The Booby Prize

There is no way to "win" in Iraq. George Bush was right to repeat "wrong war, wrong time, wrong place." I'm sure he didn't mean to do it, but he only strengthened Kerry's argument. (What a moron!) [As Al Franken says, the "What a moron!" part is silent.]

The only thing we can do is repair the aberration that is George W. Bush. We can only hope to supplant this freak and prove to the rest of the world that he was just a rip in the space time continuum. It was all some sort of "who shot JR?" nightmare/binge-drinking-induced blackout and we can all wake up now. Only we've racked up one hell of a tab during that lost fucking weekend and before we can make amends we've got to either pay the bill or we'll have to post the bail.

And the bail is going to consist of pouring money into Iraq to rebuild their infrastructure. Yeah, sure, it would have been nice to spend that money here first, but that's the price you pay for temper tantrums. And it takes about two brain cells to rub together to figure out that if you pay able-bodied men money to clear debris and rebuild they'll be too fucking busy to improvise explosive devices. Duh!

So when Kerry talks about "winning" in Iraq, I have no idea what he means. Not if he means winning in the same sense as that whiny little brat, W. Winning is not about killing more and flattening a land. I trust Kerry knows that. And I can only hope that Kerry is referring to this part of the debate when he talks of winning:

Kerry: My message to the troops is also: Thank you for what they're doing, but it's also help is on the way. I believe those troops deserve better than what they are getting today.

You know, it's interesting. When I was in a rope line just the other day, coming out here from Wisconsin, a couple of young returnees were in the line, one active duty, one from the Guard. And they both looked at me and said: We need you. You've got to help us over there.

Now I believe there's a better way to do this. You know, the president's father did not go into Iraq, into Baghdad, beyond Basra. And the reason he didn't is, he said -- he wrote in his book -- because there was no viable exit strategy. And he said our troops would be occupiers in a bitterly hostile land. That's exactly where we find ourselves today. There's a sense of American occupation. The only building that was guarded when the troops when into Baghdad was the oil ministry. We didn't guard the nuclear facilities. We didn't guard the foreign office, where you might have found information about weapons of mass destruction. We didn't guard the borders. Almost every step of the way, our troops have been left on these extraordinarily difficult missions. I know what it's like to go out on one of those missions when you don't know what's around the corner.

And I believe our troops need other allies helping. I'm going to hold that summit. I will bring fresh credibility, a new start, and we will get the job done right.

On another note, the winning moment from the Big Spin last night for me had to be this -- from The New Republic Online:

Reporters want to talk to the brand-name spinners. The first inkling that the Bushies know their man didn't do so well comes minutes after the debate ends when Karl Rove walks into the press filing center. Like a game of telephone, the conventional wisdom that Kerry won the debate is already seeping out across the sea of journalists in the room. Into this skeptical ether, Rove tries out a line: "It was one of the president's better debate performances and one of Kerry's worst." Vince Morris of The New York Post stares at Rove and asks, "Can you say that with a straight face?"