Patriot Day? More Shifting Sands In Iraq

How can Bush's homeland security adviser, Frances Fragos Townsend, say that Osama bin Laden is “virtually impotent,” contrary to top intelligence experts, and when no one even knows where he is or what he has been doing?

The Bush administration would have us believe that Iraq is the “central” front in the global war on terror, and that bin Laden is on some permanent vacation in a cave – no longer a threat? Do these people ever think before they speak? “al-Qaida in Iraq” is only loosely affiliated with al-Qaida and did not even exist before we invaded Iraq. It has been widely reported that al-Qaida is back, in strength, in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region.

According to some, a debate over the various progress reports from Petraeus, other commanders, government agencies and diplomats is “moot” because Bush has already decided to carry his “new” strategy forward and Democrats lack the votes to stop him.

All I have heard from the war supporters is that the mainstream media is so liberally biased as to be unreliable. Yet, it almost seems forbidden that anybody should ask any hard questions. Why hasn’t Bush taken any steps to alleviate the strain on the military? In a country of 300 million “patriots,” why is it unreasonable to call for a draft? This ill-conceived war in Iraq has put this country in a very precarious position.

The surge was not a number deemed necessary by military experts but rather just a number they were able to scrounge up by extending to fifteen months the tours of the already overtaxed troops. General Petraeus, himself, wrote the army’s new counterinsurgency manual, which calls for as many troops in Baghdad, alone, as are in the entire country. His silence on this point brings into question anything he has to say in regards to the success of the surge or the strategy going forward.

At least it does for me. But, I am just one military family member, a minority, who is not blinded by “patriotism.” I am not willing to sacrifice my loved ones needlessly and recklessly. The military comprises not even 1% of our population and it speaks greatly to the character and honor, or lack thereof, of our “commander-in-chief” and the other 99.99% that the lives and well-being of those brave soldiers who have carried this entire burden does not even rate the slightest consideration.