We can’t leave until the violence subsides but even when the violence recedes, we’ll stay forever anyway.

Basically, we’re never leaving Iraq as long Republicans are in charge.

Either way, McCain= war, if for no other reason than to save face. It’s all good as long as the wingnut yipping dogs aren’t forced to fight it.

Duros: I have heard Obama say essentially similar things.

Really? Gee, I may have to end up voting for that guy!

Yes, and Republicans are like the kid on the block who poke and kick dogs then cries to mommy when he gets bit: “Mommy i was just playing with it …” And then never feels any responsibility when the dog is put to sleep …

If you keep poking that dog with a stick, you are likely to get bitten.

That hazards of trying to keep an open mind. Don’t worry, I’m used to it.

Sean: I have heard Obama say essentially similar things.

Thus, the “technically” part. Cease-fires are notoriously tenuous.

“We’ve been in South Korea for fifty years or so. That’d be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. Then it’s fine with me.”

So it’s fine to stay 50-100 years if Americans are NOT being harmed. Can you tell me how long St. John thinks it’s OK to stay if American troops ARE being harmed? For bonus points, if that number is the same or longer, how is this semantically different from flat out saying he “favors staying 100 years in Iraq” unconditionally?

Very well, Jay. What he DID say was, “Make it one hundred…That’d be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed.”

Let the hair-splitting begin.

If McCain wants to keep us in Iraq, McCain needs to come up with a plan that stops the violence. Since all McCain wants to do is rehash the failed Bush plans, we can assume Iraq will continue to be a fuck up with no end in sight if he’s elected.

So when McCain says 100 years in Iraq and attaches a fairy tale situation he has no plan to bring about, we can just assume he’s playing to the wingnuts and really means he will stay in Iraq despite the violent fuckup that it really is.

So bottom line is, McCain did say “we should stay in Iraq for at least 100 years.”

The bottom line is, McCain did NOT say “we should be in Iraq for at least 100 years.”

To put it another way, the presence of the US is not just a “convenient excuse” for radicals. The existence of the radicals themselves is the direct consequence of the US presence. They don’t just “trot” out Western Provocations. Western powers have actually, in fact, acted provocatively! We have, in other words, provoked these people! Are you arguing that preemptive war is not provocative? Really? I guess that depends on what side of the guns you’re on. But then again, that’s the whole point.

Jay Tea, before you start doling out the history lessons, you might want to try taking a longer view.

The US has been fucking around in the Middle East for decades, from propping up the corrupt Shah of Iran to supplying weapons to Saddam Hussein to counter the radicals who took power after the Shah was overthrown. We are, however, only the latest in a long line of colonialist/imperialist powers who have been the targets of nationalist and islamist movements going back to the beginning of the 20th century and before.

There are ways to positively engage and influence the politics and societies of a region and there are negative and counterproductive ways to do it. If history has shown anything, it’s that long term occupations of hostile civilian populations only makes things worse until finally the occupiers are forced to withdraw because eventually the cost of occupation always eventually outweighs whatever initial benefit the occupation was supposed to bring. Populations grow increasingly radicalized and resistance, whether passive or aggressive, becomes the norm.

Suggesting that military invasion and occupation is a bad way to win the trust and support of a population is not to “cater to the lies of the nuts.” It’s recognizing the vicious cycle of history and trying to change it.

Conservatives see the direct and overwhelmingly negative consequences of military occupation and suggest that it’s a reason to continue the same policy. We may seem dumb to you Jay but the conservative way of thinking is the very definition, as they say, of insanity.

To the rest of you, I say this: the problems of the Middle East did not suddenly emerge on 9/11. Nor did they burst, fully formed, on the day Bush came into office. The presence of the US is just a convenient excuse for the nutjobs, the latest in a long line of “Western provocations” that they trot out for their domestic audiences whenever they need to whip them into a frenzy. If it isn’t “US forces in Iraq,” it was “US forces in Saudi Arabia” (at the invitation and request of the Saudi Government) or “US forces in the Persian Gulf” (keeping THEIR oil tankers safe from Iraninan mines and boats and planes) or “US supporting governments like the Shah and the Saudi monarchy” or some other perceived attack.

And if all else fails, there’s always Israel to fall back on.

Catering our foreign policy to the lies the nuts tell the masses is beyond dumb. But it seems to be the linchpin of things around here…

J.

That is par for the course in politics though, so I guess that’s the level you want to operate at - because I have a hard time believing that you truly believe that you are accurately representing what McCain said. Ah well.

Stupidity from the wingers I expect, but some of the comments from normally clearer heads here is really baffling. It’s amazing how the constant drumbeat of propaganda from even despised criminals like Bushco can cloud otherwise wiser souls.

“Terrorists!” “Boo!”

I will repeat this statement as many times as necessary because the simple fact is McCain = more war. Period.

Don’t forget jay, McCain wants us to stay another 100 years in Iraq in exactly the same way that Al Gore invented the internet.

-our economy has been trashed, our treasury looted, national debt has sky rocketed, the deficit has swelled, our civil rights have been trashed, the environment has been trashed, the EPA gutted, the government bureaucracy has become the playground of partisan extremists, the DOJ has become the stomping ground of Jesus first law second idealists, our parks have been opened to mining and such, regulatory bodies have been sold to the industries they regulate, we now torture.

Hell, Iraq is probably the area of biggest success the republican party has had under Bush that McCain can try to ride to the White House. And it is a complete clusterfuck. Good luck Johnny.