Because of the fiercely partisan nature of politics and the ruthless and, in my opinion, insulting and degrading style of Karl Rove, the debate about what to do in Iraq has been narrowed to cut and run and stay the course. This is not meant to give people a clear picture of the different options, this is meant instead to stifle debate by forcing the variety of opinions on the left and in the center about differing courses into a convenient little box--"cut and run."

We certainly cannot talk about strategic withdrawal, or standing down that the Iraqis might stand up, or a horizon strike force, because those are all cut and run options. The only option, as always in the GOP, is to follow the President even if he is walking us off a cliff. Britney Spears had it right, "Honestly, I think we should just trust our president in every decision that he makes and we should just support that, you know, and be faithful in what happens."

When we keep turning these corners and see that our lack of planning has not been rescued with a new strategy aside from wait and see, a new direction might help.

Well, we know from who served and who did not (a common forward I am sure you have all seen) that the men with the real guts, the real courage, are the men who have never seen battle, and the cowards are the men who served their country. The smear of Murtha is dispicable.

The most dispicable smear of Murtha was the one he made against our U.S. Marines, who had not only not been given a trial yet, but had not yet even been charged with anything, calling them cold-blooded killers (or was it murderers?) -- either way it was disgraceful.

I realize you were referring to the "smearing" of Murtha. I am afraid all I have heard is those criticizing his comments and his proposed strategy. Just exactly what smear of Murtha is worse than those he has made against those in our armed forces?

He did not convict them, but from what I understand was lamenting the fact that this kind of violence against civilians is occurring as a result of the difficult and extensive tours in Iraq. He called for changing course long before this, but I think he was interested in this because he DOES NOT want to see it happen, guilty of acting unlawfully or not. The undisputed facts are that these people were killed; whether the soldiers were justified is a legal matter.

The smearing was by Jean Schmidt to some degree and of course Ann Coulter's fragging comment, and the questioning of whether he deserves his purple hearts. Classic Karl Rove; take a decorated war veteran with close ties to the Pentagon and smear him as a coward and someone who hates the troops.

Does anyone remember which General won the most battles for the Americans in the Revolutionary War? Twice wounded, and bearing those scars, including a permanently disabled leg, as he led troops back to battle, one General won more battles than all the others - including Washington - combined. He was our greatest hero of that war, at least up to a certain point.

His name was Benedict Arnold.

Whatever achievements the likes of Kerry and Murtha might have had in service to our country pale in comparison to Arnold's, so I see no reason they should be excused from subsequent treachery any more than was he.

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He did not convict them? Here is the link. He said our Marines had "killed innocent civilians in cold blood." He did blame it on their long hours and stressful conditions, but that doesn't make it any less dispicable. In fact, I think in some ways it makes it much worse. He called his fellow Marines cold blooded killers in order to make a political point.

As for it being purely a legal point, there is question now whether or not those people were even killed by those Marines.

Murtha being a former Marine does not make him off limits for criticism. My husband was in the Marine Corps for six years and did some great things in the service. That would not make it okay for him to call his fellow Marines cold blooded killers when they had not even been charged with a crime. It is amazing that so many on the left get so upset when John Kerry or John Murtha are criticized, but they had no problem whatsoever branding over 250 veterans (many who were purple heart recipients and some even POWs) liars and worse.

Murtha smeared himself with his comments. If others questioned his service with no evidence, then they were not only wrong, but were wasting their time because he already smeared himself worse than anyone else could.

Way to go Lorrie, now i don't have to post the link.
I see Kimyl Oh! is still posting from the palace in North Korea. Given time the real Kim will starve him to death along with the millions he's depriving of food to launch a missile. Let old Madam All-not to-Bright go visit him again. I'm sure she can come up with a few billion to help him build some more nuc's and missiles. She did it before.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12838343/

Here's another link. Listen, this guy is a marine, he has no reason to say these things without accurate information to back it up. He did not say all marines, or all of our troops, he said that in this case the evidence seems to indicate that. This man has high level pentagon contacts that the press doesn't even have, so I would at least give him the benefit of the doubt that he would not make up a lie about troops to serve his interests. That would be repugnant for sure.

Of course, the right, rather than address the situation of the war, or what we should do about unclear objectives, guerilla warfare, interminable soldier stays in Iraq, and no end in sight, make it about a personal attack on Murtha.

A slice:

Military officials told NBC News that the Marine Corps' own evidence appears to show Murtha is right.

A videotape taken by an Iraqi showed the aftermath of the alleged attack: a blood-smeared bedroom floor and bits of what appear to be human flesh and bullet holes on the walls.

The video, obtained by Time magazine, was broadcast a day after town residents told The Associated Press that American troops entered homes on Nov. 19 and shot dead 15 members of two families, including a 3-year-old girl, after a roadside bomb killed a U.S. Marine.

Also, please try to defend the inadequate armor (personal and vehicular) that our soldiers went into war with under this "troops first" administration. And the clear lack of planning for post-war Iraq. These are things that I have always wanted to hear the GOP try to defend. Even the troops booed Rumsfeld when he was asked that question. Do the troops hate our troops?

Kimyl,
You are being civil and I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I ask in all sincerity, have you been reading any blogs the past couple of weeks? This post at The American Thinker was widely linked and discussed on talk radio and I thought everyone was aware of it, but you evidently have not seen it yet.

I am just saying there is still a great bit of question surrounding Haditha. There has already been one report finding no coverup, which was another of Murtha's claims. How much comfort do you suppose it gives those on the jihadist side to see a U.S. congressman accusing U.S. troops of being cold blooded murderers and the government of covering it up? Even if it is true, which is far from proven (and the coverup has been debunked) there are ways you do things during times of war. If Murtha were really such a great military hero, you would think he would know that.

As for the armor issue, you do go to war with the army you have, not the one you wish you had. That is a fact. I guess maybe we should wait until we can invent a bubble to completely envelope each soldier and protect them from bullets, bombs and germs. That would be awesome, but unrealistic. Reality is that you do the best with what you have. If the Clinton administration had not starved the military for so many years, maybe we would have had more, and better equipment. You don't just snap you fingers and have stuff like that appear. Some of the calls for more armor have evidently caused additional deaths. You must have missed those posts too. The links are here and here.

I apologize for the length of the last comment. Please be sure to read the last two links provided. They are to Paul's posts at Wizbang about how up-armored Humvees are causing deaths because the added weight is causing them to roll over easily. Here is a brief excerpt from one of the posts:

"I genuinely hold the Democrats who demagogued this issue responsible for these deaths. The Humvee was commissioned by war planners and designed by engineers to do specific tasks very well. When the Democrats decided they wanted to Bash Bush, they forced the Pentagon to add additional weight to the vehicle damaging the dynamics. That decision has killed people.

We've had evidence for over a year now that the armor might be killing more people than it saved. It now appears to be the case."i> Read it all.

Well, time will tell with the Haditha situation, but I think that the way the right jumped on Murtha as a traitor instead of looking at the bigger issues he is concerned about (if you see him on TV, his concern for the troops is very evident).

As for the hummers, the post indicates that the armor has saved more lives than it has lost, and if the designers failed to test the up-armored humvees for rollover problems, that would again point to negligence on the supply side. The idea that you go to war with the army you have might work when Japanese bombers destroy Pearl Harbor, but Saddam was contained, and we could have easily have extended our timeframe for war to better prepare. He was not going anywhere, and we could have prepped everyone if we had just kept playing that game. Of course, I am of the opinion that we jumped into war while popular support was high, and that it was unnecessary, but even if it were inevitable, we were in control.

As for the original post, I think Levin said it well yesterday on Fox; Democrats voted against the Kerry amendment to set deadlines, but largely for the Levin amendment to redeploy and change strategy.

How can you say Saddam was contained? When the amount of anthrax necessary to kill thousands of Americans could be transferred to terrorists by handing them a small briefcase, there is no way to adequately contain that. We believed Saddam had bio and chemical weapons. The decision to invade not only was made in the shadow of 9/11, but came after the anthrax attacks. The Russians told us they had intelligence that Saddam was planning terrorist attacks on U.S. soil and on U.S. interests abroad. To have sat and waited for him to act would have been grossly irresponsible. This president, and many Democrats in congress, were not content to retaliate against Saddam after he attacked us. They sought to prevent such an attack from happening in the first place. We had waited quite long enough. I am convinced that all that waiting is what gave Saddam the time to transfer materials to Syria. I may be wrong, but since there is some evidence of that we should be trying like hell to find out what happened to the WMD, raher than reveling in the fact that we were unable to locae stockpiles and it has hurt the President politically.

Listen, this guy is a marine, he has no reason to say these things without accurate information to back it up.
-------------------------------
Oh come on! You wrote in your very first words of your first post about the "fiercely partisan nature of politics today"

At least be capable of logically connecting your OWN words before trying to enagage the debate with others..

I won't pretend that Saddam was not playing games to some degree, but he was not a serious, viable threat when we invaded him anymore than he had been for the previous 10 years during which we were controlling his airspace and monitoring his movements. If you want to speculate, I think he had to pretend to have WMDs in order to remain secure in the Middle East, but had to feign control of his country for his ego and also attenuate the likelihood of US intervention. Regardless, the invasion was done hurriedly, and without adequate planning, and seemed driven by fear more than anything.

Yes, things are fiercely partisan, but there is a line I don't think he would cross as far as loyalty, especially since he is probably more of a marine than a Democrat. He is clearly not using the military as a pawn in his political game by speaking in front of military crowds and flying fighter jets. No one is guilty of using our troops as political pawns...

Yes, things are fiercely partisan, but there is a line I don't think he would cross as far as loyalty, especially since he is probably more of a marine than a Democrat.
-----------------------------
Don't you see how purely speculative you are being. How is your comment ANY different than someone who says "I think he is doing this solely for political purposes since it is clear he cares little about the Marines anymore"

The bottom line is this (which really can't be argued)

Starting with the Kerry nomination, then the Paul Hackett race, and now the 2006 national 'band of brothers' campaign (which consists of a variety of vets from different wars, all united against Iraq and running for House seats - and for which Kerry has raised money) there is a STRATEGY.

The Democrats have embraced any and all veterans who are willing to speak out against Bush and the Iraq war. Their veteran status is why we are asked to listen to them.

And Murtha is chief dog on this list.

So, you can speculate that Murtha is just a fluke here - and unrelated to this coordinated campaign of vets running for office (along with the usage of family members of dead Iraq war vets like Sheehan) - or you can at least be honest that the guy TODAY, NOW, is getting paid and working as a POLITICIAN - NOT a military member.

A politician, like all politician, who wants two things - his party back in control, and his personal stock to rise within that same party.

Who even HEARD of Murtha in the House before all this noise. Waters, Frank, Conyers, Lee, Ford, Pelosi, Wexler, Lewis, Emmanuel, Harmon, Lofgren, Sanchez (both of them), Waxman, Nadler, Rangel, Weiner, Markey, McDermott, McKinney, Dingell, Kucinich....those names all come to mind from being in the spotlight over the years

But Murtha? Please.

"This man has high level pentagon contacts"...do you know who they are? We would all like their names. As for the troops booing Rumsfeld, if that is the same situation I viewed, they were actually booing the soldier asking the question which had been given to him by a hostile reporter.

While you may choose to defend Murtha, there are many of us, active and retired military who will never see him again as more than a traitor. Many questions surround the situation in Haditha and until all are answered everyone (especially retired military) should keep their powder dry. This is the classic case of the Dems putting Murtha out there front and center believing the public will support him 100% because he is a decorated Marine..wrong. We will see right here in my own state come November how the voters feel about Mr. Murtha...his challenger is making inroads daily and I certainly hope this is an upset.

Where are all the Iraqi/Afghani conflict veterans running as Republicans? (crickets)

Or do you suppose that people who have been in Iraq might have some valid ideas about how to change things, ideas that will not be heard in the Bush echo chamber?

My "I think he is probably a marine first and a Democrat second" thought is based on actually seeing his face when he speaks about our troops, and the fact that he is a pro-military Democrat, a stance that would be easier for him to manage as a Republican running for office.

Murtha has not talked about politics, or band of brothers, or winning back the house as much as he talked about strategy, issues on the ground, and policy. I would say he seems genuinely concerned for our military, our troops and our country, which is vastly different from photo-ops with troops, press conferences on flight decks, speeches at rallies of troops, and Bush's never ending insistence that supporting him is supporting the troops, even when he cuts funding, fails to pay for personal armor, and consistently changes the rules for stopgap measures.

Murtha is using the troops poor behavior to point out the folly of this war, Bush uses the troops as props to keep his public support. One seems concerned with troops surviving and succeeding, the other more concerned with himself.

Where are all the Iraqi/Afghani conflict veterans running as Republicans?
-----------------------------------
I have yet to find someone on the left NOT ask this question when I bring up the Democrats' band of brothers, reporting for duty strategy...

Not ONCE has someone on the left stopped to think before writing that they are the ones still fighting the fight and protecting the world from the Islamic menace...

The military overwhelmingly votes Republican, especially for President (ask Gore) - and so to see someone wonder why Republicans are not leaving their jobs as warriors to go pontificate in the D.C sewer is quite telling of a misunderstanding of what exactly a soldier is all about.

Ask the soldiers what they think of Murtha and his "loyalty"...

"Where are all the Iraqi/Afghani conflict veterans running as Republicans? (crickets)"

Last figures I saw, they were all too busy re-enlisting. I have a cousin who was an Army Ranger and he joined the guard after being out of the service for about a decade. I guess he could have decided to run for political office, but obviously thought his skills were better suited to rejoin the fight. As Steve said, that is what soldiers are all about. It is obvious that too many on the left side of the aisle still have not figured that one out.

In any voluntary army you are going to have a preponderance of soldiers who "like to fight", who sign up not just for the free college but for the chance to shoot something or see battle. They like Bush because they get to fight and he is openly homophobic, the don't like Clinton because he is reticent to send them to battle and he doesn't hate gays enough.

Whatever the case with what soldiers think, they are clearly gonna trend toward strong nationalist tendencies, always attempt to see the divinity and purpose in any mission, and follow any leader who talks the talk (even if he didn't walk the walk).

Our military is the best trained, and the best equipped, but given the way they are recruited, they might not be the most enlightened or best educated of our populace. I think a majority of them also have good hearts, but probably also have simplistic views of right and wrong and a distaste for nuance and subtlety. They also have little or no ability to defy orders, voice their disagreements with policy, or otherwise assert their independence. Of course they support the party of black and white, good v. evil, no subtlety, it's part of their training. Appreciating the gradient of right and wrong, or acknowledging any US role in blowback would jeopardize the clarity of the mission or induce sympathy for the opponent.

I am sure your conclusion will be that I hate the military, but I cannot control your illogical jumps to conclusions. I can tell you what I do support; the right to defy an illegal order, the right to a decent living and health care upon return, the right to not re-enlist in a war you feel is immoral without being called a coward, the right to the best armor and weapons we can afford, and the right to question one's leaders when views in DC do not match up with reality on the ground.

Anyway, I am sure that I will never have the absolutist mindset and undying nationalism/superficial patriotism of people on this blog, but I can live with that. Despite our voluntary army's trend to not come from my socioeconomic background, I still know a few of them and many of them appreciate the points I made above, and see the shallow insignificance of a yellow magnet. I can tell you that the faux patriotic magnet crowd is overwhelmingly GOP.

Are the true Republicans still fighting the fight, or have they yet to see the light? Are the former soldiers running for office cowards who hate battle or are they principled men who want to change policy to give our soldiers a better task. A difference of opinion I guess, but your view is grounded in anecdote and not research, so don't try to claim some factual certainty. If you do I can tell you how I know for sure that the loss of pirates in the seas is directly correlated with the increase in global warming. One goes down and the other goes up.

The troops we recruit we do so with patriotic ads, with images of driving tanks and saving America. We don't tell them about maimed soldiers, or poorly chosen wars (Grenada, Viet Nam, Somalia, Iraq). We emphasize glory and righteous battles (like WW1 and WW2, the Gulf War) and not rigid structure and the potential for failure, because it is an ad campaign, not an informative educational process. The kind of people you appeal to are the kind who probably don't ask the tough questions, who accept control, who seek out challenges certainly but take them on without asking the how or why. This obviously provides huge advantages over a draft in that you don't get people asking tough questions to depress morale, you don't get people who do not want to be there, etc. But you are likely to have, on balance, a group of people with certain personality traits that deal well with authority, that do not question too deeply, and that enjoy to whatever the degree combat, stress and sacrifice of war.

I just think that, like any situation, that which makes our military very strong also provides us with certain conditions that are likely to develop. Any system is one of trade-offs and complexities, and pretending that our military is perfect in all respects is as intellectually devoid as saying that democracy, Christianity, socialism, capitalism, communism or any other system is perfect. The key in any system is to recognize faults and avoid dogmatic thinking (or accepting all because most is right), because your rationality is your greatest asset and should not be squandered.

kimyl, that last post was possibly the most insulting thing I have read in a long time. Way to go!

...a preponderance of soldiers who "like to fight", who sign up not just for the free college but for the chance to shoot something or see battle. They like Bush because they get to fight and he is openly homophobic...

Forget service to your country, just gimme a gun and lemme do some queer-bashing!

...they might not be the most enlightened or best educated of our populace.

Tell that to EVERY military person I know- ALL college graduates!

...simplistic views of right and wrong and a distaste for nuance and subtlety.

They also have little or no ability to defy orders... or otherwise assert their independence.

In case you didn't know- in combat, not following orders can get people killed. There's no time to sit down and wonder WHY you're being shot at- you either shoot back or you get squashed.

Of course they support the party of black and white, good v. evil, no subtlety, it's part of their training.

Is this another way for you to say "I'm better than you/them because I'm smarter?"

I am sure your conclusion will be that I hate the military, but I cannot control your illogical jumps to conclusions...

There's nothing ILlogical about my so-called "jump" to conclusion. Everything you've said shows quite clearly how you feel about them.
Simple minded
homophobic
uneducated
bloodthirsty
cookie-cutter robots unable to think independently

Yes kimyl, I have concluded that while you may not "hate" the military, you certainly do look down on it and its members.

I can tell you that the faux patriotic magnet crowd is overwhelmingly GOP.

And the "I support the troops..... When they shoot their officers!" crowd is overwhelming Democrat.

Just as a friendly reminder, you, kimyl, aren't the only one who "supports" the troops. In an interview covered by WORLD NET DAILY, Richard Belzer considers US troops to be, "too uneducated to be expressing support for the U.S. military mission since they're just '19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job' and 'they don't read twenty newspapers a day.'"

kimyl, that last post was possibly the most insulting thing I have read in a long time. Way to go!

...a preponderance of soldiers who "like to fight", who sign up not just for the free college but for the chance to shoot something or see battle. They like Bush because they get to fight and he is openly homophobic...

Forget service to your country, just gimme a gun and lemme do some queer-bashing!

Thanks for simplifying, and in the meantime, destroying my argument. Are you going to argue that most soldiers support gays in the military and enjoy training as opposed to real battle? Clearly they are drawn to the army for certain reasons, and the big differences between Clinton and Bush are not in service to our country, but in policy. GOP stalwarts love to say that Dems are defying the will of the poor by giving them opportunities and income, and that the poor would be better off with the GOP. Maybe the Dems, in trying to offer troops fewer battles and better benefits, are misreading troops, who really want battle and not to be idle. Who knows.

...they might not be the most enlightened or best educated of our populace.

Tell that to EVERY military person I know- ALL college graduates!

The fact that you blog and only know college graduates in the military tells me the bubble you live in. Surely our preponderance of 19 and 20 year olds have all the tools to critically reason their way through complex policy issues and battle situations, even though if they posted comments here that contrasted with you they would be derided as youthfully ignorant. You rally behind our troops in theory, but as soon as they express doubt in their mission or question leadership they are cowards and traitors. The GOP definition of an open mind.

...simplistic views of right and wrong and a distaste for nuance and subtlety.

They also have little or no ability to defy orders... or otherwise assert their independence.

In case you didn't know- in combat, not following orders can get people killed. There's no time to sit down and wonder WHY you're being shot at- you either shoot back or you get squashed.

Yeah, when people are shooting at you, certainly you must react. But when members of your party say lets kill these people who are putting out IEDs without evidence, you should shoot now and think later. This has happened in lots of wars, and justifying it as part of war is moral equivocation. The reason concern is expressed about Haditha is not because people fear our men to be traitorous and immoral, but because, as in Viet Nam, the confusion about who or what we are fighting might become blurred with our anger about dead soldiers and friends. I am not encouraging our army to become a mass of cats (surely you know the description of the US Senate as herding cats); I am only pointing out that there are no concrete or effective means to challenge immoral orders without risking your life or credibility.

Of course they support the party of black and white, good v. evil, no subtlety, it's part of their training.

Is this another way for you to say "I'm better than you/them because I'm smarter?"

Not at all, only saying that when in combat, and in life and death situations, pondering subtleties may complicate things and risk operational efficacy.

I am sure your conclusion will be that I hate the military, but I cannot control your illogical jumps to conclusions...

There's nothing ILlogical about my so-called "jump" to conclusion. Everything you've said shows quite clearly how you feel about them.
Simple minded
homophobic
uneducated
bloodthirsty
cookie-cutter robots unable to think independently

Yes kimyl, I have concluded that while you may not "hate" the military, you certainly do look down on it and its members.

Are you going to argue that our military is appealing to our complex minded, homosexual egalitarian, educated and sensitive types, who think independently? you have just argued against all of the above in some form or another. I am not saying that these are characteristics that harm the military per se, only that these are characteristics of many soldiers and what do you think of that?

I can tell you that the faux patriotic magnet crowd is overwhelmingly GOP.

And the "I support the troops..... When they shoot their officers!" crowd is overwhelming Democrat.

That is just slander, and I know no Democrats, elected or voting, who support fragging as a means of protest. That is dispicable. I might say that GOP policies seem to ignore the poor, but I would never take the barbaric leap to say that the GOP feels the poor are subhuman or worthy of slavery. That is a connection made in anger and not rationality.

Just as a friendly reminder, you, kimyl, aren't the only one who "supports" the troops. In an interview covered by WORLD NET DAILY, Richard Belzer considers US troops to be, "too uneducated to be expressing support for the U.S. military mission since they're just '19 and 20-year-old kids who couldn't get a job' and 'they don't read twenty newspapers a day.'"

Well, as much as you might be offended by that description, can you provide evidence against it? I do not want troops to suffer or die, but I do want them to fight in righteous battles and to understand the complexities involved in war. I would not classify them all as unable to find employment, but the statistics seem to indicate that they do come from a specific socioeconomic background, one that you do not know, and one that precludes them from a fully educated understanding of the battles they will be a part of.

I will never question the heart or intention of our soldiers, only their ability to understand the complexities of war, especially when their leadership is intent on denying that complexity to simplify battle and rally support.

Do you think troops should not know, acknowledge, or ignore the fact that we once funded bin Laden and the Taliban? That our pro-Israel policy has enraged Arabs in the Middle East? Outside of your understanding or opinion of the merit of these arguments, do you think the troops should see our battle as black and white or should they understand these subtleties? The administration seems to think that the American people, and the troops, should ignore or deride this information as unimportant. I challenge you to argue otherwise.

Kimyl, I would be hard-pressed to reply point by point to your ridiculous comments, and I realize it is just a waste of time to do so.

I make it a point that anyone who thinks WE somehow share in blame because of our "pro-Israel" policy is someone absolutely useless to discuss. Your comments about the military are repulsive.

But I will give you this one...for someone in med school (as you stated clearly in another post) you sure have a heck of a lot of free time on your hands - you should do a documentary so future med school students could learn your student.

Or when you said you were "in school studying to be a physician" did you simply mean you were a freshman undergraduate on summer vacation from the local JUCO...

In any voluntary army you are going to have a preponderance of soldiers who "like to fight", who sign up not just for the free college but for the chance to shoot something or see battle. They like Bush because they get to fight and he is openly homophobic, - Kimyl at 11:07 PM

I will never question the heart or INTENTION of our soldiers - Kimyl at 4:34 AM

Wow- talk about a hijacked thread. Anybody here read Jim Hoft's take on Kerry's letter and Bush supposedly "sneaking in" to St. Louis? Must have been the best kept secret in broad daylight ever in town- seeing as the Governor was among the big crowd and TV crews that greeted him when he arrived and Jim Talent flew in with him on Air Force One, and there were even some protestors there.

Yep- pretty secret fundraising trip.

Marty,
I am going to be doing a post or possibly even a column on that soon. There are some additional examples I have found, but won't have time to put them all down in words until after the weekend. Evidently that is a theme the Dems are deciding to push hard and like you pointed out, it is pretty pathetic.