And Now, Frank Talk About Iraq - Bush team shows less bravado

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/iraq/la-na-assess3nov03,1,436143.story?coll=la-home-headlines

President Bush and his aides sound distinctly less triumphal these days about the prospects for early success in the continuing war in Iraq -- a deliberate change in tone after a week of setbacks on several fronts.

A series of newly sophisticated attacks by anti-American insurgents --including a missile strike on a U.S. helicopter Sunday that killed more than a dozen troops, the deadliest single attack since U.S. forces invaded Iraq in March -- has made the administration's claims of progress look shaky, at least in the short run.

And as political sniping over the war stepped up in Washington, it became clear that the president faces not one but two implacable enemies: the rebels in Iraq plus the relentless pressure of time in an election year.

Military experts say it takes time, and troops on the ground, to defeat a well-entrenched insurgency -- more time and troops than the Bush administration initially wanted to spend. But the longer the struggle takes, they warn, the greater the danger that support for the war effort, among both Iraqis and Americans, will waver.

[kskiska]

1. I wonder if the chimp

will continue on his "Happy News Tour?" It's just that awful "filter" again. Things are just fine over there.

[LeighAnn]

2. Lots of Kobe, Scott Peterson this week

You can be sure of it.

[radfringe]

6. don't forget about

Teen surfer describes shark attack
Sunday, November 2, 2003 Posted: 10:46 AM EST (1546 GMT)


LIHUE, Hawaii (AP) -- The water was clear and there was no indication of danger when a 13-year-old surfing star went out on the waves with her best friend and her friend's father.

But while Bethany Hamilton was lying on her board off Kauai's North Shore, a shark bit once and then disappeared, taking off her left arm just below the shoulder.

"Nobody saw it happen. She just yelled, 'A shark bit me!"' said her father, Tom Hamilton.

Bethany Hamilton, who remained in stable condition after the attack Friday morning, talked of the attack Saturday

[CookieD]

17. Yeah, it's all Kobe, all Scott ...

all the time. Pathetic media.

[cliss]

3. Bush is running out of troops,

out of money, and the Americans are running out of patience with him.

On the news: maybe the misled TV-viewers will now turn off the TV and get their news on the Internet.

[NNN0LHI]

4. What, no more "Bring Them On"? n/t

[ILeft]

5. As Dubya would say: "There's an old saying in Texas..."

"You gotta know when to hold'm, and when to fold'm."

The whole world knows George W. Bush is one big bluff personified. Everyone at the table has been losing to the phony "Texan," and they're not happy about it. The "Bring them on" patter isn't working anymore.

[AndyTiedye]

10. But Bush* Has A Black Box Up His Sleeve That Prints Aces All Day Long

How can he ever lose?

[denverbill]

11. What? Bush never said "Bring it on."

That was the sailors on the Kitty Hawk that said that. It was all their idea.

[radfringe]

7. did you catch the ROONEY segment on 60 minutes?

If I Were Bush's Speechwriter ...
Nov. 2, 2003



(CBS) A weekly commentary by CBS News Correspondent Andy Rooney.


Years ago, I was asked to write a speech for President Nixon.

I didn't do that, but I wish President Bush would ask me to write a speech for him now.

Here's what I'd write if he asked me to - which is unlikely:

My fellow Americans - (the word "fellow" includes women in political speeches):

My fellow Americans. One of the reasons we invaded Iraq was because I suggested Saddam Hussein had something to do with the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center. No evidence that's so, I wish I hadn't said it.

I said we were going to get Saddam Hussein. To be honest, we don't know whether we got him or not. Probably not.

I said we'd get Osama bin Laden and wipe out al Qaeda. We haven't been able to do that, either. I'm as disappointed as you are.

I probably shouldn't have said Iraq had nuclear weapons. Our guys and the U.N. have looked under every bed in Iraq and can't find one.

EDITED BY ADMIN: COPYRIGHT

[JNelson6563]

8. Too bad psychotics are incapable

of such behavior. Not that the idealogues surrounding the simian would ever let his speak such things to begin with....

Julie

[4dsc]

9. but the crime rate is down

I had one warmonger post that as if that's was suppose to mean something.. I ask him if the crime number he poster were post-Saddam or pre-Saddam Iraq.. I never got an answer..

[Nottingham]

12. Things aren't going as planned!

Iraqi's were suppose to be happy
Oil flowing
Money pouring in

and
Iraqis ticked
Oil Pipelines Sabotaged
Money pouring out :bounce:

[Mountainman]

13. Repubs are going to wish they had listened to the peace marchers

Republicans would be in a much better place today if the war had never started and we were still debating it in the UN.

I think some repubs will say privately that they wished we hadn't gone to war.

[young_at_heart]

15. You'd think 10,000,000 people around the world

would have had a tiny impact on W, but he chose to label all those people as "focus groups"........what a MAJOR insult!

[gratuitous]

14. And it only took 350 dead soldiers

See? They can learn a lesson! A few hundred dead soldiers, a couple thousand wounded, and uncounted tens of thousands of dead civilians, and these boneheads figure it out just like that <snap!> that all is not going quite as well as projected. I just hope that the next lesson doesn't come at the same or higher cost.

[David Zephyr]

16. MoPaul, Baby. We Need You.

Please provide us one of your killer graphic creations with Bush's "Bring 'em On" dare juxtaposed against the coffins and death as only you can.