Majority of Americans don't think War will be won

[KipWellsFan]

http://edition.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/09/22/iraq.poll/

 

Only 21 percent said the United States definitely would win the war in Iraq, which began when a U.S.-led coalition invaded in 2003 to topple Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. Another 22 percent said they thought the United States probably would win.

 

Twenty percent of respondents said the United States was capable of winning in Iraq -- but probably would not. And 34 percent said they considered the war unwinnable.

 

The survey of 818 adults was conducted Friday through Sunday and had a sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

more at link

 

Hmm, makes Donahue's comments on O'Reilly recently seem much more sensible.

 

O'REILLY: If we cut and run outta there, like you wanna do, we would be putting every American in a thousand times more jeopardy than they're in now.

 

DONAHUE (forcefully): We're going to cut and run anyway, Bill.

http://www.newshounds.us/2005/09/22/verbal...reilly.php#more

[Balta1701]

You know, I watched the clip of that Donahue interview on O'Reilly, and while I was moderately impressed that he held his ground as O'Reilly got pissed off, I didn't think he made his points particularly well at all. He didn't challenge O'Reilly on any of the "Facts" of the case, and he didn't make his argument in any really effective way.

 

It became just 2 loudmouths shouting at each other. Just not my cup of tea.

[KipWellsFan]

You know, I watched the clip of that Donahue interview on O'Reilly, and while I was moderately impressed that he held his ground as O'Reilly got pissed off, I didn't think he made his points particularly well at all.  He didn't challenge O'Reilly on any of the "Facts" of the case, and he didn't make his argument in any really effective way.

 

It became just 2 loudmouths shouting at each other.  Just not my cup of tea.

 

Yah I totally agree, I was laughing throughout that clip.

 

a fun exciting debate between two media loud mouths

from my blog

Edited September 23, 2005 by KipWellsFan

[Balta1701]

Yah I totally agree, I was laughing throughout that clip.

I can't wait to see how The Colbert Report does in satirizing these guys.

[Balta1701]

By the way...I really like what Matt Yglesias has to say about this poll.

 

Which brings us to this business about the polling data on whether people think we will win in Iraq. I have, honestly, no idea what the question means. Will we, in fact, establish a pro-American liberal democracy that sets off a cascade of democratic revolutions throughout the region? Well, no. In that sense, we're not going to win, no matter how much we stay the course or conduct diplomacy. Will Abu Musab al-Zarqawi become Caliph of Baghdad and assert his iron grip across the country? Well, no. No matter how hastily we cut and run that's not in the cards. In that sense, we'll win. The President's own thinking on this seems rather fuzzy:

 

"The president asserted at a news conference afterward that terrorists had studied the American responses to the Iranian hostage crisis during the Carter administration, the bombing of United States Marines' barracks in Lebanon during the Reagan administration and the first terror attack on the World Trade Center during the Clinton administration, among other events.

 

"The terrorists concluded that we lacked the courage and character to defend ourselves, and so they attacked us," the president said. "The only way the terrorists can win is if we lose our nerve and abandon the mission.""

 

Losing, in other words, is leaving Iraq. Winning, by contrast, is staying there. So when do the troops come home? Not until we win. But if they come home, then we lose. So they can't come home. Apparently ever. But at other times Bush has said that "as Iraqis stand up, we will stand down." According to the administration, however, Iraqis are standing out, as witnessed by the Iraqi militia-turned-army's perfomance in Tal Afar. So why don't we start standing down? Because standing down would mean losing.

 

There's a problem here. The organizers of the al-Qaeda movement, as the president himself has had occassion to remark, aren't the sort of people who are ever going to sign a surrender document on the deck of a battleship stationed in the Persian Gulf. As a result, we more-or-less need to define our own policy objectives. Insofar as we define our objective as "not withdrawing," which is what the president seems to have done, we're dooming ourselves to pointless fighting and some kind of national crisis. If we left early next year not because "we lost, got scared, and ran away" but because "we came to topple Saddam and install an elected government and now that's done so we won" we would be able to end the war and to win it.

 

What's so wrong with that? What, really, are the alternatives

Edited September 23, 2005 by Balta1701

[Kyyle23]

Define "winning the war". No matter what, life is lost. This isnt something that the Government will be able to step away from and say to themselves "yes, they are much better off now.". US occupation of Iraq will continue for a lot longer than we are being told, even though everyone with a open-mind knows this.

 

Its just a situation that is really going to be in a constant state of flux for a long time.