46. Come on folks, you cannot not compare hypothetical deaths under Saddam, to what is happening in Iraq now. Why? Because Saddam was taken out of action by the USA and he could not continue his genocide and future mass murders of his neighbors and then on to Europe and the USA after he developed the WMD that he was developing.

In addition, Iran would have eventually helped the Shia population with weapsons, and terrorists training for them to take on the Bath Party Sunnis of Saddam Hussein. How many people would have been killed then?

Taking out Saddam Hussein was the right thing to do. PERIOD. You have no idea of what he might have done later in life, because we stopped him.

Wouldn't it have been nice if there was a George W Bush in 1932 to take out Hitler and prevented WWII in Europe? But no one on this side of the pond or the other side had the guts, foresight, and stamina to do such a deed. There was no CIA feeding our President "right" or "wrong" information about Hitler, so we just allowed him to do what he did. Kill millions of Jews and Christians and anyone else he thought would not be part of his "pure race".

GWB did the right thing. You people just don't get it. When the nuke goes off in your neighborhood or the city you live nearest or in, then maybe you will understand why we cannot allow dictators like Saddam, (and Iran) to exist in today's world.

Did President Bush and his military advisors make mistakes, yes they did, but that is another story.

I have spent 2.5 years in Iraq and I know what I speak.

w5ku at 11:02PM on Jun 11th 2007

47. #6 LJ, and #11 gfunkkid, Just how would you expect the Pope to address Bush? Mr. Bush! Maybe GW. Addressing the Pope as "Your Holiness" is a courtesy that should be extended to all dignitaries, as his Holiness greeted the President as "Mr. President". Why do you feel it would be cow towing by showing respect to another dignitary?
Face it; Bush is an "IDIOT" He has pissed off every one he has come in contact with, recently the Russians and now he insults the Pope. What a jerk.
#8 Mel; As for the mass slaughter by Sadam, THAT IS NOT WHY WE INVADED IRAQ.
In case you forgot is was WMDs.
Do you remember now????????????
Richiemac

rrm12 at 11:10PM on Jun 11th 2007

48. Bush gave Pope Benedict a walking cane with the ten comandments on it - he's such a brown nose! LOL

Mary at 11:12PM on Jun 11th 2007

49. An interesting study from the University of Georgia on why weaker nations prevail in 39 percent of military conflicts, with Iraq being the focal point of the article.

Athens, Ga.– Despite overwhelming military superiority, the world’s most powerful nations failed to achieve their objectives in 39 percent of their military operations since World War II, according to a new University of Georgia study.

The study, by assistant professor Patricia L. Sullivan in the UGA School of Public and International Affairs, explains the circumstances under which more powerful nations are likely to fail and creates a model that allows policymakers to calculate the probability of success in current and future conflicts.

“If you know some key variables – like the major objective, the nature of the target, whether there’s going to be another strong state that will intervene on the side of the target and whether you’ll have an ally – you can get a sense of your probability of victory,” said Sullivan, whose study appears in the June issue of the Journal of Conflict Resolution.

Sullivan said the most important factor influencing whether the more powerful nation is successful is whether its strategic objective can be accomplished with brute force alone or requires the cooperation of the adversary.

Driving Saddam Hussein’s army out of Kuwait in the 1991 Gulf War and overthrowing his government in 2003 was a brute force objective that was accomplished relatively quickly, for example, but quelling sectarian violence and building support for the current government has been much more difficult because it requires target compliance.

“We can try to use brute force to kill insurgents and terrorists, but what we really need is for the population to be supportive of the government and to stop supporting the insurgents,” Sullivan said. “Otherwise, every time we kill an insurgent or a terrorist, they’re going to be replaced by others.”

Based on Sullivan’s model, the current war in Iraq has a probability of success of nearly 26 percent with an estimated duration of 10 years.

Sullivan analyzed all 122 post World War II wars and military interventions in which the United States, the Soviet Union, Russia, China, Britain or France fought a weaker adversary. She examined factors such as the type of objective (on a continuum from brute force to coercive), whether the target was a formal state, guerilla or terrorist group, whether the target had an ally and whether the more powerful nation had an ally.

She tested her model and found that it was accurate in 80 percent of conflicts. It predicted a seven percent chance of success for the Soviets in the 1979 to 1988 war in Afghanistan and a 93 percent chance of success for the U.S. in the 1991 Gulf War.

Previous researchers have hypothesized that more powerful states fail because of poor strategy choices or a lack of resolve. Sullivan agreed that those factors play a role, but stressed that those factors do not adequately explain or predict why powerful countries fail. She points out that more powerful countries have a greater ability to absorb losses from poor strategy choices and can more easily change strategies. An emphasis on resolve fails to explain victories such as the first Gulf War, when many analysts predicted a difficult war against a highly resolved but much weaker Iraqi army.

Sullivan said several factors contribute to the relatively low probability of success in the current Iraq war. Most importantly, the objective requires the support of the population and can’t be accomplished by force alone. Factional infighting, the insurgency and possible insurgent support by countries such as Iran and Syria further undermine the chance of success.

“No one could have predicted exactly what would happen after we overthrew the regime of Saddam Hussein,” Sullivan said. “But what my model could say was that if the population was not supportive of whatever new regime we put in power and the American strategic objective shifted from regime removal to maintaining the authority of a new government, the likelihood of a successful outcome would drop from almost 70 percent to just under 26 percent.”

The research was supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and the Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation.

http://www.uga.edu/news/artman/publish/070611_Sullivan.shtml

Keeping a blog arguement fiesty,
this has been Blayze O'Brien Reporting

bobrien at 11:30PM on Jun 11th 2007

50. #37 Tom; Showing respect for a dignitary by addressing them properly is what is expected from another dignitary (Something your master lacks) it is what some call extending a courtesy. Obviously you have a problem with that. And for Bush getting the majority of the votes in two elections. One was stolen, and the other with scare tactics. I would love to see him and Cheney try that one again. Wouldn't it be interesting if they were running for President and Vice President today?????????
Richiemac

rrm12 at 11:40PM on Jun 11th 2007

51. Bush is one of the greatest presidents in history. He has the nerve to stay the coarse when 78% of those who originally supported the invasion of "IRAQ" show they truly have no "spine to finish the fight" as quoted from Osama in the early days of war. It appears our enemy did his homework on the Americans lack of commitment and heart.
I guess sending a cruise missle to kill innocent farmers (ie. bill clinton)was a better option. It sure deterred them from attacking again.... hah!
I ask you spineless cowrads only this.... Where are we killing Al Qeida????? Answer.... IRAQ, imagine that. So when we back out before victory, as the left will surely have us do.... Prepare for them to be even more emboldened and prepare for another 9-11 or worse... possibly nuclear (I pray not). We must succeed in Iraq. There truly is "NO OPTION". At least there they face our armed soldiers. Not the women, children and unarmed civilians they slaughtered when they attacked the epicenter of our economy.Oh, and furthermore, of coarse we are interested in the middle east for "OIL". lest we go back to the middle ages we are gonna need some you idiots. They want to sell it as well; however, from an idiological standpoint, there religion teaches them to kill the infadels.... Thats us, both left, right and moderate!!!!!! Wake up... war is brutal, but sometimes a peace is found only on the other side of war!!!!

Sean at 7:14AM on Jun 12th 2007

52. "It's the civil war unleashed by Bush's invasion of Iraq that has resulted in a torrential bloodletting in Iraq."

There are currently 3,500 dead Americans in Iraq along with violence in 3 of Iraq's 18 provinces (the others being entirely peaceful). May I ask how you would describe the situation if there were twice as many deaths and twice as much violence (7,000 Americans down and violence in 6 provinces)? You can hardly use expressions like "torrential bloodletting", "the daily mass slaughter of innocents", "the unending nightmare in Iraq" (Keith Olbermann), and/or "the most disastrous military adventure since the founding of the republic" (IHT letter) because they are superlatives that you have already used.

As for "the Iraq invasion [being] the worst foreign policy error in our nation's history", World War II faced America with over 400,000 lives lost (not to mention the other nations' millions of deaths) in much less time and somehow I don't really remember (angry) expressions such as "torrential bloodletting", "the daily mass slaughter of innocents", "the unending nightmare", and/or "the most disastrous military adventure since the founding of the republic" being used there. It doesn't sound right, because it sounds too impassioned (although, again, for more than 100 times more deaths in fewer years and months).

I submit to you that the only conclusion that can be arrived at here is the following: all those expressions have little to nothing to do with the objective descriptive reality, but have everything with presenting opposition to Dubya. Which is entirely fine, of course. Just don't pretend that your language is free of partisanship and that it is supposed to reflect objective descriptions and the unfailing truth.

"Defenders of the war keep comparing the death toll under Saddam to the slaughter going on now."

You bet we do. And that includes Iraqis themselves, by the way (You might want to take a look at "In the Red Zone" by Steven Vincent, an independent reporter who lost his life in Iraq)…

"Fine. But soon enough, the lowest estimates of those being slaughtered since the invasion will exceed the highest estimates of those Saddam killed. Count on it."

And how "soon" is that, Mo? Minutes? Days? Years? Decades? What you are doing here is taking away from anybody who does not agree with you the opportunity to disagree: "If I am right, I am right; if I am not, I soon will be."

Erik S at 8:18PM on Jun 13th 2007

53. PS: When I wrote that 'I don't really remember (angry) expressions such as "torrential bloodletting", "the daily mass slaughter of innocents", "the unending nightmare", and/or "the most disastrous military adventure since the founding of the republic" being used' for World War II, I meant not only in history books looking back, of course, but also (and more importantly) that the expressions were not being used during WWII, i.e., in contemporary news items and news reels (from the early 1940s)…

Erik S at 10:44AM on Jun 12th 2007

54. I thought President Bush served in the National Guard. Anyone who serves in any branch of the military is taught the importance of respect for a person's title and will be greeting with the proper salutation. Oh yeah, I forgot he stayed behind snorting cocaine while the rest of his unit served overseas. (I can't believe our soldiers have to salute him.)

His head of the CIA was "Brownie", Cheney's advisor was "Scooter", who knows how many nicknames he had for P.M. Tony Blair and recently said that he greeted the President of Russia as Vladmir. I did not know they were friends. President Putin was threating to point Nuclear F*ck weapons at Europe and President Bush has the balls to ignore this. It only emphasises that This administration is a joke, they never took anything seriously.

What does it say about those who voted for Pres. Bush twice??

seanjane81206 at 9:10AM on Jun 12th 2007

55. #45,

I appreciate your service to our great country...however.

I am sick and tired of the threatning message of us being attacked by a nuclear bomb. There was no proof of WMD's in Iraq or any proof of anything being processed.

"But Iraq had them, they just moved them to Syria."

if so, Why did we not try to intercept them?

The Holocaust was not realized until after the war was over. No one, not even Russia knew about it. Beside WWII was a justified war. We pursued the right enemy after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. We started to pursue Al Queda, for a while then all of the sudden we are toppling Sadaam Husein who is a completely different Muslim than Osama bin Ladan.

As for President Bush refering to the Pope with improper language does not suprise me. The head of the CIA at the time was "Brownie", Cheney's advisor was "Scooter," who knows how many nicknames he had for Tony Blair, and he greeted President of Russia, Vladmir Putin, as Vladmir. This is the same man who just threatened to point Nuclear war heads at Europe. He was supposed to have learned in the National Guard about proper salutations in accordance of a persons rank. Oh yeah, he stayed at home snorting cocaine while the rest of his unit served overseas.

President Bush used the White House as his personal playground. He never took his job seriously and contiues to belittle people. He is a rich kid who never had to deal with real life with real people.

seanjane81206 at 9:47AM on Jun 12th 2007

56. If we leave before the Iraqi government is strong enough to handle things, those who cooperated with us will be killed as collaborators. I think this fellow put it pretty well:

A Plea from Iraq To the World, “Don’t Abandon Us”
The following letter, written by the Iraqi Foreign Minister, was posted in todays Washington Post.
By Hoshyar Zebari

Friday, May 4, 2007; A23

"Last weekend a traffic jam several miles long snaked out of the Mansour district in western Baghdad. The delay stemmed not from a car bomb closing the road but from a queue to enter the city\’s central amusement park. The line became so long some families left their cars and walked to enjoy picnics, fairground rides and soccer, the Iraqi national obsession.

Across the city, restaurants are slowly filling and shops are reopening. The streets are busy. Iraqis are not cowering indoors. The appalling death tolls from suicide attacks are often high because of crowding at markets. These days you are as likely to hear complaints about traffic congestion as about the security situation. Across Baghdad there is a cacophony of sirens from ambulances, firefighters and police providing public services. You cannot even escape the curse of traffic wardens ticketing illegally parked cars.

These small but significant snippets of normality are overshadowed by acts of gross violence, which fuel the opinion of some that Iraq is in a downward spiral. The Iraqi people are indeed suffering tremendous hardships and making grave sacrifices — but daily life goes on for 7 million Baghdadis struggling to take back their capital and country.
Today, at an international summit on the future of Iraq in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, my government will ask the international community to maintain its engagement in our country to help us achieve our goals of security and stability. We recognize that our request conflicts with a plethora of voices decrying the situation in Iraq and those in the British and American publics who seek an expeditious withdrawal from a war they claim is all but lost.

So why should the world remain engaged in Iraq?
There is no denying the difficulties Iraq faces, and no amount of good news can obscure the demons of terrorism and sectarianism that have risen in my country. But there is too much at stake to risk failure, and everything to gain by helping us protect our hard-won democratic achievements and emerge as a stable, self-sustaining country.
We remain determined in spite of our losses. Spectacular attacks may dominate foreign headlines, but they cannot change the reality that Iraq has made steady political, economic and social progress over the past four years. We continue to strengthen our nascent democratic institutions, pursue national reconciliation and expand Iraqi security forces. The Baghdad security plan was conceived to give us breathing space to expedite political and economic development by “securing and holding” neighborhoods across the capital. There is no quick fix, but there have been real results: Winning public confidence has led to a spike in intelligence, a disruption of terrorist networks and the capture of key leaders, as well as the discovery of weapons caches. In Anbar province, Sunni sheikhs and insurgents have turned against al-Qaeda and to the side of Iraqi security forces. This would have been unthinkable even six months ago.

Contrary to popular belief, most government ministries are located outside the Green Zone, and employees drive to work every day despite death threats and attacks on colleagues and families. We government ministers are always at risk of assassination. When a suicide bomber attacked parliament last month, the legislators sat in defiance in an extraordinary session the following day. I am particularly inspired by the commitment of the young diplomats in the Foreign Ministry, a diverse mix of Sunni, Shiite, Christian, Arab and Kurdish men and women who serve their country without subscribing to religious or sectarian divisions.

Iraqis are standing up every day, and we persevere because there is no other option. We will not surrender our country to terrorists. They have failed to cripple the elected government, and they have failed to intimidate us into submission. Iraqis reject their vision of a future whose hallmarks are bloodshed and hatred.

Those calling for withdrawal may think it is the least painful option, but its benefits would be short-lived. The fate of the region and the world is linked with ours. Leaving a broken Iraq in the Middle East would offer international terrorism a haven and ensure a legacy of chaos for future generations. Furthermore, the sacrifices of all the young men and women who stood up here would have been in vain.

Iraqis, for all our determination and courage, cannot succeed alone. We need a healthy and supportive regional environment. We will not allow our country to be a battleground for settling scores in regional and international conflicts that adversely affect stability inside our borders. Only with continued international commitment and deeper engagement from our neighbors can we establish a stable democratic, federal and united Iraq. The world should not abandon us.

This is something that liberals who want to pull our troops out, should pay attention and listen to. I don’t expect it though. The liberals in this country have invested to much politically in an American failure in Iraq. A victory would destroy liberal credibility, what little is left.

Those who are interested in supporting our troops, the Iraqi people and, victory, don’t back down to these liberal cowards. Liberals talk a big game, but always tuck their tails between their legs and are last seen running towards the nearest educational facility or “green” facility."

Ken Berg at 11:34AM on Jun 12th 2007

57. Hey Mo, I'm gonna be in Times Square today, give me a call if ya wanna do lunch or discuss politics or something of moderate interest.

bobrien at 12:33PM on Jun 12th 2007

58. You leftists are always yammering on about IQ not being an accurate measure of intelligence and that IQ tests are biased against minorities (Blacks and Hispanics, anyway), etc etc. Yet somehow, when the supposed IQ involves someone whose beliefs and policies you do not support,it becomes a legitimate measure of intelligence.

According to liberals IQ testing is considered to be accurate when it is administered to death row inmates. Then being an idiot becomes a virtue which exempts you from justice. However it is not considered to be accurate when you test an inner city Black kid and he comes out looking like a retard.

Bush is no less intelligent than the majority of the population of the US, which is to say that he may not be an intellectual, but manages to get along just fine. Bush has talents that many city liberals lack. He can ride a horse and use a chainsaw and fly a fighter jet if need be. City liberals, especially the males, are usually talentless and lacking any practical skill whatsoever. They good for absolutely nothing except shooting off their whiny mouths and expect to go Dutch when on a date. They can't even rewire and electrical socket.

I have 2 uncles from Sweden, with only high school educations, who can barely put 2 intelligable words together, but have managed to found and run a multi- million dollar pool company. I doubt they would score very high in standard IQ tests but they do alright.

Miss Carnivorous at 2:47PM on Jun 12th 2007

59. Well gosh:

To the "geniuses" impugning President Bush's intellect- if he's stoopit, how dumb were the arseclowns he beat in both elections?
(and no, the first election wasn't stolen, check the Herald/Tribune post election Florida recount report- Gore was a lil' bi**h that couldn't take losing). I understand Lurch getting pasted- Bush had a higher IQ per their military induction testing, so the smarter man won....again.

Moving on- Meauregard, I take it you are/were against the resumption of hostilities in Iraq. If this is so, I take it that you feel Hussein fulfilled the terms of his original cease fire agreement with the UN? If not, then how could there be any objection to resumption of hostilities?

If you do believe this, can you explain how Hussein firing on US/British patrol planes fits into that fulfillment? Or attempting to assassinate a former US president? Or throwing weapons inspectors out (the very existence of which point to non-compliance) of the country?

And Phil....oh, where to start with that pile of excrement you've plopped down...

No, the internal Hussein slaughter has not been exceeded, unless you are simple enough to buy the numbers from the bogus lancet article (+ or - only 98%....how very er, inclusive). Where does your "reliable" number of 650k come from? Check Hussein's mass graves, the gassing of Kurds, the eradication of the marsh Arabs, etc. etc. etc.

"Upsetting the apple cart in the mideast..." Oh, you mean when Carter let the Shah of Iran get deposed? Oh, no you mean when a Republican does something in the middle east- how very, er objective. Setting aside mythical applecarts for a moment, you do recall the two smoking craters that were the result of people FROM the middle east, do you not?

You say Saddam was brutal, yet the leader of an independent country- and as we're not the world's policeman, we should have let him continue slaughtering Kurds and so forth (forgot that one, dincha?). I suppose you were just as vociferous in your condemnation when Clinton chucked out Milosevic- y'know, a brutal leader of an independent country. Yeah, of course you were.

"Domestic dictatorial desires"- wow, that's some amazingly asinine alliteration, innit? Care to cite some of these "dictatorial desires", perhaps in a heated hard headed harangue? Suppose you could identify some of the masses of US citizens sent to concentration camps, or his dismantling of the electoral process - oops, wait a minute- they're having presidential debates on both sides, never mind. Guess you're just a grasping groaning gimpy gremlin on this one.

Oh, jeez- hyperbole alert:

"justify a desire to start a process of stripping citizens of their constitutional rights which would inevitable end with political opponents with no ties to terrorism being "enemy combatants..."

Outside of the turgid feversweated freshman lit nature of this puffery, care to back any of it up with examples? The dude's been in office 6 years- and he's only just now going to "start stripping constitutional rights"? Yeah, and the sky is falling too. Oh, and please talk about the geneva convention- the one that states that the majority of the enemy combatants currently inflating (average 2 pant sizes) in gitmo could have been shot in battle as spies.

You vividly remember when the republicans controlled the white house and congress- oh gadzooks and damn those pesky elections! And how DARE a conservative president appoint conservative judges- I mean, a democratic president has NEVER appointed a liberal judge to the supreme court.. ginsberg is conservative, right?

You think all of America except 20% of what diehards? Where did this number come from? What are you talking about?

Yes, the race for the presidency has started sooner than ever- but you choose to ignore the actual reasons why and pull some more buffoonery outta yer arse, under the guise of being 51 whole years old... age does not always confer wisdom- I would cite the instant case as testimony.

Try this on- major states are moving their primaries up in order to increase their influence- more to the point, there will be a day in early march of 2008- which is roughly 9 months away- where the MAJORITY of delegates are in play. You suppose that might have something to with the early work by the candidates?

Dream up a terrorist attack to throw the results- uh, how would that benefit the Republicans? A Republican would be in office and ergo get blamed when it happened, so the Democrats would benefit. You base this well reasoned thesis not on what your magic 8 ball told you, but on your opinion of "neo-com" morality. Dunno what "neo-coms" have to do with the republican party...or is that the replumblican party?

Gad, what a maroon.

2BrixShy at 12:04PM on Jun 13th 2007

60. It appears that our so called President now wants to keep pushing the Illegal issue and get it passed whether the American Public agrees or not. Evidently he thinks that he is "GOD" and there is no stopping him.
Consequently, the only other solution is called
IMPEACHMENT and get him out of there. He has not been
able to accomplish any of the things he stated that he would do and IMPEACHMENT seems to be the only thing that will stop him.
Think About It!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jim Paddock at 5:39PM on Jun 13th 2007