Yea never mind he supported action in Afghanistan huh? While Bush fiddles our troops are being worn down from being over deployed. Rotations inside Iraq are longer as are what was standard 4 year active duty enlistments. But here is the problem. GW Bush does not know or understand how to fight a war. He wants to play social engineer to three tribes who have centuries of history of war with each other. He didn't want to end Iraq's future potential as a military threat good grief the man is rearming them and having them trained for the next Saddam.
Going after those responsible for 9/11 is one thing but please name me the Iraqis who were on those planes. Iraq could have been handled covertly. Saddam had no air force, not a real great army, no Navy, and we had their skies locked down.
If Bush wanted that war so blasted bad then you tell me why he didn't let the soldiers do their job and level it and be done with it? Instead he has turned it into a nation building boondoggle a tar baby we now likely will never be free of. Worse he has united what was once an enemy nation against Iraq against us as well. All this time no additional call for more troops on permenant active duty.
The other problem is General George failed to plan. Where are the needed extra forces to give those who are on third and forth tours relief? The reserves? He's destroying that program as well. Bush deceived all of us even to the point of his Mission Accomplished nonsense on a flight-deck. Ron Paul has read him like a book as well as his fellow members of congress.
Congress in either party did not want this war as in a full scale knock down drag out get it over with war lasting in months rather than a decade from now limited hands tied actions. Thats why they took the cowards way out in their authorization of use of force rather than an actual declaration or war which would have bound congress and Bush to it's swift end. They did it to save their political butts and only Ron Paul had the guts to say NO! in the GOP. He was right. Either declare it or shut up.
Bush has tied the troops hands as bit as much as LBJ did trying to protect the Iraqi people. Yet it's good because he's a Republican? Maybe if Bush had actually flown a combat mission he would have had a different view about what it takes to win. We will not win in Iraq under the Bush war plan because he has no war plan. That is one reason he can't keep generals. He doesn't allow plans for war but for policing limited areas. He has a nation building plan which in 2000 he said he was against nation building. He sure changed his mind fast now didn't he.
His intent from day one in Iraq was nation building and the first two days of air attacks proved as much. Three wars behind us say it can not be done this way and now we wish to make it four because Republicans won't stand up to a POTUS who refuses to admit he screwed up royally on this? We were headed to Iraq 9/11 or not.
About Ron Paul being anti-war? No I don't think so. If the U.S. came under direct attack he would call for a formal declaration of war from congress and that nation would soon regret starting it. He would fight it as a war telling the generals do what it takes to win and you have our blessings and full support. Even FDR knew and understood war and what it took. He let the generals run the war even the tyrant he was otherwise. Truman forgot what it takes as did Johnson and Nixon. Poppy forgot as well. Remember Poppy? He was the one whop mobilized our military into Iraq for war then let Saddam go free. He didn't have the guts either. Then Junior turns right around and has the same clowns plan for another invasion?
So tell me. If Reagan had sent the troop levels into Iraq that Bush did do you think he would have them sitting over there as Nannies and nation builders? Or do you think he would have asked for a plan from the generals to destroy the nation and be done with it to limit loss of American life and equipment and avoid a drawn out war by limited hands tied actions? Actually Reagan was a sneaky man. He didn't strut around on national TV for months on end saying Mommar I'm coming after you. He bombed the man and then Mommar shut up.
You can not take a POTUS serious who is not willing to let the military do their job. Nation building and baby sitting a government is not their job. Bush does not understand this and thus the reason he is loosing support even in the GOP. Their job is to destroy and kill. They are not policemen or the Peace Corp. They are soldiers.
Does Paul's definition of a direct attack include the firing of missiles at our pilots on a routine basis. Or does our homeland have to get hit before Paul considers an attack on Americans to constitute an act of war?
Specific areas of agreement (parenthetical questions are my suggested policies with which you may not agree):
1. Our troops are being worn down by overdeployment and over [any???] reliance on reserves (and by imbecilic criminal prosecutions for anything the antiwar antiAmerican crowd does not like?);
2. We don't need social engineering (we need mass killing of our nation's enemies funded by confiscating their oil??? We also need to preserve the sovereignty of our Kurdish allies???);
3. Bush absolutely should have given the troops free reign to utterly destroy the Iraqi enemies and flatten their areas.
4. We need drastically increased numbers of soldiers, sailors, marines, airmen, etc., generally and in the Middle East.
5. We don't need or want nation building in Iraq or anywhere else, now or ever. (not even in New Orleans)
6. Your last two paragraphs generally.
The answer STILL is not and never will be anything vaguely resembling paleoPaulie or his ilk.