Mark Steyn: The last youth standing -

How many dead innocents in Iraq is acceptable? All of them, or just some of them? Just nuke and pave, eh?

What exactly are we doing now if not killing terrorists and civilians and hoping that the ratio is acceptable?

At some point you have to concede that war kills innocent people, and you either accept that, or become a pacifist.

While you've said many things here that eventually you'll grow out of, there's one that continues to be a pet peeve: There is no such thing as a declaration of war. Get over it. There's nothing about U.S. law or war power that changes with some mythical document. There is no document. Honest.

Oh yes there is. There is the consent of the people. The whole point of a declaration of war is to make sure you really mean it.

At some point you have to concede that war kills innocent people

There is the consent of the people.

Wow... so congress can just proclaim that the people support the war... and they will without question? That's pretty cool. /s.

It's not the congressional paperwork that makes a war "popular". It's the perception of the purposefulness and importance of the mission. In WW2 we had arguably less reason to go after Germany than we lately have had to go after Iraq. But back then, the press was on ~our~ side at least most of the time. But now, over a similar amount of time, with less than 1% the number of casualties and a fraction of the cost... our national attention span is depleted.

Part of the problem is that in any conflict the U.S. must have it neatly resolved in a standard six week cycle, like a TV miniseries, or Americans will just turn the channel and lose interest. Declarations to the contrary or not.

Just pull a "Dresden" and call it a day, eh? Sure, but while it may be emotionally satisfying to just kill 'em all, it would not in the end be a victory. Our problem is not that we aren't inflicting enough casualties-- it is that we are unable to cope with any of our own, even though they are at historic low levels considering the scope of the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. I would submit that if this present level of casualties is too high to risk continuing the fight, then our warfighting days are over.

I agree with you. The problem is not that too many of our troops are dying (though every death is a tragedy), it is that they are often dying pointlessly. Hannity et al would label that statement as un-American, but the reality is that police work is not the job of the military. It is not suited for that.

Wow... so congress can just proclaim that the people support the war... and they will without question? That's pretty cool. /s.

In theory, the Congress represents the people. Politics 101.

In WW2 we had arguably less reason to go after Germany than we lately have had to go after Iraq.

...Arguably being the key word there. Germany was eating up vital allies left and right, not to mention perpetrating previously unheard-of crimes against humanity. Saddam Hussein was small beans in comparison.

Part of the problem is that in any conflict the U.S. must have it neatly resolved in a standard six week cycle, like a TV miniseries, or Americans will just turn the channel and lose interest. Declarations to the contrary or not.

This war was won within months of its conception. What we are doing there now has no end. The American people are less patient than they used to be, to be sure, but they are not unfair. The majority of them supported the war while it had clear objectives and goals laid out.

[...] it is that they are often dying pointlessly. Hannity et al would label that statement as un-American, but the reality is that police work is not the job of the military. [...]

I disagree, most strenuously.

First: None of our losses are pointless. It is easy to justify wholesale losses in old battles that were won. We lost more good men in one day at Iwo Jima, or Omaha beach, than we've lost in four years of the War on Terror. Were those islands or beacheads really "worth it"? Admittedly, we couldn't cope with that level of loss today, but it remains that every single one of them matters.

The "war on terror", much as you dislike the term, is one where we have never even lost a battle. In WW2, we spent the first couple of years getting our butts kicked. Not only did we not ~win~ any battles, but we got our collective @ss handed to us in fine form by the likes of Rommel's Africa Corps.

Imagine it today, if in the first couple of years into our war on Al Queda we'd have had twenty thousand troops killed and had won ~no~ battles.

Had CNN existed then, we'd be speaking German today. Since CNN exists now, our chances of our children speaking Arabic are, sadly, pretty good.

Your point has been that this is all the fault of Bush and his unwillingness to go far enough. I would submit that it is far more insidious than that. It is the combination of the willing anti-western fifth column of U.S. media, and the basic short attention span of the American Public that makes modern warfare impossible.

It wouldn't matter if we're talking about taking Baghdad, Damascus, Tehran, or taking Atlanta or Seattle ~back~ from some invading force. Our media would be on the other side. That's just the way it is. No, it doesn't bode well for us.

The most "pointless" of losses are in battles lost. And no... we haven't seen the end of it yet. Our most grievous losses will come after we've turned and run from this battlefield. But they'll be losses not on some beach on some forlorn island, they'll be losses by the thousands on streets here at home.

Me? I'd rather beat them there. Like we're doing. This is no time to give up.

"Dr. Rice is eye rolling tongue hanging out stuck on stupid.."

- I think Steyn and you give too much weight to Condi's stock response. She knows more than anyone else the true situation in Gaza and elsewhere in the Middle East but, being in charge of the diplomatic corps, she was being diplomatic, as required.
For her to give an honest answer, that Gaza remains a hotbed of ignorance and religious based violence would have only set off screaming headlines, ie;(American's Believe Moslems are Incurable Killers) and probably caused more riots and deaths from Pakistan to Iran.
Better that she give an innocuous reply than rock the boat.

Im a minister an I have worked with drug addicts, alcoholics and welfare type people for 25 years, almost everything the goverment does is a complete waste of time and money, chiefly because they do not know what is really happening in the slums, barrios and housing complexes. They think they know, and they have a belief n people that is far from reality.

The dems are blissful in their ignorance and happy with the warm fuzzy feeling that they are 'helping' (from afar) with their tax funded 'aid' and big brotherly attitude. Any failures they attribute to the need for more funding (for more failing programs).

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