How dare you question our brave Democrats Ace? I think we all know that they had only our best interests at heart as they lied like cheap, dirty rugs.

Right?
Jake

Somebody shd put together a whole downloadable pamphlet of these.

Ace, we're still IN Afghanistan. And making phenomenal progress. We're NOT losing in Iraq. We're doing far better than expected. Remember the quotes about 20,000 bodybags? Give yourself a break from the MSM "we're losing" meme and go read some Michael Yon or Bill Roggio and have a nap or something. We can and will and must win because too much is at stake for us not to.

I hate to nitpick, but there haven't been 2,000 KIA. The figure is just under 1,600 (1,564 if memory serves as of yesterday). Around 500 have died, but not due to hostile fire or any hostile intent.

Laura is right. You don't get a sense of progress against the insurgent factions unless you read Bill Roggio (who still needs $$ to get to Iraq, BTW) and Belmont Club and get a feel for the tactical and strategic operations being conducted as we speak. Reading the NYT and WaPo gives the impression that we're in a responsive/victim mode, when in fact we, and the growing Iraqi army, are on the offensive.

Ace: I think you are right that conservatives generally were more optimistic about how well the war effort would go than the illiberals, who were imagining however many tens of thousands dead in the initial assault as might pop into their head. Many (ironically) thought our troops would get wiped out by Iraqi WMD. But it is wrong to say that conservatives were rosy about the prospects. We too thought Saddam had WMD. We just figured that if he used them, we would use our WMD and that would be the end of it. Worse case scenario, we take a heavy hit, but the Job is over. Time to move on to Iran.

No one imagined that things would turn out as well as they have: that with a couple of thousand dead, Iraq is well on the way to democracy and self-sufficiency, and not only have we nearly completed our military victory, but thanks to the psychotic murder lust of Zarqawi's Al Qaeda in Iraq, we are well on our way to winning the political battle for democratic Iraq to turn towards pluralism. No one could have given intolerance a worse name than Zarqawi has. He won the one battle for us that we couldn't win on our own.

I just don't believe ANYONE thought we could accomplish so much with so few losses, terrible as each one is. Everyone had hopes (well, everyone but the Democrat leadership and their followers), but that is different than expectation.

Ace,
I have to take issue with your post as well. Iraq is a success by any standard except moonbat. And regardless of who said what to whom in the past, I am highly confident at the present time that Sadaam won't be reconstituting any WMD programs.

Hello? Tubino? Is this thing on?

I mean, I guess the guy's gotta sleep at some point, but I just figured he'd be here defending Sen. Kennedy against that neocon Bu$hCo. shill Tim Russert.

I just have to say I'm absolutely gob-smacked to learn that there are people in the media capable of asking such questions.

I mean, really, who knew?

I wonder if it was the same look Kennedy had when the Oldsmobile hit the water? That crushing feeling of betrayal when he discovered that there were still certain forces in this universe not sucking on his ginormous ass. Like, gravity, and the media's desire to screw politicians.

I expected higher casualties, but I expected them up front, too. Weren't the pundits predicting thousands dead in house-to-house urban combat in Baghdad? I was surprised by what we got instead, but not shocked. Or all that discouraged. If they'd just report the damn successes once in a while...

I was also in the camp that figured high urban casualties as we went door to door. The lefties I spoke with were largely on the side of still higher casualties from -- WMD attack.

This war has been a HUGE success. And if France had not strong armed Turkey to block us in the North, it would have been jaw droppingly clean.

Yes, Iraq is "Vietnam on the Euphrates".

Except that we've taken Hanoi.

And Ho Chi Minh is in prison.

And free elections are being held in what had been North Vietnam.

And the ethnic minorities in Vietnam are gaining a fair measure of control over their own territories.

And Giap is leading a rag-tag band of suiciding losers, instead of an army.

And there have been no My Lai-style atrocities.

And the war is being fought by professional volunteers, instead of by reluctant draftees.

And US fatalities are down by 96%.

Yup, other than those minor differences, "Vietnam on the Euphrates" has it pegged.

Something about this all stinks. Did these Democrats really think the media would not call them on their own words? Are they that complacent?

And who props Teddy up and rolls him into an interview without preparing him for these setups? It all seems a little too easy, like it's a drama being staged for our benefit, with each side taking hits, pushing and pulling, gaining ground and giving it back up.

And then do they go out for drinks and watch the money roll in, the hippie chicks selling their bikes for Harry Reid; the Kansas City florist signing up to Bundle for Blount? Is it just elaborate staging or is this shit for real? Because there isn't any explanation why these Donks keep falling for this.

Because there isn't any explanation why these Donks keep falling for this.

Us Jews and our puppet Rove. And Gentile blood in pastries. Mmmmm, baked-in bloody goodness.

I saw the interview and it was priceless. Total deer in the headlights. Unfortunately, Russert was pretty tame for the rest of the interview. As someone who has suffered through years of Kennedy as my senior senator (I recently escaped) I am used to Kennedy saying inane and down right false things and having MA continue to return him to the Senate term after term.

Among the best politcal lines ever delivered during a debate was by Kennedy's opponent in his first primary:

"If your name was Edward Moore your candidacy would be a joke."

As it is, the joke has been on the people of MA.

we judge by actions and deeds and results, not intentions and withheld reservations

philistine!

Other possibilities...some Dems did want to go to war, but when the going gets tough, they want to back out, especially when they find their base suddenly becomes anti-war.

Kennedy is still a egotistical big mouth

Well, we captured Baghdad all right, but it does seem a bit like Syria is trying to reprise the role of North Vietnam for us. Of course, they don't have China and Russia to protect them....

Just in case you guys aren't on the DC44 reading list, Hitchens slams the Post and all things flip floppish with his latest. He guts the Post for reporting that the 2002 joint resolution did not authorize the removal of Saddam:

"A prize, then, for investigative courage, to Milbank and Pincus. They have identified the same problem, though this time upside down, as that which arose from the passage of the Iraq Liberation Act, during the Clinton-Gore administration, in 1998. That legislation—which passed the Senate without a dissenting vote—did expressly call for the removal of Saddam Hussein but did not actually mention the use of direct U.S. military force.

Let us suppose, then, that we can find a senator who voted for the 1998 act to remove Saddam Hussein yet did not anticipate that it might entail the use of force, and who later voted for the 2002 resolution and did not appreciate that the authorization of force would entail the removal of Saddam Hussein!"

That's partly why we supported it. Naive or not (okay-- let's admit: naive), we thought Iraq would be much like the first Gulf War, and much like the War in Afghanistan. Not easy -- no war ever really is -- but certainly not Vietnam on the Euphrates.-----Ace

If you continue like this , you are going to have to get yourself one of the Andrew type mood-o-meters to monitor your over-reactions.

As Chad mentioned over 500 casualties have been the result of accidents which may or may not have happened had the forces been training in Georgia. In any event, if the forces of 'good' are going to lose their will because 1600 heros have perished over a period of 3 years, then we might as well run up the French flags now and save everyone a lot of trouble.

Perhaps you should NEVER read the Times again. I find it works for me.

Hitchens is awesome.
Love his consistent logic, how he hammers their ridiculous precepts into the ground.

I supported the war from the start, but I was expecting casualties to be pushing 5,000 by the time we took Baghdad. And I always figured the aftermath would be Northern Ireland on steroids. So, overall, it's gone better than I expected.

The two areas where I was too optimistic are 1) the press coverage, which has been more biased and negative than I ever expected; and 2) the Democrats, whom I expected to be craven and shifty, not flat-out defeatist.

Much of the blame for both has to go to the Sixties, a time and a place and a mindset that has an absolutely magnetic attraction for aging lefties. Iraq isn't "Vietnam on the Euphrates," but these people sure as hell want a remake of the summer of '68 back here in the States.

Regarding the conduct of the war, my only real complaint is that we did not seal the borders as immediately as possible. When I gave my brief to the JCOS, I told them that they should lock down the country first. However, they just gave me their lunch orders instead.

The only real resistance is from IED's and suicide bombers. And most of these events seem to occur in certain regions, not across the country. I am shocked at how hard it is to stop roadside bomb placements, but these devices have failed to slow down the growth of the new Iraq.

Also, the Iraqi forces are getting stronger, not weaker.

The trendline is on our side. And it would shift more so if we started carpet bombing the Syrian border.

Have you guys seen this yet. Nice video presentation prepared by the GOP. Small example of the hypocrisy of the Dums...

Who Said What?

Regarding the conduct of the war, my only real complaint . . .

The Dems have enjoyed criticizing the President for completely incompetent conduct of the war, never acknowledging that the 'obvious' alternatives they propose had at least as many issues as the choices that were made. A couple of examples:

1) More Boots on the Ground. It is undoubtedly true that more personnel is a good thing, but the same people who criticize Bush for inadequate troop levels also criticize him for: a) imperialism and intrusion on the Iraqi people; b) high cost of the war; c) inadequate equipment levels; and d) extension of deployments. All of these get worse with a larger force.

2) Dissolution of the Iraqi Army & Police Forces. The Baaths had set up a resistance network before the invasion - how much more effective would it have been if they owned the army and police as well? Infiltration of the army and police has already led to several tragedies; how much more frequent would those have been if the Baaths' power and organization were kept intact from the outset? The population could never have developed any degree of trust in the US or their hopes for democracy with their old masters left in those positions.

Perhaps other decisions would have had more favorable consequences, but second-guessing decisions without honestly acknowledging the alternatives' potential shortcomings is naive and cowardly.

Kennedy made the case against invading Iraq in 2002 on the grounds that Saddam had WMDs and would use them in a desperate last stand to defend his regime. Kennedy argued the casualities from the WMDs Saddam would likely use made the cost of invading Iraq too great.

As of today, I believe...
American casualties
Hostile, non-hostile, total
1621 , 448 , 2069

The dems have done everything to discredit this administration and basically make it powerless to govern, since they felt from the first moment (of their delusion) that 'we wuz robbed' in the presidential election(s).
The MSM has done everything to support the discrediting, in an effort to make the conservative movement flounder.

The Dems were doing all they could to hurt Bush from the get-go, they demanded and unfortunately Bush agreed to go to the UN one more time pre-war. This gave Hussein enough time to ditch all of his WMD.
One thing that amazes me in all of the Dems hysteria (and others as well) over the lack of WMD's is that everyone seems to have forgotten the video that used to play on the nightly news when president splooge was in office of the dead Kurds that Hussien had bombed with WMD.
Based on the current ravings this never happened because Hussien only had surplus AK47's and at no time did he have WMD's.
In addition we are now learning that the wonderful Senator Jay "I have more money than you" Rockefeller took it upon himself to go to the Middle East and tell the leaders that Bush was going to attack, and it was just a matter of time.
Is it just me or does anyone else smell TREASON?
But hey, let's stick to the topic "Bush lied".

Did Ted Kennedy win the poetry contest?

What kind of nation have we become when 1600 deaths (the lowest death rate in the history of warfare) can cause so many to give up the fight. My God, we buried that many on Tarawa after a few days, and that number pales when compared to Iwo Jima, Omaha Beach, or the first bloody weeks in Korea.

We need to start breeding men again.

...because they just don't like war, under almost any circumstances..

Its not the "war" part per se, its the funds that could otherwise be spent buying votes with social program handouts -- that really cuts them to the core.

Until the rise of the welfare state, where votes could reliably be bought en-mass, the dems were just as belicose as the republicans...perhaps even more so.

What kind of nation have we become when 1600 deaths (the lowest death rate in the history of warfare) can cause so many to give up the fight.

But think about it -- we'll have such great "self-esteem" when we lose.

I'll tell you one thing, there isn't going to be any premature troop withdrawal before 1/21/09.

A lot can happen in 3 years, 2 months, and 6 days.

I concur with Purrple Adendum. The Dems want the money BUT they are also fear that this Iraq-democracy transformation will be a success. A success in Iraq spells doom for the future of the DNC. I really believe they want us to lose.

I’m frankly surprised no one in the media has acknowledged the fact that no one on this earth was more surprised to find out that there were no WMDs than Saddam himself. And he didn’t know for a very good reason. He had a bad habit of killing the messenger.

In all fairness, if the Democrats want to continue beating the drum of motivations, perhaps it’s time we revisit Chappaquidick.