Senator John McCain has a habit of speaking the truth in way designed to backfire on him.
Check out this clip from YouTube.com, which is exciting the usual anti-war precincts. The Arizona senator tells NBC’s Today show that is doesn’t really matter when U.S. troops leave Iraq. What matters, he adds, is American casualties.
The Left is upset for the wrong reasons. What they hear him saying is that it doesn’t matter when the troops come home and nothing else. For ideological reasons, it is incredibly important to the Left that the troops come home immediately. They simply do not want America to be the kind of country that sends troops aboard to protect its interests. That’s what bilateral diplomacy and U.N. chin-wagging is for. And, they believe, that they taught the nation a vital lesson in the 1970s, by forcing the pull out of forces from South Viet Nam. They fear that policy makers will unlearn that lesson and use force as a last resort against our foes. If that lesson is unlearned, their youthful efforts will have been in vain–and much opposition to the war is simply about their nostaglia for themselves.
The other interpretation of McCain’s statements is actually more worrying. If it doesn’t matter when we withdraw troops, why not right now? He just said it didn’t matter… And by saying that casualties are the most important item, the senator is signaling to our enemies that if they mount enough attacks that President McCain will throw in the towel.
I suspect that McCain simply meant that the withdrawal date is not the most important issue. Is anyone concerned when we will withdraw from Germany and Japan? (Besides the Germans who are begging us to stay?)
What he should have said is this: Why should we leave when we are winning?
Define winning? Bush never has. How do we know that all terrorists have been captured or killed?
Whether the Germans are begging us to stay is not the point. The point is that the Iraqis do not want us there. Another point is because of this illegal war in Iraq we are not able to devote the resources needed to go after Bin Laden. It seem sthat the right is so worried about terrorism tha they support the war in Iraq, but could care less about bin Laden? Even if he is in a cave somewhere he has the means to plan and execute future attacks.
Iraq is only about oil, it has nothing to do with terrorism. The Bush administration’s chosen war againt Iraq shows this. If the “war on terror” was really about terrorism, why did we not attack North Korea? Why not Pakistan? why not Saudi Arabia? 15 of th 19 hijackers were Saudis.
If Iraq were about terrorism and not oil different chioces would have been made.