[proud American in Canada]

"It accomplishes nothing to go in there and slaughter 15,000 civilians, "innocent" or not,"

Thank you for such an insightful post.

I would love to have your opinion about the possibility of GW speaking to the Iraqis on this whole prison humiliation mess.

Personally, and I've been posting on it this weekend, I think it might go a long way to mitigate the damage done. Or at least some way. And I think something more must be done than Larry King appearances or other news sound bites.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1128894/posts?page=96#96

[CasearianDaoist]

I imagine that he will wait until there is really firm data and then speak to the people. Court Martials and a press conference devoted to this mess is the only way. Take the hit now. I think that they will handle it honorably. I doubt that it will go much further if it is no deeper than what we have seen and it is handled with responsibility and honor. The Arabs might respond to it to some degree. It is a tough one but things like this happen in all wars. In fact it is actually pretty trivial compared to somethings I have seen. But now we are held to a extremely difficult standard - not that I condone it but no one seems to care avout Amreican contracters's bodies being multilated. In the end blame must fall on the officers in charge, they let decorum get out of hand.

I dowonder if Americans will really care once honor has been maintained.

I think that Bush needs to speak to the nation soon as the press are getting hysterical on this. If I were Bush I would dredge up what damage the press did during Vietnam. He will not do this though, too much of a gentleman.

[Ranger]

I've wondered myself why Bush hasn't made addresses to the Iraqi people; explain our motives, let them know what is expected of them and so on. It seems a voice of reason could fill a void even from an infidel.