell you. It's pathetic.
Who is the US supposed to win against when the insurgency is fighting the Shi'a and anyone who supports them, not just the US per se? The US is supposed to take a side in a religious war over a millennium old?
But you know what, don't answer that. You're insipid enough to believe that just because some slimy fat pundit with a radio show who has dodged the draft on almost every single war for which he was alive ignores the real issues and attacks someone slightly left of his views, then he must be right. You are definitely not as intelligent as you hold yourself to be.
TJ,
Because the grown up neo-cons use emotional appeals, doesn't mean you should use them too. The people who you worship and quote with every chance you get have consistently ignored the details and complexities on this war for a bunch of meaningless, empty emotional rhetoric. And you are doing the same exact thing, pretending as if you have somehow proved a point.
The only point you proved is that you can steal a political talking point. That's hardly a great feat.
Last time I checked, soldiers follow orders of their superiors. Mercenaries fight as they deem necessary, not an organized military force. A simple Google check would verify that for you.
Things we want to win: