“I'm playing for October-November," Mr. Bush said to Draper. That, evidently, is the time during which, he thinks he can sell us the real plan, which is “to get us in a position where the presidential candidates will be comfortable about sustaining a presence."
Comfortable, that is, with saying about Iraq, again quoting the President, “stay... longer."
And there it is. We've caught you. Your goal is not to bring some troops home, maybe, if we let you have your way now. Your goal is not to set the stage for eventual withdrawal. You are, to use your own disrespectful, tone-deaf word, playing at getting the next Republican nominee to agree to jump into this bottomless pit with you, and take us with him, as we stay in Iraq for another year, and another, and another, and and on.....
All that Bush is doing is trying to position everything so that a Republican presidential candidate will be in a favorable place, win election, and agree to continue Bush's Iraq war. Isn't nice to know that Bush is doing things in Iraq to make it good for Republican presidential candidates instead of the troops and their families?
I think that with this in mind, there should be a campaign sign that says:
VOTE FOR A REPUBLICAN FOR PRESIDENT
AND CONTINUE THE WAR IN IRAQ
