Well, that didn't take long.
Anonymous sources (read: cowards) at the Pentagon are already telling CNN that Murtha, a 37-year Marine, is being "irresponsible" by alerting folks to the fact that our military is "suffering" from the strain of fighting this many wars for four years now.
One particularly absurd quote, a senior military official (read: Rummy) says that Murtha is wrong when he says that "the United States and coalition troops have done all they can in Iraq." The senior defense official responded:
"I challenge that. If we have done all we can do then why are we still engaging in Operation Steel Curtain [operations near the Syrian border], why are we providing security for the Green Zone, and why are we still looking for Zarqawi?"Did you catch that? Murtha, one of the most senior and experienced and conservative military voices in Washington, says that we have accomplished everything we're going to accomplish in Iraq, and one of Bush's top officials, anonymously of course, asks 'then why do we continue to fight?'
Damn good question. Why DO we continue to fight? The problem with the Bush administration is that they see our continued fighting, our continued engagement, our continued sending of more and more troops to Iraq as PER SE evidence that such fighting, such engagement, and such deployments will somehow be effective and accomplish something.
You do not PROVE that more can be accomplished by pointing to your failures. It does not prove that more can be accomplished by pointing to the fact that you have NOT sealed the Syrian border in 3 years of fighting. It does not PROVE that more can be accomplished when you point to the fact that the Green Zone, which houses US diplomats and others, is growing increasingly dangerous and thus requiring more and more troops. And finally, it does not prove that more can be accomplished when you point to the fact that you STILL haven't captured Osama or his top deputy.
More NEEDS to be accomplished? Absolutely. But you want us to believe that more CAN be accomplished, and we're to believe this because you point to how much you've failed to date? Forgive me, but how does reminding us what you HAVEN'T accomplished after all this time somehow prove to us that you're competent of accomplishing it if we only give you a little MORE time and a few MORE American lives?
Only the Bush administration would point to their abject failures in order to prove that they are on the road to victory.
