**** See PART TWO on previous posting/thread. ****

5) If Congresses passes new legislation mandating a withdrawal timetable for U.S. troops from Iraq and heavy violence still reigns in Iraq, Congress has to allow twelve (12) to eighteen (1 months to complete the withdrawal, we owe it to the Iraqi people. The U.S. egregiously mismanaged the reconstruction of Iraq so therefore our nation needs to try to make-up for that fact where we can which places a moral mandate on the U.S. that when we withdrawal our troops we do so at a moderate time table so as to give the Iraq people a fair chance of making arrangements to keeping their country on the path where it doesn’t collapse. The Iraq government is going to need this amount of time to increase the size of the Iraq Security forces and have them implement a security plan to fill the vacuum left by the departing U.S. troops. The Iraq government will likely need this time to move the central government out of Baghdad because as things look now if they stay in Baghdad they will be chopped to pieces by the different militant groups that will likely operate there. An awful lot of Iraqis answered America’s call to help rebuild Iraq, many of them put themselves and their families lives and wealth on the line to do this, if we just leave Iraq at a rapid pace that will be a severe and unforgivable betrayal and will result in repercussions that Washington will maximumly regret. Moreover Congress owes it to the 3,300 Americans that loss their lives in Iraq and to the 12,000 Americans seriously wounded and their families to leave Iraq on a timetable that gives Iraq a fair chance to succeed.

6) American troop presence in Iraq is a major cause of the security and political problems in Iraq. The Sunni insurgents as well as the major Shiite militia, the Mahdi army, publicly annunciate as their major goal driving the U.S. out of Iraq, al Qaeda has as its reason for being the destruction of American culture with its freedom and democracy. Pervasively widespread amongst the Iraqi population is the belief that the U.S. presence in Iraq is a major root of Iraq’s problems. The U.S. presence in Iraq is fueling the extremely problematic interference of Iran and Syria in security matters in Iraq. When the U.S. armed forces leave Iraq, a major spot light will be focused on the al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq, the key perpetuators of the shocking violence in Iraq, and the truth will shine bright that they don’t care about the Iraqi people and they are using the Iraqi people to spread their regressive, anti-rights culture and the Iraqi people will be better positioned to expel these terrorists from Iraq.

7) President Bush is a lost cause on Iraq. He is unable to accept the realities in Iraq and his track record indicates he is prepared to pay unconscionable costs in terms of American lives and monetary resources to keep Iraq from collapsing. The American people’s only hope for saving America from this disaster in Iraq is if Congress leads on this issue which means the Republicans in Congress, the Democrats are already there, have to part ways with the president on the Iraq issue. The Republicans need to keep in the forefront not only that the costs here demand they break from the President, but also, sticking with President Bush on the Iraq issue will bring them a profound and resounding defeat in the next national elections.

All these listed factors have to lead responsible Americans to the conclusion that the right course for the American people to be taking at this time is to have the Congress pass the initial supplemental Iraq War funding bill with no benchmarks with negative consequence conditions for failure on the Iraq government. If Democrat leaders can’t get the votes amongst their rank and file to pass such a bill by appealing to these members character in terms of patience (in four months the surge assessment will be in and the case for an Iraq exit strategy overwhelming) and wisdom (pick your battles – the present supplemental bill battle is only a loser for the Democrats but the next one is a winner) then the Republican and Democrat leadership should offer the following carrots: cut the current supplemental of any non-military reconstruction funding for Iraq (that way Democrat members can say to their anti-war constituents we are with our vote fighting with the President to change America’s course in Iraq) and the Republican congressional leadership should give a public commitment that they will not allow a filibuster to be conducted on the next supplemental bill but rather they are agreeing to allow a debate and vote on a supplemental bill, that has a six month withdrawal timetable, to begin as early as October 1, 2007. When the next supplemental bill comes up for funding the Iraq War after September 2007, the surge strategy assessment will be in and President Bush will be out of chances and there should be a political bi-partisan juggernaut existing that will push through binding veto-proof legislation on the President to bring the troops home from Iraq.