Now that the the democrats have had their little political grandstand, perhaps Bush and the dems can work to find common ground on the war.

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Read this post quick before the mods delete it!

http://www.myfoxcolorado.com/myfox/p...Y&pageId=3.4.1

As for the Democrats working to win the war..nope.

They are going to go now with the "Slow Bleed" policy.
What this is is basically funding the war while setting ridiculous conditions that hinder all aspect of it on our side.

Basically its the Murtha plan to lose the war while gaining politcally off the deaths of US soldiers or anyone else that gets killed during that period.

A crowd who states boldly that they want to run out on people who are being murdered by terrorist wil have absolutely no qualms whatsoever about intentionally causing American deaths to do the same thing.

One point: (Although there are many to choose from)

If the Democrats had been successful in setting timetables or defunding the war, I think it will HURT them politically long term. IMHO Iraq is a lost cause, most people can't even define winning, much less tell anyone how to do it. Therefore, this was a golden opportunity for Bush to hand off this losing debacle into the hands of Democrats. He could have blamed them with their strings for the loss. Which is coming regardless IMHO.

This says two good things about both sides.
1) Bush is standing by his convictions and not just handing over this loser.
2) Murtha is pushing to defund the war even though it is shifting the blame from Bush to the Dems, again shows strong conviction.

If I were in charge of Democratic Strategy, I would let Bush and all the Republicans hang themselves. Need more money? Here you go. Want to send more troops? Here you go. So in the end, when the inevitable happens, that Iraq is a craphole that supports terrorism against the USA, everyone will know right where to point their fingers.
But the Dems are showing actualy loyalty to the American people and standing up for what they believe in. At least those that didn't accept huge pork bribes for their votes.

Ixtellor

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George W. Bush "I don't think our troops ought to be used for what's called nation-building"

Blasphemy is a victimless crime.

I happen to agree with that. It only benefits the Dems in the long run. Bush can't solve the Iraq problem (or any problem). He's clearly incompetent. The war is largely what got them into power and it could very well win them the White House. So let W hang himself. However, the American people want us out and many elected them to do just that. So there's another dymanic at work here.

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I wasn't born with enough middle fingers.

The Official Articulating Orifice of the Borg has been informing us all that if the Dems passed the Funding/Timetable Bill then the responsibility for the Iraq Fiasco would slide to the Dems.
The bill didn't pass.

Does this mean that the responsibility remains with the War Criminal-in-Chief?

That "what's in it for me" attitude has problems of it's own. For instance, Lieberman gets a lot of respect for bucking his party even by some of the "get out now" crowd. He knows it's not the best political stance, but goes with his conscience. Then you have Reid saying the war is lost while our guys are still over there. If he votes to fund the war at any level, a war he says is already lost, he loses. Saying what they think and then not being willing to accept responsibility for their position. "The war is lost, but I'm going to let our guys stay over there because I care more about Bush having a bad legacy than I care about our soldiers." Isn't that what everybody is sick of?

For over 3 years, the Democrats have been fighting against the political will to get the war won. They've been gnawing away at it, IMO, for the sole purpose of using it for their political gain. One thing we should have learned from Vietnam is that military might won't win any war if it's not backed up by political will at home.

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"Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves." ~Ronald Reagan

The bill did pass. Bush vetoed it. The thing is that Bush has always been taking the responsibility for the war. He believes in it and stands by it. The Democrats need only be responsible for their own actions. They have the moronic stance of expecting someone else to stand up for their convictions. In effect, they are saying, "we want the war to end, but we want someone else to do it." Bush does exactly what he says he will do. They can't expect Bush to end the war for them and take the heat if it goes in the crapper.

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"Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves." ~Ronald Reagan

I was referring to the party in general, not to any one person. There are a wide variety of stances in both parties, some of which (on both sides) make no sense to me.

Which they couldn't do if the war was being "won". They used the incompetent running of a now unpopular war for political gain. Big deal. The GOP would do the EXACT same thing. So what? Want to counter that? Do better.

Actually, I didn't learn that at all. It's our lack of winning that reversed the political will in the first place. That and the realization in both cases that we had no valid reason for being there in the first place.

The bottom line is that no matter what the Dems or W say, if the people want the war to end it will. Not right away because our system is a turtle, but eventually the people will get what they want.

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I wasn't born with enough middle fingers.

Why "eventually"? Why not NOW?

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"Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves." ~Ronald Reagan

Why not now? Simple: Nothing happens in our government "now". Ever. We don't have a dictator. We have a quite sloppy Republic. Lots of people on both sides feel yanking funding while the Commander-in-Chief is still sending more people over there is a bad recipe. So they are working to gradually get troops out. If W digs in and the people really want an end, then they will simply wait until 2008 and take care of it then. It took years to end Vietnam after the people decided. It will be the same here. Bottom line: Not enough people want to defund to get it passed. Congress 101.

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I wasn't born with enough middle fingers.