President Bush has been giving speeches about Iraq. He has spoken in front of veterans groups and other pre-screened groups. The pre-screening is necessary so that Bush will only meet with people who love him. Criticism is not allowed.
If you've seen or read the speeches, you'll notice that there is no discussion about when our soldiers and Marines are coming home. The President always talks in general terms such as "freedom" "victory" "democracy" etc. He never says that we've lost 2210 Americans in Iraq and how many more he expects to lose in the coming months and years. He talks of continued sacrifice. Why won't he discuss it? By placing numbers on our dead, it would force Americans to deal with the reality of war. The war goes on and there are still no firm plans to bring our troops home.
A WARM WELCOME
Just the other day, former President Bill Clinton greeted some returning U.S. troops. After a long flight back, having someone to greet them, even if wasn't planned, certainly warmed the spirits of the troops. From the Boston Globe:
"This is great," said Staff Sgt. Anthony Thompson of New York City, who stood next to Clinton.
Clinton's private jet, a Falcon 900, was scheduled to land for fuel, but there was a mechanical problem as well, said Rebecca Hupp, airport manager...
...Clinton had some fun when Army Spc. Joshua Ruschenberg used a cell phone provided by troop greeters to call to his sister-in-law, Shancy Garrison in North Carolina, and handed over the phone to the former commander in chief.
"Hi, Shancy, it's Bill Clinton," the former president said into the phone.
Democratic Rep. John Murtha was in Virginia recently. The Falls Church News-Press has an article. Here are excerpts:
Pennsylvania Rep. John T. Murtha commanded the stage and a live national television audience with unbowed resolve to defend his call for the immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Iraq last Thursday, spellbinding an overflow crowd of 600 at a town meeting hosted by Rep. Jim Moran in the Ballston area of Arlington.
Murtha’s credentials as a respected, veteran member of Congress with a strong record of supporting national defense has given enormous credibility to his call, and he told the audience Thursday that he’s been frustrated by the Bush administration’s reaction.
“All they can respond with is rhetoric,” he charged. “We’re 6,600 short in our military recruitment goals this year, and now have the smallest military since 1941. Families are having to go out to buy their sons and daughters in Iraq their battle armor, because they’re not getting it from the Pentagon, and all this was going on before I started speaking out.”
“I am getting criticized personally, yet this is not about me,” he stated. “It’s about people thirsting for a policy that makes sense, instead of an open-ended policy with no exit strategy.”
“I want to save every single life I can, yet now we’ve lost just about as many Americans in Iraq as in the (World Trade Center) towers,” he added. “In addition, there are 7,500 wounded, many so disfigured their wives can’t look at them, and many more who suffer from battle fatigue. They call it by something different these days, but we knew it as battle fatigue.”
“Our efforts in Iraq have turned the Iraqi people against us. 150,000 were put out of their homes in the siege of Falluja and the only thing that is uniting the Iraqi population now is its opposition to the U.S. occupation.
He said an immediate complete withdrawal would not only save U.S. lives, but compel the Iraqis to get serious about self-governing. With the U.S. forces out, the basis for the existence of the real terrorists would evaporate, and the nation’s new leaders would root them out in their attempt to create a stable society based on the rule of law....
You might be able to see some highlights on C-SPAN.
MAUREEN DOWD
Today's Columbus Dispatch has a great column by Maureen Dowd. Dowd writes about Judge Alito. Here are some excerpts:
You’ve got to like a man who knows how to juggle.
Judge Samuel Alito picked up the skill on a summer vacation a decade ago, and his juggling talent was on full display Tuesday as he tried to balance the old Sam, who was eager to impress Reagan revolutionaries with his zeal, with the new Sam, who is eager to impress a bipartisan Senate panel with his open-mindedness.
It was a tale of two Sams.
Is he the old Sam, who devised ways to upend Roe vs. Wade and crimp abortion rights? Or the new Sam, who has great respect for precedent and an "open mind" about abortion cases?
Is he the old Sam, who plotted ways to tip the balance of power to the executive branch? Or the new Sam, who states that "no person in this country is above the law, and that includes the president"?
Is he the old Sam, who said Robert Bork "was one of the most outstanding nominees of this century" and "a man of unequaled ability"? Or the new Sam, who shrugged off that statement as the dutiful support of one Reagan appointee for another?
Is he the old Sam, who cited membership in a Princeton University alumni club that resisted the admission of women and minorities when he was seeking a promotion in the very white Reagan old boys’ club? Or the new Sam, who has "no specific recollection of that organization," unless, of course, he innocently joined it to support ROTC on campus, and who says he’s been shaped partly by his hopes for his 17-year-old daughter, Laura, and by his sister’s experiences "as a trial lawyer in a profession that has traditionally been dominated by men"?
and...
Like the president, the judge loves baseball. Alito once vacationed at a fantasy baseball camp (OK fielder, hopeless hitter), wearing the red and white Phillies uniform. W has spent five years in fantasyland on Iraq, on occasion donning military costumes.
His fingers in his ears, W didn’t want to hear that we had too few troops in Iraq, ignoring advice from L. Paul Bremer and Gen. Eric Shinseki, or that the troops didn’t have enough armor. But the president continues to fling blame outward. In a speech Tuesday before the Veterans of Foreign Wars, he warned the Democrats that they should take care not to bring "comfort to our adversaries."
Alito was evasive, disingenuous and deferential. He fits the Bush era like a baseball glove.
