Posted on 08/20/2006 11:54:51 AM PDT by jmc1969
U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., says the United States is not winning the war in Iraq and he still thinks more troops are needed on the ground.
McCain, a possible GOP presidential candidate in 2008, appeared Sunday on NBC News' "Meet the Press."
Asked whether the United States was winning the war, McCain said, "I don't think so, but I'm not sure that it's turned into a civil war ... I think it's been well documented now that we didn't have enough (troops) there from the beginning, that we allowed the looting, that we did not have control, particularly ... (in areas such as) the Sunni Triangle, which led to us paying a very heavy price."
McCain said U.S. troops must be able to deal with the insurgency, particularly Shiite militias.
He reaffirmed his stand that U.S. troops should not withdraw. "I want to emphasize that we cannot lose this," McCain said. "It will cause chaos in Iraq and in the region, and ... we must prevail."
I guess he missed most of his lessons on totalitarianism, despite his incarceration in the Hanoi Hilton. He is too smug to think that Islamofascism can easily invade the USA.
One more mark against McCain, and now just what would HE do differently in Iraq. Iraq is in control of her own government, and The USA will be there for a long time. Enough of this schilling for the defeatests. McCain has now sealed his electoral doom as a possible presidential candidate.
Why is McCain wrong in this instance? Why is Fatboy Sadr still roaming free?
We are not fighting a "war in Iraq".
We are fighting a "WOT" which Iraq is a part of.
McCain, talk sense or STFU already.
Maybe he just lacks vision? ; )
Did you just come out of a coma or something?
So the guys leading the insurgency see McCain saying we are not winning. Chuck Hagel saying we are not winning. Newt Gingrich saying we are not winning. What do you suppose they are thinking now? Probably, if they keep on blowing up other Iraqi's from now through 2006 we will be forced to pull out of Iraq and then watch the real blood letting begin.Amazing how these guys scatter at first sign of disastifaction in how things are going. I would not vote for any of these gentlemen if my life depended on it.
This isn't the way to win primaries, Senator McCain. At least not in the Republican Party!!
McCain's setting himself to appeal to his core constituency -- Democrats.
Thanks Mccain for your ususal support (not) of our troops.
The same reason that Fatboy Clinton is still roaming free. The price of freedom is that we have to suffer idiots and traitors
No. You don't get it if you think a RINO can be nominated. The people who participate in caucuses and nominating primaries are the die-hard activists. Those people won't accept a pro-abortion, pro-homo, gun grabber -- even Rudy.
I think he did a marvelous job during 9/11 and the aftermath. Moreover we have a mutual friend who introduced us in the months after 9/11. I know him personally and have worked with him on a cuase we both were deeply dedicated to. Still, I'd be the first to stand up at a national convention to nominate an opponent. It's about idealogy and beliefs, period.
Lets finish this then McCain. How many more troops do we need and how much collateral damage is acceptable to you? How many more troops dying is acceptable? Are you for bombing Mosques that house Terrorists? You can't be President if you can't make hard decisions and what you have said is dribble coming out both sides of your mouth.
McCain - Not winning the Republican Presidential nomination in 08.
Where is Karen Hughes?
By John E. Carey
August 20, 2006
More precisely, “Where is the United States’ campaign of truth and honesty in the Middle East?”
Declaring the United States “must do better job of engaging the Muslim world,” Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice introduced former presidential adviser Karen Hughes on Monday (March 14, 2005) as the Bush administration’s choice for a State Department post designed to change Islamic perceptions about America.
Hughes became undersecretary of state for public diplomacy with the rank of ambassador.
“I’m eager to listen and to learn,” Hughes said, with Rice standing at her side.
The official U.S. State Department web site says, "Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Karen Hughes has been tasked by President Bush with leading efforts to promote America's values and confront ideological support for terrorism around the world. She oversees three bureaus at the Department of State: Educational and Cultural Affairs, Public Affairs, and International Information Programs, and participates in foreign policy development at the State Department. "
How do you think she is doing?
Recently in Lebanon, thug named Hassan Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader, emerged from the shadows to become, in just over a month, one of the more important political figures of Lebanon and one of the leaders of the Arab world’s radical wing.
Before the war, Hassan Nasrallah was the one who made sure the garbage went out, the aged were cared for, the children had schools.
During the war Hassan Nasrallah, as seen by Arabs, is the man who faced down Israel and the Great Satan.Before this war, few respected moderates in Beirut or in the greater Arab world paid much attention to Nasrallah. Now his stock has soared.
He is the darling of the man on the Arab street for not just keeping his forces in the field for more than thirty days with the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) but by apparently winning.
By appearing almost daily on al-Manar ("The Beacon," the name of Hezbollah TV), al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya TV during the conflict saying, "We have not been harmed," Nasrallah made himself the most important face of the war, eclipsing everyone in the governments of Israel and Lebanon.
I keep asking myself, where is Karen Hughes? Or, more correctly, where is the mighty U.S. and its public diplomacy?
Are we to expect that Nasrallah stole a march on the entire U.S. government and that is O.K. ?
I don't generally mind my public servants doing nothing; but when the stakes are so high I get interested.
But maybe our public servants are working hard. On Saturday, August 19, 2006, the president said in his weekly radio address, "Thanks to the leadership of Secretary Rice and Ambassador Bolton at the United Nations, the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution that will help bring an end to the violence and create a foundation for a sustainable peace. "
Does the president really believe that? We don't. Maybe this is more "misunderspinning."
Didn’t the president hire his Texas friend Karen Hughes, with a salary clearly over $150,000 a year, to do for the U.S. just what Nasrallah is doing in his spare time? I mean, am I the only one outraged?
The degree of lasting political clout Hassan Nasrallah and Hezbollah have gained remains to be seen. But there is a gain, not a loss.
And Nasrallah's gain is the United States' loss.
The last time we saw Karen Hughes, she was apparently carrying U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s baggage.
We ask the president; “Where is Karen Hughes?”
See: http://extendedremarks.blogspot.com/
2006_08_02_extendedremarks_archive.html
Yes, the first person I always got to when asking the question "Are we winning the war?" is someone who is associted with a war we lost, and whose experience consists of having been shot down (twice!) and spending 6 yeras as POW.
John McCain (and the rest of his generation) wouldn't know a military victory if it slapped them in the face.
He's right in one respect; there aren't enough boots on the ground, but that's only because the US military has still failed to learn the lesson of WWII/Kora/Vietnam: quality infantry willing to slug it out with the enemy in face-to-face combat, not tanks, not high-tech gee-gaws, not special forces, not public-relations officers, win wars, and that you have to break eggs if you wish to make an omlette.
We don't have many infantrymen (or is it now infantrypersons?) because to spend money on the them would mean fewer toys (F-22's, DD(X)'s, Strykers, etc). It's also difficult to get people who mostly see the military as a way to get that great, entry-level-network engineering job AFTER their service, to join up to crawl through the mud when the civilian sector pays about 3 times as far as starting salaries (which are typically pathetic, but not as pathetic as military pay). The X-box generation wants to play Infantryman via the first-person shooter, but not actually, you know, BE one.
And of course, we're forgetting our media-obsessed society which wants to see antisceptic wars and not war as it really is; the blood, the filth, the human suffering, which, unfortunately, are often necessary when one is involved in the destruction of a poisonous culture in the hopes of replacing it with a much more rational and humane one. Somewhere along the lines, we forgot how to kill effectively, viciously and on the eyeball-to-eyeball level.
Bingo and he forgets the DemocRATs cannot vote in most of our primaries. Since the SCOTUS ruled a state like OK can have a closed primary, would suggest that all states go to closed primaries and shut off the DemocRATs from voting for McCain in a Republican primary.
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