I thought it was a good speech, all in all. I esp liked his quoting Schroeder - i thought that made the point well.

One thing that hasn't been done yet is having Iraqi government leaders address the American people. It would be extremely powerful for many U.S. citizens to hear from the Iraqis themselves "we need you to stay."

I think there's a few reasons this ace card hasn't been played yet. For one thing, the Iraqi government doesn't want to appear too close to the U.S., lest they get the appearance among the Iraqi populace of just being mouthpieces of the Coalition. I think that could be alleviated by having a section in the speech which basically said "Look, we need you to stay, but this is contingent on trusting that when the point comes when we ask you to leave, you will."

Second, the Administration probably doesn't think things are so desperate on the P.R. front that they need to ask the Iraqis to do this just yet. Its notable that Bush felt it was necessary to buck up the citizenry with last night's speech, and he was probably right, but I don't think there's anywhere near a majority of voters supporting the "get out now!" option.

Lastly, the Iraqis are pretty busy right now trying to hammer out a Constitution which all sides find acceptable, so they probably have enough on their plate without having to concern themselves with how the average U.S. voter feels. So, the Administration probably feels it isn't worth doing something which might fuel the long-standing Iraqi suspicions that we're going to cut and run, such as implying things are running so much against the war here that we need to involve the Iraqis in our politics or we might really up and leave them.

I thought the speech was good. Apparently the spot polls immediately afterward showed that a majority agreed.

Andrew McCarthy has some links to 9-11 that the liberal media claims do not exist.

"There was nothing in it that we and our readers didn't already know, but the message is one that many rarely hear." Gee, and why would that be?

I dunno. Maybe you've been on the moon. With fingers in your ears.

...Or reading the New York Times, which is the next best thing.

Worse, Joe. You can see Earth from half of the Moon ...

rimshot

Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is.

[The] President...is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy.

If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy.

Any questions on this?

Did FDR ever tell the American people how long WWII would take or how much it would cost?

Exit strategy: we exit when we've won, and the Iraqi government can stand on its own. And if they ask us back later, we come back and repeat the process until we've won.

The operative words being "we've won."

Any questions on this?

"Did FDR ever tell the American people how long WWII would take or how much it would cost?"

no, but that was a conventional war, with lines on a map, territory taken etc. More comprehensible.

People dont need to know how long it will take or how much it will cost. They DO need to know about the relevant intermediate steps to victory. And laid out by someone in charge, not in blogs, the MSM, etc.

Tuesday night was a start. Im not sure how much more is needed, how soon. But I think more WILL be needed. Im not sure Bush is the one to give it, both cause of his office and his own strengths and weaknesses (as Clinton showed, sometimes being a detail guy is a weakness, but here not being one is a constraint) Ideally it would be Rummy, but Im afraid his credibility is fatally shot with most folks whos minds arent made up (one "its just a few bitterenders" comment too many, Im afraid) Rice could do it, but its not really her job. Everyone down the chain is too obscure.

liberalhawk / PD Shaw, it is astonishing to compare the silly nonsensical arguments we are hearing with what happened in WWII.

FDR lied about his attempts to get the US into WWII in 1940. FDR concealed the fact that the US Navy was ordered to conduct aggressive patrols in international waters and even attack German submarines which were acts of war. There was even a US pilot aboard a PBY spotting the Bismarck for the British long before the US entered the war. FDR concealed from the public the extent to which he was transfering US military equipment to the British in arguable violations of the law.

Heck, what did the invasion of neutral countries like Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia have to do with Pearl Harbor! Those were in fact illegal invasions by the current silly rhetoric that media like the NYT today report with a straight face.

11 RR - what does that have to do with what I said? I was merely discussing the need to clarify the strategy of the war.

Joe, you sound...upset. Why is that? What about my post is objectionable? Do you think they bespeak a lack of will? A betrayal of our troops? What?

Not upset, JC. In the words of Chili Palmer ("Get Shorty"),

"I'm the guy who's telling you the way it is."

Since "we won" means the Iraqi government able to take care of the terrorists and their allies with little to no American help, the exit strategy is whatever it takes to get to that point. Failure is not an option.

Any longer-term presence beyond that is up to the Iraqis, and the USA too (as it showed in Germany).

Also recommended, from "Get Shorty":

"Now I've been shot at three times before. Twice on purpose and once by accident. And I'm still here. And I'm gonna be here for as long as I want to be."

When one understands why the Chili Palmer character needed to say that, one understands why the exit strategy for the USA is "we won, and they don't need us any more."

Okay, fess up time - hope you don't mind if I engaged in a little rope-a-dope -

The above are quotes -

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is." -- Governor George W. Bush Houston Chronicle, 1999

"[The] President...is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy." -- Rick Santorum 1999

If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy. Karen Hughes.

This has been going around the net, so it probably didn't take in Joe.

I personally found the link to the George Bush governor quote, but haven't been able to confirm the other two. There are more as well.

Reading and listening to more Cordesman, others, actually I DON'T believe we should have an exit strategy, or withdraw soon. Even Juan Cole doesn't believe this.

I posted this as a cautionary reminder to everyone really, to not take partisan blinders too seriously. We have enough people who turn on a dime and say "we have always been at war with Eastasia".

Once again... there is an exit strategy. It's called "we win, and our enemies lose."

Unlike Kosovo, or Somalia, (or, to be bipartisan, Beirut in the 80s) it's pretty clear what that means. It's also pretty clear how big the stakes are.

As it turns out, quotes from al-Qaeda leaders and what we know now indicate that the stakes in Somalia were also pretty big, and a similar approach would probably have been a good idea - it just wasn't as obvious HOW true that was. We have no such excuse this time.