Political Games - Where the fuck’s the reset button?

Not that we didn’t already know that, but here’s more proof. Apparently Rove thinks that my freshman Representative Joe Sestak is “vulnerable” to a challenge in 2008. For those who don’t know, Sestak defeated an incumbent 57-43 this past November. I don’t know who Rove has in mind or what numbers he’s looking at (probably that fuzzy math), but here’s what I say.

Bring it on.

[List is here; read the entry, too, to find out what the White House thinks is an appropriate use of GSA funding.]

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You hear a lot of happy talk from those who either support Bush’s “new” strategy in Iraq or are afraid of being labeled “anti-war” (as if that’s bad thing) about how we need to “give it a chance” to see if it “succeeds” before calling for the troops to come home. This is utter horseshit. Let’s assume, as many who support the surge [all, what, 15% of America?] have argued, that this is our “last shot” and we’ll know “within a year” or so if it’s working. What exactly is “success”? Presumably, success is a great reduction in violence, a lessening of ethno-religious hostility, and other political benchmarks. Let’s say, for the sake of the argument, that “success” as here defined is achieved by December 31st. Then what? If their mission has succeeded, the next logical step would be to… draw down troop strength, as the Democrats in Congress have suggested. If these conditions are not met, if our “last shot” has failed, then what should we do? Continue following a 4+ year strategy that has failed? No! We change course, and the public decided by their votes in November to draw-down our troops. If the condition has improved, if our mission is successful, then we can leave and declare victory. If it fails, we admit that our military cannot fix this problem and remove them to both get them out of harm’s way and so their presence cannot further exacerbate the situation.

That is the beauty of the Iraq Supplemental Funding Bill that just passed the Senate days after a similar bill passed the House. According to the bill, the troops need to start drawing down by March 08 [or so; it depends on the bill and a variety of other issues] because they will either have been successful in their mission and can come home, or it will have been long past clear to anyone with a functioning brain that we will have failed. Naturally, almost all the Republicans voted against it (including the “moderate” Specter) and Bush has threatened to veto it. Because it will “send the wrong message” and prevent us from winning or something. These people are children. 662 days to go, folks. It’s gonna be a wild ride.

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