4,000 Souls

**yodajazz** · 04-26-2008

Originally Posted by PeterK

When the USA started this war almost nobody was against it. Now when things don't go as people would like it to be this war has to be stopped.
Yeah right! The American people chose a president who started this war.
Not once but Bush was chosen twice.

The democrats are fighting who can be candidate and McCain will be the next president. And he won't bring your troops home.
Sadly but true. This war won't be over very soon and the US economy will suffer even more.

My friends were against the war before it started. We discussed how it would upset the balance of power in the region among other things. I did not think that Saddam was a threat. Even if he had weapons he had no delivery system and we already had air power over his nation through a ‘no fly zone’.

As far as Bush being elected twice we all remember how he got in office the first term. We know that he lost the popular vote. And the fact the 2000 election was even close was due to public manipulation. Al Gore could not use the success of the Clinton years like he could have because of that bogus Monica Lewinsky crisis. Why is she never mentioned today? Because it is so obvious how trivial that situation was in reality. I say it was an illegal coup attempt based upon technicalities when the public good was really more important. Bill Clinton’s sexual escapades got front page news, but Osama Bin Laden declaration of war on US troops was buried to the back pages.

By second term with the war going on many people did not want to change leadership in the middle of a war. And he still did not win by much. He was greatly helped that his base was stirred up by the gay marriage issue. As I have said before, here in Ohio gay marriages were banned in a 2002 election. But then they put it back on the ballot in 2004 to place the ban as a constitutional amendment. There were some irregularities here with long lines in heavy Democratic areas and college towns. But the person whose responsibility to certify the election results was also Bush’s state campaign chairman.

I do agree that the war will not be over any time soon, no matter who becomes president. There never was any plan to bring troops home. The real plan was to build permanent bases and use Iraq as base for regional control. And the US is showing it's committment by opening the world largest embassy. Instead I see the US as going out the way of the other empires. They overstretched their capacity because of greed. And that is something my friend also predicted before the war started.

**trish** · 04-26-2008

I was against this war before it started and plenty of people expressed the same sentiments at the time. From the start there was serious doubt concerning the existence of WMDs in Iraq. From the start there was serious doubt about the morality of America embarking on its very first preemptive war. On day one after the bombing, as Bagdad’s streets and buildings were being overrun with looters and the city’s infrastructure was being carried away for scrap, we saw how unprepared Rumsfeld was for the next step of the Iraqi mission. The premise that in the beginning hardly no one was against this war is just simply mistaken. Sure, now that bad has gone to worse, a lot more people see this engagement for the fiasco it is.

I do agree it would be tragic were McCain to win the presidency, because he WILL continue to drain American blood onto the oil fields of Iraq. I’m not so sure the competition between Hillary and Obama will remembered in November. I think the democratic party will unite behind either of them. Sure, there are some polls now that show McCain neck and neck with Obama, and others that show him neck to neck with Hillary. But these are polls where the Democratic vote is still split by the current indecision between Hillary and Obama. To truly see how McCain is currently doing against the democrats you need a poll that matches him against either Hillary OR Obama.

Will a democratic president pull the troops out of Iraq? Well at least it’s an open question. They say they will. I think they’re honestly expressing their intentions. We know that McCain says he won’t. I think he is also honestly expressing his intention.

**chefmike** · 04-26-2008