Timm,
Do you honestly think that Iraq can be secured?
Anwar province..1/3 of the country is gone. (Marine report).
Baghdad is on daylight curfew.
Let me know what your concept of "victory" looks like. I'll pass it on.
In the meanwhile, I'm going to read Woodward's book..."State of Denial".
IMHO it's a total shame what we've done to that country. Same with our own...not that it was any of MY doing.

Explain "victory".
Keep believing.

NAH, I don't victory looks like that,for sure. I wish I had an easy solution,HELL,even a hard one, but we can't just pull out!:(

timm,
I don't know what victory looks like. That's why i asked.
There isn't an easy answer to this one.
I'll go with Murtha on this...redeploy out of harms way, let the "dust settle", return later.
I don't "get" what keeping secrets from the American people does, much more than create more doubt.
And, I don't buy the lie that having more of our brave soldiers need to be sacrificed so that those that have already died have not "died in vain".
That's Nixon-speak.

Wow, where to begin? I'm not sure what secrets you're talking about here. There are Security secrets that shouldn't be available to the public,surely you agree on that! The opinion of keeping our troops there(war is hell) is an opinion and a policy that we are not privy to change. And Nixon,although paroniod, did much for foreign policy, but usually that is swept aside by the revisionists. Hope you didn't pay full price for the book,lol

I don't know what we should do. We've messed up so bad over there that there are no easy decisions in regards to Iraq. We should have never gone to war with Iraq in the first place. We should have finished what we started in Afganistan first. That is where the real threat is. That is where the suicide bombers in Iraq are coming from. They are just taking advantage of the situation in Iraq because of the chaos.

Our government shouldn't have (indirectly) lied to us about Iraq.

Those polls that Dal... posted are correct because I have seen them on other websites. They don't want us there.

Repeat after me: the people voted in the shakey leaders and the shakey leaders want our(and the other countries laying in the weeds) help in securing the country. God knows it's not perfect, or pretty, or possibly even tenable, but that's the hand we're dealing with,and we should stay,imo

If we choose to stay, we will be over there for many more years...

Timm,
A few questions:
1) Secrets: Do you honestly believe that the accurate facts about US involvement in Iraq have been provided to the American people?
2) Change: Can an uninformed populace effect change?
3) Does lying to the citizens lead to informed "consent of the governed", or does it lead to "falling in line and marching goose-stepped behind the leader"?
4) Is a "war of choice" really hell or just the likely outcome of one's own leader's creation?
5) Do you think Nixon's foreign policy decisions were successful? If so, explain the helicopter evacuations from Vietnam.
6) Is the full price of a book more important than the full price of blood being paid for inept decisions?
7) Where are the emperor's clothes?

That's enough for now. I have a few more but I'll wait a while (pun intended).

Talk about begging the question?? Sheesh!
1.Not exactly, but I don't feel that anybody other than Congress, at the most, should be privy to some secrets. We're not dealing with the conventional enemy here,and I think that comes into play greatly here. 2. Short and sweet--that's what those people in Congress are for, to help their constituents(?) understand what's up. 3 and 4 are pure crap,so I won't dignify with an answer. 5. I was speaking of His achievements outside of 'Nam. 6 and 7( See 3 and 4) Hopefully you have a fireplace!

Hey Timm,
Begging questions is well seen...if you don't know who i'm talking about, don't bother asking.
So, what question did I duck?
Yes, I have a fireplace. Unfortunately, some fat guy is stuck in it and I don't dare fire it up as it would burn his nice red suit. Dang, I'm tired of feeding these reindeer.
Keep believing.
Got any venison recipes...ya know, ones that go with balogna.

DTS:'begging the question' is what one does in an arguement when one assumes what one claims to be proving! You didn't duck a question but you assume your questions to be factual, therefore becoming rhetoric! Don't burn the fat guy and I'm strickly a beef man myself! TTYL