President Bush's war policies have failed in almost every regard, the bipartisan Iraq Study Group concluded Wednesday, and it warned of dwindling chances to change course before crisis turns to chaos.

It said the United States should find ways to pull back most of its combat forces by early 2008 and focus U.S. troops on training and supporting Iraqi units. The U.S. also should begin a "diplomatic offensive" by the end of the month and engage adversaries Iran and Syria in an effort to quell sectarian violence and shore up the fragile Iraqi government, the report said.

Beating extremists is only slightly less possible than beating tribbles.

I haven't read the report in its entirety, but I thought this article was worth including. President Bush has said that he finds many of the recommendations in the Study Group's report useful, but the goal will not change. He also said that he is awaiting for reports from other agencies and will make decisions based on the opinions from various sources. Nevertheless, failure, President Bush said, is not an option, and I could not agree more.

wow, failure is not an option? That is sooo revealing!! OH MY GOD, now we know what to do!! I have to say, that took some true guts for you to admit that you agree with that statement...I mean, I am a big fan of failure, but to hear that our prez is not, wow. I am reassured that he really has a grasp on reality now. You and him have shown me the light. And surely, hidden within that statement is a plan for how to achieve success, right?

If you caught any of President Bush's joint press conference with Prime Minister Tony Blair, you'd know that President Bush is not divorced from reality...he said that things in Iraq were "bad." He also acknowledged that changes were needed and that he was not at all satisfied with the progress that has been made in Iraq.
That being said, he is also aware of the consequences of failure. This, by the way, is also acknowledged by the Iraq Study Group. President Bush is going to give a speech by the end of the year that will outline the new direction the effort in Iraq will take. Like I said, he has other opinions to look over. I would bet that the bar for "success" is going to be lowered, but the goal of an Iraq that can govern, sustain and defend itself will not change. What will change is how we are going to accomplish that goal. We'll find out in the next couple of weeks.
Personally, I'm not advocating an open-ended commitment with no light at the end of the tunnel either. However, if you are ready to toss in the towel without considering the consequences of doing so, then I don't think you've thought this through very well.

http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2006/12/ ... ister.html

12/8/2006
Fruit Salad With the Prime Minister (The Neediest President in History, Part 2):

And so it was that James Baker III, oozing the kind of reptilian evil that we expect from the half-men, half-crocodiles that slither from the putrid pools of 41's inner circle, said to a Senate Committee regarding his Iraq Study Group's list of nearly four-score recommendations: "I hope we don't treat this like a fruit salad and say, `I like this, but I don't like that, I like this, but I don't like that.'" Yes, Baker was there to save the nation from Iraq and 43 and 43 from himself, but no one gives a damn. When it's time for an empire to fall, it must fall. So when 41 became a weepy bitch over Jeb's imminent passage from public life, it was the pathetic whine of a fallen patrician, the end of the goddamn line.

For what was 43's press conference yesterday but a chance to hunch over in the ditch once more and toss dingleberries at the media, the degraded man, not so much a president anymore as a dalmatian, bred to be a proud-haunched firefighter mascot but merely capable of licking his own anus instead of actually saving anyone from an inferno.

Fruit salad? Hey, listening to Bush, Jr. yesterday one got the idea that we were watching a jiggly Jello mold with a coconut topping. It wasn't just the usual state-the-obvious-firmly lines: "[T]he Palestinian-Israeli conflict is important to have — is important to be solved." Or the bizarro dropped half-sentences that are more insulting than incoherent: "I talk to families who die." And it wasn't the moments where Bush demonstrated his ability to magically pull synonyms out of his ass: "I also believe we’re going to succeed. I believe we’ll prevail" (which was followed by a descent into Howard Hughes-like echolalia: "Not only do I know how important it is to prevail, I believe we will prevail. I understand how hard it is to prevail").

No, no, it was the nutzoid insistence on his ability to "understand" and "read" things that made Bush seem like he needed the approval of someone, anyone, at this point. From the ridiculous statement of "I understand what long deployments mean to wives and husbands, and mothers and fathers, particularly as we come into a holiday season" to the disturbing admission regarding the ISG report: "To show you how important this one is, I read it, and our guest read it. The Prime Minister read — read a report prepared by a commission. And this is important," it was part of a litany of demonstrating how great and wonderful he is, please love him.

But also how bugfuck insane. Said the President of the United States, once again, "And one of the things that has changed for American foreign policy is a threat overseas can now come home to hurt us, and September the 11th should be a wake-up call for the American people to understand what happens if there is violence and safe havens in a part of the world. And what happens is people can die here at home." Have we really, sadly, horribly not advanced in our thinking in the last five years past that?

Fruit salad? Hell, at this point, we'll be lucky to get out of the next two years without having all of our salads tossed.

This "blogger" is utterly clueless.

This "blogger" is utterly clueless.

And our President is simple-minded.

But I'm glad he decided to "read" the commission's report (or at least the Cliff's Notes).

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2006/12/09/international/i122203S81.DTL&feed=rss.news

Iran Offers to Help U.S. Exit From Iraq
- By JIM KRANE, Associated Press Writer
Saturday, December 9, 2006

(12-09) 14:32 PST MANAMA, Bahrain (AP) --

Iran's foreign minister delivered a blunt challenge to the United States on Saturday, saying Tehran is willing to help U.S. troops withdraw from neighboring Iraq but only if Washington makes some tough policy changes.

Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki claimed U.S. troops were responsible for at least half the violence tearing apart Iraq and that their departure would pay security dividends for the entire region.

"If the United States changes its attitude, the Islamic Republic of Iran is ready to help with the withdrawal from Iraq," Mottaki told the International Institute of Strategic Studies conference here. "Fifty percent of the problem of insecurity in Iraq is the presence of foreign troops."

Mottaki echoed calls made last week by Iran's top national security official, Ali Larijani, for Gulf Arab countries to eject American bases in their countries and establish a regional security pact with Iran. Mottaki went further and offered deeper cooperation with the six Gulf Arab states on energy, tourism, business and counter-narcotics.

Iran's offers do not seem to have tempted Gulf neighbors who are apparently more worried about the dangers of living near Iran's nuclear facilities, especially amid threats by Washington and Israel to use military force to destroy them.

Mottaki's forceful speech was a challenge to U.S. interests in the Gulf and a strong display of the country's rising assertiveness in the face of U.S failures in the region.

At one point, Mottaki addressed an international audience that included U.S. Vice Adm. David Nichols, the deputy chief of U.S. Central Command, and said the regional chaos sparked by the Bush administration's twin wars demonstrated that U.S. military force was no longer a realistic policy option in the Middle East.

"Today the time of threats is over. The period of unilateralism is over," Mottaki said. "Look at Iraq. Look at Afghanistan. That gives us a very important lesson."

Iran's proposal for a Gulf security alliance shows no sign of gaining traction among the region's Arab leaders. Bahraini Foreign Minister Sheik Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa said security of the energy-rich region depends on the United States, the European Union and other major oil-importing countries.

Much of the discussion at this security conference centered on the U.S. Iraq Study Group report, and its recommendation that Washington seek Iran's help in steering Iraq away from civil war.

William Cohen, defense secretary under President Clinton, urged Iran to push for talks with Washington.

"If you forgo aspirations for nuclear weapons and cut off funding for radical elements and support the Mideast peace process, then yes, you'd be welcomed into the international community. We'd have billions of dollars going into your economy," Cohen told the Iranians among 250 delegates from 22 countries.

"If Iran is simply interested in pursuing a nuclear energy program and not weapons, that's something the U.S. wouldn't object to and would support."

You don't really believe the parade of lies coming out of Tehran, do you?

I'm sure you prefer the parade of lies coming out of Bush & Co. I mean, at least his parade has shock and awe. What does this other parade have? I don't even see any floats.

What other things do you have in mind that constitute "lies" from the Bush Administration?

You forgot the

If you're response is to be taken seriously, I won't even bother. Because you're either utterly oblivious to reality. Or so far out of understanding what has been going on in our country over the last 7 years that it would take a few books worth of posts to get you up to speed.