Sunday Morning Talk Show Thread 31 December 2006

FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind.; former Gov. Tom Vilsack, D-Iowa, presidential candidate.

MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Former NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw; journalist Bob Woodward.

FACE THE NATION (CBS): Alexander Haig, former Ford White House chief of staff; journalists Ben Bradlee of the Washington Post and Tom DeFrank of the New York Daily News; Gerald Ford biographer James Cannon.

THIS WEEK (ABC): Former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., presidential candidate; wife, Elizabeth Edwards.

LATE EDITION (CNN) : Feisal al-Istrabadi, Iraq's deputy ambassador to the United Nations; Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn.

Oh My Gosh, I am stunned. You always seem to be able to highlight the best performances, even if we are not aware of it at the time of posting. So much of the thread is Sunday Thread freepers playing off each others posts and educating and enlightening one another as we comment. We are so glad and lucky to have you as one of the Top Ten Judges. All the Judges deserve commendations, Rodguy especially keeps it going and alas Babylon started it all, and continues to keep those threads coming. I have to reiterate what I have said before, I am so very proud and humbled by the incredible abilities of the Sunday Thread Freepers. Let's kick it up a notch to start the New Year.

You are not talking Powell's Overwhelming Force doctrine, I suspect. We are not taking out an Desert Storm era Iraqi force lined up like bowling pins in bunkered positions, or retreating in massive columns along that turkey shoot "Highway of Death".

As to the tactics on the ground now? I'm no second guesser, like most people seem to be on the issue of how the tactics are working out.

I can speak for the histories or wars and warfare I personally have read -- not many, but enough for me to speak some of what I hope is history's wisdom to you and the many other chicken littles of either persuation -- your's that we ain't doing enough, which as chicken little sky is falling second guesser opinionations is honorable enough. You want to win! Great, so do I!

Your advice if taken is a whole lot better than the other side's chicken littles -- those "Withdraw now!" idiots. That's because you think things out better.

So I have hope that "chiken little-ism" isn't really your thing.

So speaking to that non-panic-mode better part of you, here's my read of history's take on the matter in Iraq today.

On the ground: We're winning, and we're doing fine.

That's pretty much it. Warrior and war-wise.

In the politics, we're like arm-wrestlers, holding in the middle at best, and getting close to getting our hand jammed into the table at worst.

And POLITICS that's the virtual war where maybe the Powell Doctrine of overwhelming force would be applied effectively. If we had the overwhelming force. But this is the real world and we do not. Life is not supposed to be easy that way. Political fights are the toughest and need constant vigilance and perseverance to win. Overwhelming force is never available in politics.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.