The view from Kansas: Thumbs down on Bush's Iraq plan

Diane:

Watching Shields and Brooks on PBS... isn't it amazing that they're both emphasizing that the tone of the speech is sober, as if this is something new for this president, and of course, it is.

This is too serious to be flippant.

So we send more forces, and we stay and hold neighborhoods? How long do we stay? When will these places be stable? Victory won't look like the victory of WWII, Bush says, so what does victory look like? Is there such a thing as victory?

VA Sen. Webb just raised an interesting point... will there ever be peace in Iraq if there are American troops on the streets of that nation?

From Joan with 80 years of experience:

Bush talked about the Iraqi government doing this and this and this, but will they do it? They haven't done it before. What makes this time different?

The Iraqi government doesn't have any power over there at all. The Iraqi leader comes over and tell Bush what he wants to hear. He doesn't tell the truth.

Bush's mention of Afghanistan is ridiculous. Isn't he aware that that is a mess again and it never did get cleaned out right before?

Everything from Bush is just words, words words. He says we have to have patience and wait for results, but for four years we had patience.

It's almost as if it's Vietnam. You keep throwing men and materials into that country to fight a war and stabilize it and then it doesn't work.

The view from Kansas, from Joan and Diane, is thumbs down.

Joan says: You want to know something else? I think if we got out of there, the other countries in the Middle East would say we have to do something, and they would take action.

Diane:

As I sit listening to my mother what strikes me is the anger in her voice.

Joan:

It makes me mad to have this happening all over again. My generation fought WWII, my father's generation fought WWI and here we are doing the same damn thing again. When will we learn?