"The startling thing about his views is they haven't changed a bit." What, exactly is startling about that? When have Bush's views about anything ever changed regardless of the evidence? His objective is to pass the pullout on to his successor so that he can say that person lost, not him. He really is that transparent (and, I would have said, stupid, except for the fact that he has managed to con so many of our fellow citizens repeatedly. That makes them, not him, stupid.)

You say that few Democrats, much less Republicans, want a rapid and total pullout. If you are talking Congress creatures, that might be true although I'd like to see some evidence. If you're talking American citizens, it's obviously false as most recent polls show.

By the way, why wouldn't we want a total pullout, rapid or otherwise? What, exactly, would be the purpose of keeping people in Iraq? For the other view, go over to the American Prospect for an intelligent discussion of the issue.

You say that if the message is "stay the course," the Republicans may call his bluff. You want to put some money on that? Lugar already said that he wouldn't. Got some inside info you're not sharing or is that just wishful thinking?

We are where we are in Iraq because we elected a President based on abortion. The RR ignore American children living in poverty. The majority of Americans have no idea that poverty is part of America.

I am frustrated because no matter how many talking heads make millions of dollars I have no idea how many Americans are living a life of poverty. Katrina was just another day another story in 24hrs. news..

Bush, Cheney and their best buds are responsable for thousands of dead Americans and Iraqi's..

The Supreme court, congress ,senate and President were allways a bunch of men who loved each other more than women could imagine.

When I watch Bush, Cheney, talking heads, and best buds I ponder why they love each other .

I ponder why American women have watched women and children die in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine?..

Last time I checked, American women run their cars on gasoline.

It's amazing to me how little people realise how their daily lives are affected by what happens elsewhere in the world. You people seem to assume that the various inputs on which your modern lifestyles depend just appear by magic.

The US economy is dependent on oil pumped in the Middle East. The Middle East as a region is hugely unstable. If the US Fifth Fleet didn't chug up and down the Arabian Gulf to secure those oil supplies, America would be a very different (and poorer) country.

Oil is the reason we constantly interfere in the affairs of the Middle East, Iraq included. No American has the right to criticise this interference without first arranging their lifestyles in a way that makes them independent of the oil economy. I'd suggest a log cabin and somewhere in the Rockies, and a generator...

You're an idiot. Our dependance is our responsibility. To kill thousand to support our lifestyle is evil. My property taxes more than doubled this month, as well as my homeowners insurance. This severely affects my "economy". Do I have the "right" to attack the assessors or my representatives?

was supporting a tyrant in Iraq to enforce stability by killing millions of people. That, incidentally, is the policy adovcated by anti-war "realists".

Your tax example is fatuous. A better one would be of a street-gang fight breaking out in your neighbourhood that prevented you reaching the shops. The "anti-war" argument suggests you should not interfere in the gangs' affairs, even as your children starve.

I agree with Zygote. Employing those so blatantly ridiculous claims that to be against the war in Iraq is to incur responsibility for thousands of lives? What about the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi lives that this war is directly responsible for, nor the approximately 2 million who have left the country?. Saddam didn't do this;WE did. Just like the all too frequent LTE writers in my conservative part of the country, you have partaken too freely of the neocon koolaid and have lost all ability to think objectively and rationally.

GreenwichJ:

was supporting a tyrant in Iraq to enforce stability by killing millions of people. That, incidentally, is the policy adovcated by anti-war "realists".

Your tax example is fatuous. A better one would be of a street-gang fight breaking out in your neighbourhood that prevented you reaching the shops. The "anti-war" argument suggests you should not interfere in the gangs' affairs, even as your children starve.

Turn off your talk radio and do a little research to find out who actually supported the tyrant in Iraq. Fascists in the GOP put Saddam in power, armed him and propped him up until he angered our Saudi friends by failing to comply with their illegal OPEC cartel. Kuwait was also in their sights for selling above and beyond their assigned quota of oil. When Saddam threatened to trade his oil in Euros rather than Dollars -- it was the last straw.

That is when we assisted Kuwait in implementing horizontal drilling techniques to steal Iraq's oil. When Saddam predictably informed us that he was going to take action against Kuwait, we assured him that it was an issue for him to deal with as he saw fit and that the US would have a hands-off stance on the issue. We all know what happened next.

You have to go back to 1990 to understand the war in Iraq. It didn't begin on 9-11. It would be much simpler and easier for us to just buy the Middle Eastern oil. But for certain segments of our population (the oil and defense industries), it is much more profitable to take it by force. That is why Dick Cheney doesn't want to reveal the details of his Energy Task Force meetings back in 2001.

I live in a small one bedroom cottage, that even my friends look at with horror and love. I have a small garden front and back.. I don't have a dishwasher and have never owned one. I don't have a washer or dryer, and have never owned either.

I have a car but use it only in a two mile radius.

I have worked full time since I was a teenager, but I never took a job that I could not walk to or catch a bus to or arrive on time even though I worked split shifts, late shifts and early shifts.

When I pass all the houses that have been demolished in my neighborhood and look at all the mcmansions I wonder what is the cost of supplying water, electricty, gas to these monster houses that used to be called hotels.

Then we have newspapers like the L.A. Times who engage their readers with accolades for a few square feet of natural habitat that rich people have given to the planet earth in exchange for a kitchen they will never cook in, multiple bathrooms that no person will ever use, a "grand room" that is a empty room.

You may say I am person who just cannot afford six bathrooms with a bidet.

I consider myself a person who has outperformed the stock market for the last 20 yrs.

I just don't want six bathrooms, a "great room" a refigerator that holds more that my local supermarket. A "dressing room" that holds clothes that went out of fashion yesterday.

My carbon footprint is Zero.

I choose not to be a party to poor people dying for the Mcmansions, Suv's, Hummers and cheap oil in America.