Jon Stewart included some great footage of Bush talking tough on being ready to defend the nation on his show Wednesday 12/3 in which Bush states that if terrorists attack us, 'our response will be devastating': http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=212822&title=end-times-countdown-bush-exit. The relevant section starts at about minute 6:00 of the 6:49 minute segment.

Bottom line for me is I can separate all the things you mention and direct blame to different folks. You blame bush because you believe that he is where the buck stops.

I understand that perspective but I think there are plenty of others who bear more blame for all the things that have happened in IRaq and because of it than Bush.

I also separate the decision to invade with the execution of the war. hindsight is an easy way to argue this but, given what we knew and the state of the world at the time, we acted in the interests of Iraq and what we thought was the right thing to do given the aftermath of 9/11.

But, you're right - overall - we failed miserably. But, not entirely.

i have often heard it said that it is far better to be thought a fool then to open ones mouth and cofirm it. and the whole world pays for dad's wayward son's mistakes.....what a complete and utter.......words escape me!!!!!!and/or they arent permited on line!!!!!!!!!

And what terrorist groups was Saddam actually working with? (pointing to some line bin Laden said about Iraq doesn't prove they actually had a REALTIONSHIP)Thanks! Oh and BTW: your Clinton Derangment Syndrome is showing! Moonbat.

I reread Joan's article, cursed a few times, then wandered off for a cup of coffee, reflecting on how sadly tragic poor Bush has been his whole life. It's as if a Greek myth or a Roman tragedy played out on our own lives' stage. Who wants to be part of this story, I thought -- and then reflected, the spawn of this coward and bully remain hidden in the laws and regulations and judges he left behind to bedevil us. Bush is gone but can't be forgotten: we have much work ahead to undo the evil he's done.

The way America tiptoes around Bush rather than attacking the source of our ills, I can imagine a future Banana Republic (kind of like the United States) having a dicktater like Bush who, when he does something worthy of removing him from office, the people instead find some poor random schmuck on the street, then apprehend, torture and kill him.

After all, as bad as the dicktater may be, he is too important to actually suffer for his crimes.

This seems to me to be how Americans think.

really, just forget I used the word altogether...

Mark Denney: "I understand that perspective but I think there are plenty of others who bear more blame for all the things that have happened in IRaq and because of it than Bush."

Why? I mean, he's the top guy in charge. He directs the war policy. All the important decisions are supposed to be rubber-stamped by him. So why is he the one you want to let off the hook? Unless you're saying that he wasn't really in control of, or didn't understand, what was going on...

Mark Denney: "I also separate the decision to invade with the execution of the war."

Even a moral, righteous war becomes an immoral, wrong-headed war if the people waging war don't bother to plan what they're doing and investigate who they're doing it to. Bush disbanded the Iraq Republican Guard and didn't even bother to try to set up post-invasion jobs for tens of thousands of militarily trained men, most of them with families. What does anybody expect to happen when people whose primary skill-set is fighting are left without employment?

Mark Denney: "Hindsight is an easy way to argue this but...."

Dismissing my viewpoint as "hindsight" does not invalidate the jugment or the analysis. Things in the past are always going to be hindsight, but that doesn't mean it isn't important to meaningfully assess them.

Mark Denney: "...given what we knew and the state of the world at the time, we acted in the interests of Iraq and what we thought was the right thing to do given the aftermath of 9/11."

How did we act in the interests of Iraq, when we didn't even have an immediate plan for preventing the looting that occurred within a day or two of invasion? Some of the world's most precious antiquities, historical artifacts from the very cradle of human civilization, are lost forever. Meanwhile, our own soldiers were unsupervised, spending their spare time scraping the gold leaf from ancient paintings into Zip-Loc bags. The whole thing was royally FUBAR because Bush rushed us into invasion to meet the spring attack window the military had told him was the only opportunity until the following fall. And what did Bush know? Nothing, because Bush is famously incurious about other cultures, and plainly didn't give a shit about the common people of Iraq. He just wanted to get revenge on behalf of daddy, who notably has publically cried over his son's failure. For Bush it was never about helping or protecting people, it was, in his own words, a chance to "Fuck Saddam -- we're taking him out!" Bush keeps Saddam's pearl-handled pistol in his Oval Office drawer. He's an ill-equipped cowboy born into a postmodern age.

But I'll take your message as an agreement to disagree, and we'll leave it at that.

"And what terrorist groups was Saddam actually working with? (pointing to some line bin Laden said about Iraq doesn't prove they actually had a REALTIONSHIP)Thanks! Oh and BTW: your Clinton Derangment Syndrome is showing! Moonbat."

Ask the members of the Clinton administration. It was Clinton's State Department that designated Iraq as a state sponsor of terrorism every year for the eight years Clinton was president.

is the juvenile back and forth between the republican supporters and the democrat supporters.

I have news for you ding dongs-- Clinton and Bush elder shake hands and hang together. They both laugh at you losers, angling over minute details rather than seeing the big forest.

what is appalling is that neither party ousted this soulless animal from the White House. not the republicans, whose party he destroyed, and not the dumcraps, who are supposed to be the opposition and the PEOPLE'S party.

unless you eunuchs get your shit together and begin to actually THINK and have the nuts to face reality, this country is toast the next time the two parties decide to REALLY stick it to us to increase their own wealth and power.