Think we've made too much about McCain's nutlog plan for a century of war in Iraq? Well, he seems to think that our if, ands, and buts are really just a century of candy and nuts! Where the rosy scenarios never ever end! Really, why wouldn't you consign your kids, their kids, their grandkids and whoever happens to be left over in the remnants of civilization in the year 2525 to McCain's marvelous plan?
Well, maybe we should take pause at some of his flawed reasoning and glittery contradictions!
McCain: If Americans aren't dying, why not stay? We have a base in Kuwait!
Yes. And Kuwait has really done an exemplary job of not killing Americans. We've done an exemplary job of not arming a bunch of Kuwaitis that want to kill us. We've had no trouble on the moon, either. Why not station some troops there?
McCain: It's not American presence that bothers the American people, it's American casualties.
Uhm...doesn't this go without saying?
McCain: We need a reduction in casualties to the point where the Iraqis are doing the fighting and dying.
Well! This is really, the most powerful argument for immediate, wholesale withdrawal I can think of! If we came home, all of this - our own troops survival, the Iraqis fighting and dying - would be immediately achieved.
McCain: The Saudis...they didn't want us there for various reasons, so we left.
Glad you mentioned this, John. In a poll conducted in September of 2007 by the BBC, ABC News and NHK, Iraqis gave the following responses:
- 70% of Iraqis believe security has deteriorated in the area covered by the US military "surge"
- 60% see attacks on U.S.-led forces as justified
- Only 29% think things will get better in the next year
- 58% said they had "no confidence" in U.S./UK occupation forces
- 53% "Strongly Oppose" the presense of coalition forces in Iraq. An additional 26% "Somewhat oppose" them. I'm guessing there are "various reasons" for this.
McCain: Many experts said that the surge would not succeed and that I was wrong. I was right.
Oh, did it? That political reconciliation is all ironed out? Because we're sort of poised for the coming of the de-surge that Petraeus promised. And, don't you know, it'd appear that things are poised to go south in Kirkuk in short order. So you'd better hope that the surge solved everything. Because new problems are unfolding, and like the new movie from P.T. Anderson says, "There will be blood." Do we want another century of it? That's the question.