And for a good reason. Violence over the past two days has led to at least deaths from insurgent attacks:
BAGHDAD, Iraq – Suicide bombers targeted Shiite pilgrims in the south and police recruits in central Iraq, and a roadside bomb killed five U.S. soldiers, bringing Thursday’s death toll to at least 130 people in a series of attacks as politicians tried to form a coalition government.
The two-day toll from insurgent attacks rose to 183, reflecting a dramatic upsurge in bloodshed following the Dec. 15 parliamentary elections. Some leading Sunni politicians accuse the Shiite-led government of condoning fraud in the voting.
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A suicide blast near the Imam Hussein shrine in Karbala, 50 miles south of Baghdad, killed 63 people and wounded 120, Karbala police spokesman Rahman Meshawi said.
In the attack’s aftermath, a woman and an infant girl in a bright red jumpsuit lay in a pool of blood, their faces covered by a sheet. Television images showed men ferrying the wounded in pushcarts.
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In Ramadi, an insurgent stronghold 70 miles west of Baghdad, a U.S. spokesman said dozens were killed when a suicide bomber attacked a line of about 1,000 police recruits. Marine Capt. Jeffrey S. Pool initially put the death toll at about 30, but Mohammed al-Ani, a doctor at Ramadi General Hospital, later said 56 people were killed and 60 injured.
The attack took place at a police screening center. Pool said recruits later got back in line to continue the screening process.
Well election is over. Bring on the new election!
Meanwhile back in the USA, Republican Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama was revealed to have sent Rumsfeld a letter back in 2003 urging troop withdrawals ASAP:
(More on the flip)
MOBILE, Ala. – U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, in a September 2003 letter to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, called for a drawdown of U.S. troops in Iraq “as quickly as possible,” the Mobile Register reported Thursday.
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Sessions’ three-page letter, which the Mobile Register obtained under a Freedom Of Information Act request, was dated Sept. 5, 2003, shortly after Sessions returned from a fact-finding trip, including two days in Iraq.
“As strongly as I support our actions in Iraq, I think it’s very important that we start drawing down the number of our troops,” Sessions said in the letter, which urged the Pentagon to concentrate on beefing up Iraqi forces. “I would try every way possible to reduce our presence as quickly as possible and to spend money on local police, civil defense and military.”
“There is no way an American soldier who does not speak the language can be an effective law enforcement officer,” Sessions, a former federal prosecutor, wrote.
He also called for an expansion of the Iraqi army, which would allow for a U.S. troop drawdown and provide Iraqis with steady jobs and “a stake in a new Iraq.”
Guess they really paid attention to ya, didn’t they Jeff. Of course, now he says that you shouldn’t compare what he said then in private correspondence to the Secretary of Defense with Jack Murtha’s call for troop withdrawals recently. And what are his views today about the situation in Iraq? Oh yes, that “[S]uccess in driving down the insurgency may be worth some delay in reducing the numbers.”
Dear Senator, please see the story immediately preceding yours re: that success against the insurgency. If that’s success I’d hate to see what you call failure.
Of course, on that note, and as Booman already told us Bush is reaching out for help on Iraq from outside Cheney’s bunker in the White House. Or is he?
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President George W. Bush reached on Thursday beyond his tight circle of trusted aides to solicit views on Iraq of former secretaries of state and defense, including some who have publicly criticized his policy.
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Lawrence Eagleburger, secretary of state for Bush’s father, said when talking to the president there is a tendency to be restrained in expressing opposing views.
“There was some criticism, but it was basically ‘you haven’t talked to the American people enough,’ and it was very mild,” he said to reporters after the meeting. “We’re all has-bins anyway,” he said, smoking a cigarette in front of the television cameras on the White House driveway.
Pardon me, but the problem isn’t that Bush hasn’t spoken to the American people enough. I’ve heard enough speeches on Iraq from him to make a root canal seem painless. The problem is that he never has anything new to say, and that he appears to be unwilling to change the course that was set for him back in early 2002.
I mean if they weren’t listening to conservative Senators like Jeff Sessions back in 2003, what makes anyone believe that Bush is honestly seeking out differing viewpoints on Iraq now? All this was just a dog and poiny show with a bunch of old dogs and broken down nags as a backdrop for the same old spiel:
“The main thrust of our success will be when the Iraqis are able to take the fight to the enemy that wants to stop their democracy and we’re making darn good progress along those lines,” Bush said.
Sorry, I’m sick of hearing this tripe from you Mr. Bush. Damn sick.
