McCain's Alzheimer's strikes this time geography

[BigRob]

How about we never should have been over there to begin with? How about we should, as Obama has said, have put those troops in Afghanistan and gone after Osama bin Laden..remember him?

Speaking of which, it's now been exactly 2500 days since your Republican president promised the American people that Osama would be captured 'dead or alive.'

http://www.buzzflash.com/perspectives/Osama_Clock.html

So since we are there regardless of your thoughts on the view, is it not good to enact policies to then reduce their deaths?

 

[BigRob]

actually he has said it may have helped. Also today McCain attacked Obama for saying that other things such as the Sunni Awakening, and the Shia Militia cease fire played a large part, and could have reduced the Violence without the Surge. McCain attacked Obama for not knowing the facts about the Surge, and that the Surge happened helping them meet with and create the Awakening ( aka Sunni Crack down on Al Qaeda Elements) fact is it was Created months before the Surge was even talked about, let alone was put into place. Its one thing to screw up , its anther to attack someone for not knowing the facts, when in fact you are the one who had them wrong.

He said it was better yes, but stopped short of saying that the surge worked or was a success. In fact, he turned it around into a comment on we did not know if his plan in 2007 to withdraw and set timetables would have achieved better results. He is dodging giving McCain any credit for the surge. That much is obvious.

As for the Sunni Awakenings, yes they started months before troops were actually on the ground, and yes they played a role, but keep in mind McCain was calling for a surge long before the surge actually became a real strategy. Added to that, I do not think that you can say that the Sunni Awakening is the entire cause of the violence to fall, I can just as easily argue that the troop surge gave confidence to the average Sunni to actually go after the extremists in a more aggressive manner.

Obama is playing politics in this situation, which is typical for anyone running for President, but I think it hurts him, because all he says on it is that "it may have helped" when average Americans view the surge as a success.

Also he attacked Obama today saying that Obama would rather lose the wa
r and win the Election vs win the war and lose the Election. I expected more from McCain then this cheap attacks, and what truly amounts to him saying Obama does not care about this nation.

McCain is playing to his strength, which is foreign policy. Obama's position continues to waver on Iraq and McCain has to play it up. He is playing politics as well, same as Obama. As for Obama, he came out with his Iraq plan again before even leaving on his trip, and then continued to call for a pullout in 16 months.

Further, Obama did not support the surge in Iraq to bring stability, but now he comes out with a plan to "surge" in Afghanistan. I am unsure what his logic is on this and why the surge "may have helped" in Iraq, but will be a sure bet in Iraq.

Obama is not doing anything to gain my vote.....but McCain is doing alot to make sure I don't vote for him.

McCain is just about the worst person we can have running, I will admit that, but anyone other than Obama is fine with me, especially with a Democratic congress.

 

[Popeye]

So since we are there regardless of your thoughts on the view, is it not good to enact policies to then reduce their deaths?

Here's a decent policy,...Iraqi PM Maliki, in the Der Speigel interview, said he supported a timetable for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq.

"U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes."

Please don't tell me that it was mistranslated because not only was the original translation by Maliki's interpreter but an audio recording exists which has since been translated to mean the same thing.

In fact, though Maliki had been "talked to" by US officials after the Der Speigel interview became public, following a meeting in Baghdad on Monday between Maliki and Obama a government spokesman said they were hopeful that U.S. combat forces could be out of the country by 2010.

If you agree with that fine, but I get the distinct impression you want to stay there indefinitely.....now how would that be saving lives?

 

[BigRob]

Here's a decent policy,...Iraqi PM Maliki, in the Der Speigel interview, said he supported a timetable for U.S. troops to withdraw from Iraq.

"U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months. That, we think, would be the right timeframe for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes."

Please don't tell me that it was mistranslated because not only was the original translation by Maliki's interpreter but an audio recording exists which has since been translated to mean the same thing.

In fact, though Maliki had been "talked to" by US officials after the Der Speigel interview became public, following a meeting in Baghdad on Monday between Maliki and Obama a government spokesman said they were hopeful that U.S. combat forces could be out of the country by 2010.

If you agree with that fine, but I get the distinct impression you want to stay there indefinitely.....now how would that be saving lives?

I am not going to try to claim that his comment was some mistranslation. Here is how I interpret this:

1) Maliki has been saying for awhile now that Iraqi soldiers need to take the lead and that US soldiers need to leave the country as soon as possible.

2) I think he says this because domestically it is a popular opinion. Obviously he is a politician as well and no one wants the US army in the country forever. I think he says this to attract domestic support for himself and keep his job.

3) However, he has said this numerous times before, but then goes to the UN and continually asks for them to extend the mission of the US soldiers in Iraq. He is caught in the politics game. On one hand he must continue to push for a withdrawal to maintain domestic popularity, but at the same time he knows that a pullout right now is a disaster.

4) Given the success of the surge however, he is able to up the rhetoric for withdrawal since Iraqi citizens now see much less violence and less of a need for US troop presence.

It is still a volatile situation however, and it must be handled carefully, but do not forget that the Iraqi government and its leaders are politicians as well and want to keep their own jobs.

If it it simply lives are we are worried about, we cannot justify a pullout if the nation will then break out in more deaths. Is an American life worth more than an Iraqi life? I simply said that since we are there, any prevention of US soldier deaths we can have is a good thing, and should not be marginalized.

I do not want to stay forever, but I want to stay long enough to ensure that Iraq will not implode when we leave and bring the entire region with it. I think we are making progress towards this goal as ISF forces continue to take the lead in missions.