What Kerry Should be Saying on Iraq

On the stump today Kerry is talking about how the increased deficit numbers mean yet again, we are on the "wrong track." The people agree already, John. Look, Bush is not running on his record at all. Nobody cares. The Bush administration has lost over million jobs, has 5 million more people without health care, has the biggest federal deficit in history (both as number and as percentage of GDP), has grown even non-military\homeland defense spending as the greatest rate since LBJ's Great Society, has watched Medicare premiums increase this week by a record 15 percent, has involved us in a war which has cost over 1000 U.S. lives, divided our population, and it opposed by most worldwide.

There is no plan nor timeline for us to get out of Iraq. Today, Rumsfeld admitted that Fallujah has become again a safe haven for terrorists, and that ground operations are needed. General Myers said today "The enemy is becoming more sophisticated" and that this accounts for the rise in casualties. Just this bloody month, we have 23 dead soldiers. More wounded, more abductions (2 Italian women and 3 Iraqis today,) well over 50 Iraqi soldiers or police officers dead, Ukrainians pulling out troops, a Turkish company leaving over threats of beheading. This is a success? We are winning? If our casualties are increasing, and they are getting more sophisticated, shouldn't we be doing something? Bush's answer to this is that "We will leave when the job is done." Okay, that sounds good, but how do we know when the job is done? No answer.

This administration has presided over two of the greatest intelligence failures (9/11 and Iraq) ever, and still has no plan besides relying on Congress to fix it. No heads rolled, no structural changes, no big increase in funding, nothing.

Again, if Kerry can't make hay out of this, he deserves to lose.