BUSH STICKS TO HIS DELUSIONAL PRINCIPLES, SAYS WE ARE MAKING PROGRESS IN FIGHTING QAEDA IN IRAQ

Bush still persists in his unfounded delusion that he is on the high moral ground, sticking to his "principles" on the war in Iraq. Furthermore, Bush claims that there is measurable progress in Iraq, and what the anti-war public thinks be damned. The report on progress (Initial Benchmark Assessment Report) in Iraq was a joke. See my post from yesterday, indicating that the report was filled with gobbledygook and boiler plate, and showing very little progress.

Among other fictions, Bush still insists we are fighting Al Qaeda. Juan Cole asks who he means, for example, does Bush mean the Salafi Jihadis or Iraqi Sunnis fighting Americans? And how many Al Qaeda members are there in Iraq? Fifty, 100, 500? How about all the other insurgent groups fighting Americans in Iraq? Are they all part of a sinister world conspiracy to attack America "because they hate what we stand for." Michael Gordon and Jim Rutenberg write this morning in The New York Times from Baghdad:

"In rebuffing calls to bring troops home from Iraq, President Bush on Thursday employed a stark and ominous defense. “The same folks that are bombing innocent people in Iraq,” he said, “were the ones who attacked us in America on September the 11th, and that’s why what happens in Iraq matters to the security here at home.”


"It is an argument Mr. Bush has been making with frequency in the past few months, as the challenges to the continuation of the war have grown. On Thursday alone, he referred at least 30 times to Al Qaeda or its presence in Iraq.


"But his references to Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, and his assertions that it is the same group that attacked the United States in 2001, have greatly oversimplified the nature of the insurgency in Iraq and its relationship with the Qaeda leadership.