"Oh, that America might see the last of these fish-eyed sacks of loathsome bile and infamy: unwholesome in their birth; repugnant and stench-forming in their decline." That was Tony Blankley's understated take in the Washington Times on the aging Watergate generation in Congress. He continued, "Now the Watergate babies have grown old — and age has not improved them. They plan to finish their careers as they started them — in defeatism, betrayal and national dishonor."
The Democratic drumbeat against the war in Iraq has come to a head. New York Times theater of war critic, Frank Rich says, "Mr. Bush may disdain timetables for our pullout, but hello, there already is one, set by the Santorums of his own party: the expiration date for a sizable American presence in Iraq is Election Day 2006."
According to Jim Hoagland of the Washington Post, "U.S. military commanders are composing their own scenarios that point to a drawdown of 30,000 to 40,000 American troops- from a current force of about 140,00 – that will begin before the midterm elections."
John Murtha, the Vietnam veteran Congressman from Pennsylvania, was the 800 lb gorilla who sent the whole apparatus plunging past its tipping point and into the abyss by calling for an immediate U.S. withdrawal from Iraq.
Republicans said Murtha lacked backbone and promptly found a Marine who said only cowards cut and run. Murtha, who is a 37 year Marine vet, pointed out that Dick Cheney took 4 draft exemptions during the Vietnam war.
