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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4638
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| Posted: 19 March 2008 at 9:43pm | IP Logged | 1
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The surge is a "success" only because they've moved the goalposts. The original rationale of the surge was that by sending in more troops "at a critical juncture" they could dramatically stabilize things so that we could then start reducing our troop presence there. Now they are saying the fact that the surge is a success means we can't reduce the amount of troops.
So in reality, the surge is a failure. It hasn't accomplished its goal of creating a more secure or stable Iraqi governmental infrastructure. The added troops are helping maintain greater security in the present, but how is that any kind of solution if the security is so tenuous the troops have to stay there forever to maintain it? The troops are propping up a false security while no real progress has been made in the civil war there. The cynical might suggest the surge is just a ploy to create the illusion of progress until they can get McCain elected. Or maybe the plan really is to stay there 100 years like McCain has opined.
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Kevin Hagerman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 15 April 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 18349
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| Posted: 19 March 2008 at 10:14pm | IP Logged | 2
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100 years or until the oil is gone.
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F. Ron Miller
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1289
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| Posted: 19 March 2008 at 10:56pm | IP Logged | 3
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Surge? You're playing their suckers game if you call it a surge. Call it for
what it is a troop escalation.
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William McCormick
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 26 February 2006
Posts: 3297
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 5:52am | IP Logged | 4
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William, Howard asked, I was answering. And this whole thread is about hypothetical predictions about performance as president. Don't be testy.
*********
Wasn't being testy. Just can't believe anyone thinks that Gore or Kerry could have done a worse job running this country than Bush. What does he have to do before some people get it? In my almost forty years I have never seen the country in this big of a shambles.
Bush's mistakes certainly aren't hypothetical.
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Brian Hunt
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5180
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 9:19am | IP Logged | 5
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Amen William. The most dissapointing thing about Bush to me is that he started out with a great team of advisors, but one by one his administration has ignored them. The man seems incapable of taking good advice.
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Howard Mackie
Byrne Robotics Security
Armed and Dangerous
Joined: 16 February 2005
Posts: 666
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 9:32am | IP Logged | 6
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I am curious as to who the "great team of advisors" would have been. I know there was a time that Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Rice were considered to be exactly that. I know he always talks about taking advice from the"Generals on the ground" , and then ignores any advice that strays from his"vision" and gets rid of them. So, and I am being serious, who are the advisors he ignored?
Howard
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Michael Roberts
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 14911
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 9:35am | IP Logged | 7
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So, and I am being serious, who are the advisors he ignored?
---
Powell.
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Michael Penn
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 April 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 13140
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 9:53am | IP Logged | 8
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Powell... he clearly knew better, but opted to be a team-man. What if he'd resigned because of the war plan instead of selling it...?
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Josh Sherwood
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 29 May 2007
Location: Canada
Posts: 280
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 12:55pm | IP Logged | 9
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I've been re-learning a lot about this debate recently. Here's what I remember from the pre-invasion:
Contrary to conservative claims, a large number of Americans had questions about invasion. Their questions were ignored, the invasion occurred, and they were then told "the time for debate is over."
But the time for debate never began!
At the time, before the war began, a British weapons inspector named David Kelly was ordered to exaggerate their findings. He did so, but later confessed to somebody at CBC that the WMDs were a fabrication. He was later found dead under mysterious circumstances.
Why were the WMDs fabricated? There exists evidence dating to before 9/11 even occurred that Iraq was on Bush's To Do list.
If you follow the series of events as they unfold, you come to realize just how fragile the invasion of Iraq was from the very beginning. The evidence was weak, the war was shoved down our throats, and the results have been as disastrous as we feared they would be.
And anybody who says to the contrary is a revisionist or a liar.
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Todd Douglas
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Joined: 14 July 2004
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 1:11pm | IP Logged | 10
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QUOTE:
| There exists evidence dating to before 9/11 even occurred that Iraq was on Bush's To Do list. |
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I seem to recall a Time or Newsweek article that told the story of "Dubya" wandering the halls of the White House, sticking his head into Rice's office and saying, "F*** Saddam...he's goin' down."
I'd like to think it's an apocryphal story...but, given what we've seen of the man, it's pretty darned believable.
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Christopher Alan Miller
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 26 October 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 2787
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 1:17pm | IP Logged | 11
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Iraq was on Bill Clinton's to do list as well .He's the one that first started calling for a regime change.
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Mike O'Brien
Byrne Robotics Member
Official JB Historian
Joined: 18 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 10927
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| Posted: 20 March 2008 at 1:36pm | IP Logged | 12
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the desire to go establish a perminant presence in Iraq does date back to the 90s but not through Clinton - it was a group in Washington DC called the PNAC (http://www.newamericancentury.org/) a number of whose founding members went on to be a part of Bush's first cabinet.
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