Ball of Delusion

Transcript From Bush Speech on American Strategy in Iraq

Most of Bush's speech last night was just repackaged talking points. And on that basis alone, it seems to be a washout.

Bush did his usual thing: treated a disaster as thought all it needed was little advertising to make it seem like a good idea.

Before the speech, Bush said he would lay out "concrete steps." But what he did was simply restate stalled U.S. policies and this time repackage them as a "five-step plan." In essence, he said, "These are the five things we keep claiming we want to do, but haven't had the competence to accomplish them." We knew that, George. Tell us something that we don't know.

But one of the things that the pundits don't seem to notice is that Bush has actually done terrorists a gigantic favor and he tacitly admits this. But he doesn't quite realize that he's admitting it because the man actually doesn't understand the implications of his own words.

He says:

"[T]errorists know that Iraq is now the central front in the war on terror. And we must understand that as well."

"The rise of a free and self-governing Iraq will deny terrorists a base of operation."

Got that? "Iraq is NOW the central front in the war on terror." It wasn't before we invaded. We MADE it a "central front in the war on terror."

But, whereas there were were no terrorists there before, now the terrorists may be able to use it as a base of operations.

We did that.

Bush's actions in Iraq have given the terrorists a POTENTIAL base of operation that they didn't have before. And Bush KNOWS this.

Instead of hurting the terrorists, we've given them the opportunity to establish a beachhead, and now we have to sacrifice lives to prevent them from taking advantage of the opportunity we gave them.

And we claim that we did it to "help the Iraqi people."

Well, we've actually opened the gates of hell in their country and flooded the place with terrorists.

We have forcibly occupied their country so we could have OUR war there.

Their country is being used as a battleground for a war that they aren't part of. A war between the United States and Al Qaeda. The Iraqis themselves have nothing to do with the war that is being waged on their soil.

And we have the GALL to claim that we did it to HELP THEM.

Frankly, not only are we doing all of the above, but we're insulting their intelligence by feeding them a line like that.

In addition, Bush still hasn't answered the hard questions: if we "turn over sovereignty" to Iraq - what does that mean? Will we still have an army there? If we have the army, how are they sovereign? If we DON'T have the army, how can we prevent terrorists from doing what they want? What if the "sovereign" government wants us to leave? Do we leave at their request, or deny their sovereignty? How is this "interim government" supposed to quell the chaos? If they actually have elections in January, what will prevent them from electing a fundamentalist Muslim government hostile to the United States? And why WOULDN'T they? Right now in Iraq, anti-US sentiment seems to be a ticket to popularity.

The Iraqis are being devastated by a WAR that we started in their country.

They are flooded and surrounded by terrorists that we brought into their country. Things are blowing up right and left. Innocent citizens have been abused. People have been being forced to violate their religion. Wedding parties have been blown up. Children have been killed.

And Bush is trying to tell them that we are doing them a favor.

With a straight face.