Bush resists major course change in Iraq

President Bush said on Friday he will resist election-year pressure for a major shift in strategy in Iraq, despite growing doubts among Americans and anxiety over the war among Republican lawmakers.

And why should he listen to the people? What was it he said back in April?

I hear the voices, and I read the front page, and I know the speculation. But I’m the decider, and I decide what is best.

Methinks he doth not counsel the people.

“Our goal in Iraq is clear, and it’s unchanging,” Bush told Republican loyalists, denouncing Democrats who want a course correction as supporting a “doubt-and-defeat” approach.

Mr. Bush, what is our goal in Iraq, exactly? You’ve changed it so many times—obviously it’s not “unchanging”—that I can’t remember anymore. I remember something about weapons of mass destruction, but there were none. I also remember something about Saddam’s being involved in 9/11, but there were no connections. I think the latest I’ve heard is “democracy and freedom for Iraq,” but with our own Gestapo-like prisons in Iraq, that’s definitely not the goal.

But less than three weeks before November 7 elections, pressure is growing in the U.S. Congress for a major shift in a war that has cost the lives of at least 73 Americans in October alone.

“I don’t believe we can continue based on an open-ended, unconditional presence,” Maine Republican Senator Olympia Snowe was quoted as saying in The Washington Post.

“I don't think there’s any question about that—that there will be a change” in the U.S. strategy in Iraq after the November 7 congressional elections, she added.

“Vote for us in November, and we promise we’ll change our Iraq strategy! How? We’ll never tell!”

I’m sick of all this crap about the Iraq Occupation. Get the U.S. the hell out of there—and anyone else there with us.

[…] Read the original article.
[+] Add post to your del.icio.us.