[detbuch]

Originally Posted by spence

You guys are armchair quarterbacking...

So . . . are you saying that's a bad thing? You do it a lot. Even in this thread and in this post to which I'm replying.

What would you be willing to give up for US troops to stay in Iraq? Bush had to give up some legal protections just to keep us there until 2011. What about contractors?

If you believe that the Arab nations are finally waking up to the monsters they've helped to create, wouldn't that make it an "easier" option for them to give us a wider latitude in helping them fight those monsters?

How do you build a coalition against Syria with steadfast Russian opposition? If the terrorist threat isn't imminent how do you get Arab support?

Perhaps the Arab's do not entirely desire a coalition with non-Arabs against terrorist threats, except those traditional coalitions such as being left to their own devices (tyranny, etc.) and a little economic and military support. But without ideological or utopian requests to become democracies, or to tolerate others, etc. Perhaps Arab rulers don't want to support that which lessens their power. Is that so hard for utopian masterminds to understand?

Don't we have to test Iraq and see if they can stand on their own? Isn't this nearly the same welfare dependency argument Conservatives are glued to at home?

Oh wait . . . so you agree with the "welfare dependency argument"? And you're glued to it like the Conservatives? Or do you just see it as a bunch of hooie, and are more inclined toward the progressive notion that one cannot stand on his own? That he can't build it on his own? This is confusing--you believe that Iraq can stand on its own, but on the other hand, maybe not? Which is it?

And no, it isn't nearly the same welfare dependency argument. The Federal government's constitutional duty, as conservatives see it, is to allow individuals or their local governments who represent their wishes to be independent, and to actually build things on their own, and to self govern. Its constitutional duty is to protect them from foreign threats, not to make foreign governments dependent on us. The Federal government's primary responsibility in Iraq is to do that which protects our homeland and its people from the foreign threats that are brewing there. If that takes seeing to it that the Iraqi government is able to fight our enemies, with whatever help it needs from us, that is what it should do, or if that government is not able, then to handle the matter ourselves with whatever might and power necessary.

And if it takes a more powerful military to do so, it should focus on that, not on micromanaging our personal lives.

Wouldn't a President Romney or McCain likely be saddled with the exact same constraints as Obama?

I think they would be.

-spence

There you go doing that armchair quarterbacking thing.

It is a bit mind-twisting how when Obama does or doesn't do something you think that those who oppose him would do or don't do the same thing. Did that apply to the things that Bush did or didn't do? So when Obama blames Bush for the problems he has "inherited," does that mean he's just blowing smoke up our butts because he would have been "likely saddled with the exact same constraints" as Bush?