Jophiel wrote:
Quote:
Are they talking about the "calls in washington" that were soundly defeated in a vote?
You're honestly going to point to that joke of a resolution and vote as a valid indication of
anything? Seriously?
I didn't. The article you linked did. See the point? Or are you going to try to argue that the reason the article said "Despite calls in Washington and Iraq to pull out foreign troops..." had no intent to make the reader think that there was some overwhelming movement to withdraw our troops "now"?
Don't you think the impact of the story would have been very different if it had said something like: "Both Washington and Iraqi leaders have called for a gradual reduction in foreign troops contingent on the ability of the Iraqi forces to take over the job of security"? Wouldn't that have been a more accurate assessment of what people are *actually* calling for? Why write it in a way that implies an immediacy?
Quote:
Again, it's the whole "You're either staying the course or else cutting and running" attitude that's making people frustrated.
But ask yourself where that attitude is coming from Joph? Whenever withdrawal is stated in a conditional way (ie: the polls that state that 90% of Iraqi's want US troops to leave, but only after Iraqi troops can handle the job, or the statements at the Arab Summit that put those same conditions on withdrawal, or the Washington statements to the same effect), why is it *always* reported in the news as though they're demanding an immediate withdrawal?
The Republican's pushed that resolution exactly in order to address that perception. They were responding to the assumption that "withdrawal" means "today". They were stating clearly that no one is talking about immediate withdrawal. How can you not see the bias, when even after they made darn sure that everyone knew that we were not talking about immediate withdrawal, this CNN article still writes about it in a way that implies that's exactly what *is* being demanded?
Even after making their point clear, CNN still reports it as "Calls in Washington to pull out foreign troops". Sheesh. At what point will you admit that the guys at CNN are manipulating public perception of these events?
Quote:
Which is exactly what that resolution was. Guess what? People are smart enough to see that there's a middle ground between "Just keep waiting..." and "We must leave in the next five minutes!" and they're wondering why it's not being addressed.
Great! Then address that. Wait! It has. Bush has stated on several occasions what the conditions for US troop withdrawal in Iraq are. Heck. It's quoted in that article Joph:
"As Iraqis stand up, we will stand down," the president told a military audience in South Korea.. The perception that there's no exit strategy is purely one created. You can decide for yourself whether it's the "liberal media", or Liberals manipulating the media, or the media all on it's own trying to make things look worse then it is. The fact is that the conditions for us leaving are well documented and well known.
But some people insist on a set timetable with dates. That's silly. That was the point of the resolution the Republicans tossed out there. To show that you *can't* set a date for something, when that something is contingent on other factors that can't be nailed down in terms of time. We're not baking a cake here Joph. We can't say that in 20 minutes we can take it out of the oven and it'll be done.
What you should be asking yourself is why there are some who keep insisting on set dates for withdrawal. What is their motive and agenda in doing that? Why can't they be satisfied with the conditions already stated? Why pretend that those conditions don't exist? Why artificially create the perception that there's no middle ground between being there "forever" and "leaving today"? Guess what? The Republicans want our guys to come home too. We just want to make sure they're finished with their job first. Why is that "wrong"? Isn't it more "wrong" to insist on a timetable that doesn't take into account success?
Heck. While we're on the topic, why continue to try to make people believe that we're failing in order to push the agenda of a "right now" withdrawal? As I've pointed out multiple times (and you've not adequately debunked a single point), there are many indicators that our operations in Iraq are succeeding. But how many of those are being reported on your local news channel? Where are the news shows following the progress of our work in Iraq, complete with maps showing where we're operating today so that the people at home can *see* for themselves the progress we're making? Where's the guys charting our progress? Where's the guys making note of how many Iraqi security forces are now working and taking over the roles previously done by US troops?
You rail about how the US public doesn't know anything about the progress of the war, and my response is that it's because our media seems amazingly unwilling to actually report on the progress of the war. All the information is out there. I was able to generate a list of successes and progresses, but I had to do a fair bit of googling to find it. Where's our media coverage of this? Why isn't anyone simply taking the Bush administration's list of operation goals, and charting the success as we move towards completion? Heck. Unless you've been digging around on the internet for information about the war, you probably wouldn't have known that the Iraqi's are set to ratify their Constitution on Dec 15th. Why is that? Why isn't that a big news story?
Again. You talk about perception. But ask yourself *why* your percpetion doesn't seem to match what's actually happening. Who's misleading you? When I can find a deliberately misleading statement in the opening paragraph of CNN's lead story today about Iraq, I don't think it's hard for me to say where that's coming from...