That War Funding Thing

By Cernig

To me, Bush is beginning to sound desperate in his drive to keep funding his favorite war. He has hung everything on Iraq being the story of his presidency, and he simply can't handle the idea that his legacy will be that, after countless examples of incompetence that kept him always behind the curve, the grown-ups took his toys away. If he leaves office with the occupation still in progress, he can con himself - and, he hopes, future history books - that failure is the next president's fault.

``Instead of approving this funding, Democrats in Congress have spent the past 68 days pushing legislation that would undercut our troops,'' he said in his weekly radio address. ``They passed bills that would impose restrictions on our military commanders and set an arbitrary date for withdrawal from Iraq, giving our enemies the victory they desperately want.''

In a statement, Reid, D-Nev., responded: ``Democrats are continuing to fight to fully fund our troops and give them a strategy for success worthy of their sacrifices. President Bush continues to insist that we follow his same failed strategy that has drawn our troops further into an intractable civil war.''

...``The longer Congress delays the worse the impact on the men and women of the armed forces will be,'' Bush said. ``I recognize that Republicans and Democrats in Washington have differences over the best course in Iraq, and we should vigorously debate those differences. But our troops should not be trapped in the middle.''

Bush intends to push this message again the White House Rose Garden on Monday and in Ohio on Thursday and Michigan on Friday. As I say, desperate.

And to be honest, simply telling Bush that a majority of American's are behind them is too passive a response by Dems. They should fight back with some accusations of their own. I've some example soundbites, free gratis, to any Dem who wants them.

When Bush and his cronies charge that Dems are "giving our enemies the victory they desperately want", they should reply with:

If the Bush administration hadn't been incompetent in setting up and administering the Provisional Authority, allowing corruption in reconstruction attempts and alienating the entire Iraqi army by allowing rigorous deBaathification as well as being complicit in a Shiite gerrymandering of the constitution, we wouldn't still be in Iraq and the "enemy" would already be defeated.

Every poll (2004, 2006, 2007, 2007 again) shows that it is the Bush administration's incompetence up until now and refusal to say when or even if the US will ever leave Iraq which is fuelling most of the insurgency in Iraq and huge amounts of unrest elsewhere. That's what is now handing the enemy their victory.

And in response to the charge that "the longer Congress delays the worse the impact on the men and women of the armed forces will be", Dems need only recite a litany of Republican funding failures. For instance:

Was it a Democrat controlled Congress that failed to fund or supervise Walter Reed and the VA or make provisions to adequately fund treatment of PTSD? No.

Was it a Democrat controlled Congress that failed to fund body and vehicle armor, a lack which is was the direct cause of half of all US casualties? No.

Was it a Democrat controlled Congress that failed to fund the military to the extent that the Pentagon had to borrow from soldier's paychecks to pay for operations and maintenance? No.

Then follow up with the very first point above and this:

It is the Bush administration who have failed the troops, the Iraqis and Americans. Their incompetence has brought us to where we are today and we now say enough. They either bring the troops home or we will take their ability to continue this senseless pursuit of more incompetence away from them.

This isn't rocket science.

Update Andrew Sullivan covers another one of the GOP talking points - and the shamelessness of Dick Cheney.

Update 2 It occurs to me that one of the defining characteristics of the Bush administration (indeed of the whole conservative movement) is false certainty. They don't do nuance, they don't do parallel thinking. They do certainty, even when it is based on bugger all except their own erroneous belief that certainty is always strong, resolute, good. Eric Martin at American Footprints gives some examples from Iraq.

And then they demand, loudly, that their certainty be trusted and unquestioned - and yet when it is, it inevitably falls apart on them. Look at the denials over AttorneyGate, the rhetorical retreat after the Baghdad briefing (which they are now trying to claw back, hoping we've all forgotten), Scooter Libby, the failures of the CPA and oh so many others.

This is partly what drives their incompetence and their corruption, because they believe their own false certainty right up until they are forced to accept reality. (McCain anyone?)

The Dems should be taking reality to the Bush administration and its cheerleaders and forcing them to admit their certainty is a house built on sand.