The problem IS that the war has been POORLY,or not at all, marketed. Why do you think the voices of negativity have been allowed to keep the drive and the hopes of the resistances alive so easily and freely? No marketing! There has not been a moment that this effort has been allowed to move ahead with full,positive force, and with more often a vacuum on the side where there SHOULD have been good marketing going on.
The defeatists have steadily swayed America's middle-of-the-road'ers, fence straddlers, and useful idiots to the wrong side. And now have the nuts to say the thing has been marketed!?! It is the people with senses and thought processes, and who properly perceive the situati...

The problem IS that the war has been POORLY,or not at all, marketed. Why do you think the voices of negativity have been allowed to keep the drive and the hopes of the resistances alive so easily and freely? No marketing! There has not been a moment that this effort has been allowed to move ahead with full,positive force, and with more often a vacuum on the side where there SHOULD have been good marketing going on.
The defeatists have steadily swayed America's middle-of-the-road'ers, fence straddlers, and useful idiots to the wrong side. And now have the nuts to say the thing has been marketed!?! It is the people with senses and thought processes, and who properly perceive the situation who do not need any marketing.They/we have known from the start that this needs a united backing and all the while we have bemoaned the fact that there is not a good,sensible information, or marketing, program going on to counter the ugly,petty,disingenuous barrage of self-serving attacks from the enemy within. The only marketing gone on has been from those who have spoken and acted in treasonous ways,daily deflated the confidence of our people in uniform,hourly stimulated the insurgents' motivation and every minute cared for nothing except their own rise in the popularity polls or "atta boy's" in their blog's comments.

Speaking strictly statistically, "we've killed more of them then they've killed of us." However, that's a conventional war, and this is not.

We -did- free people from a horrible dictator. But -we- had almost nothing to do with -driving- them to a civil war. They've chosen that all on their own. What we're doing -now- (at least where I am) is trying to -prevent- civil war. We're trying to stop all violence, especially sectarian violence.

The problem is that there's no clear goal in mind. You've got the left telling us to get out of Iraq. You've got the right telling us we're going to stay the course. And as everyone's said, it's all political. Nobody cares about the actual war itself, only ...

Speaking strictly statistically, "we've killed more of them then they've killed of us." However, that's a conventional war, and this is not.

We -did- free people from a horrible dictator. But -we- had almost nothing to do with -driving- them to a civil war. They've chosen that all on their own. What we're doing -now- (at least where I am) is trying to -prevent- civil war. We're trying to stop all violence, especially sectarian violence.

The problem is that there's no clear goal in mind. You've got the left telling us to get out of Iraq. You've got the right telling us we're going to stay the course. And as everyone's said, it's all political. Nobody cares about the actual war itself, only it's implications upon American Politics. The left thinks making the war look like a debacle and convincing people it is will hurt the right, especially Bush, politically. The right thinks that to maintain any political power they have to do the opposite of the left and therefore stay as long as possible; they can't be seen as backing down.

I think both sides need to take a step back and instead of looking at politics, look at the actual issue. What's the actual -goal- here in Iraq? What's the best way to accomplish that goal? -I- don't know, I'm just a ground-level troop, but for goodness' sake, look at the actual -WAR- and not just the political consequences thereof.

I don't get it. "Politicizing" the war? How could a war ever be anything but political? As far as I can tell, this war was politicized before the shooting even started.

Cathal Drake said:

-we- had almost nothing to do with -driving- them to a civil war. They've chosen that all on their own.

Okay, literally speaking, this is true. However, lots of people predicted beforehand that a civil war would be the only probable outcome of the invasion, and now it's come true. We may not have forced people into taking up arms against one another, but we were the primary contributors to a situation in which civil war was almost inevitable, it seems to me.

And man -- you conserv...

I don't get it. "Politicizing" the war? How could a war ever be anything but political? As far as I can tell, this war was politicized before the shooting even started.

Cathal Drake said:

-we- had almost nothing to do with -driving- them to a civil war. They've chosen that all on their own.

Okay, literally speaking, this is true. However, lots of people predicted beforehand that a civil war would be the only probable outcome of the invasion, and now it's come true. We may not have forced people into taking up arms against one another, but we were the primary contributors to a situation in which civil war was almost inevitable, it seems to me.

And man -- you conservatives and your theories about Viet Nam! It's incredible, it's like the Dolchstoßtheorie all over again. Our military is invincible, but we lost because of a bunch of spineless commie hippies at home, and now it's happening again. Can you explain precisely how opposition to the war at home causes us to lose? And what do you think would have happened in Viet Nam if we had somehow managed to silence all that opposition and allow the war to continue? Would we be a whole lot better off now?