Whether or not you or I agree on this, the judiciousness of this conflict is predicated on the Commander-in-Chief's duty to protect the United States.
Well said JJ. War was declared on our shores by the enemy on September 11th 2001. And there is no doubt in my mind that if the commander in chief of this country, along with the leaders of our allied nations had not made the decision to remove one of the head snakes from the middle east, that snake named Saddam would have eventually funded, supported or backed another attack on our country. Anyone who believes differently is only fooling themselves.
Even though public opinon has turned immensly on this administration, and the war in Iraq has not gone well, I still believe that it was the right thing to go into Iraq. I will alwyas stand by that decision.
Don Cardi
DC I admire your intellectual honesty notwithstanding that you and I have always had a fundamental disagreement over the wisdom of pursuing the Iraq war. IMHO we should have occupied and held Afghanistan and continued to monitor Al Queada cells through whatever means necessary including stepped up security and hit and run military raids when appropriate. I always thought we had no good exit strategy, and I regret we find ourselves in the mess we are in. I never thought invading Iraq was the appropriate answer to 9/11, and the ressurection of the Taliban the growing strength of Iran and the probable takeover of Pakistan by fundamentalists who do not like Musharef will make the world a more dangerous place not less dangerous. Saddam was a "snake" as you put it, but he was also a counterbalance to Iran, and by removing him we have created a vacuum. Worse still it is looking like Iraq will be taken over by some other dictator once we are out of there.
That said, we are there, and we need to find a smart way out of this mess. If the so-called "surge" works, good for us, but I am afraid it is too little too late. I am concerned for troops who are doing their third and fourth tours of duty, and I am concerned that Bush has never asked the American people to make a single sacrifice in what he claims to be the primary front of the war on terror.
BTW Regarding people on my side of the aisle, those who voted for the war, had more information at hand than I did at the time, and for them to be coming forward now and claiming they were "tricked" is disingenuous.
As for Boxer's comments, the only thing I'll ad to my previous post is that what should make the news is a Senator not running at the mouth. They all seem to be incapable of saying inything in less than twenty minutes.
