McCain denies misstating the timing of Iraq surge

I can see this little man just beating his fists in the air...

John McCain is caught misstating and he's asserting he when the Iraqis started taking the battle to Al-Quaeda. Bull, he's stumbling over his lips again. Everytine he opens them, he trips.

McCain credited the recent $10-a-barrel drop in the price of oil to President Bush’s lifting of a presidential ban on offshore drilling, an action he has been advocating in his presidential campaign.

Actually I don't remember the price moving at all when george bush made this announcement. But I do remember the $13.00 drop in 3 days due to the report that we are using 9% or so less gasoline then we did the year before. They are afraid that we'll use even less in the future.

But I'm loving this election campaign. So much drama from John McCain everytime Barack Obama does or says anything at all, especially with him overseas.

Desperation. < :-)

"A surge is really a counterinsurgency made up of a number of components. I’m not sure people understand that `surge’ is [one component of a surge]."

Yes. I can see where people would have difficulty understanding that.

Whatever. Be that as it may, I think that Obama recognizes that the surge has worked in limited ways. Casualties have been vastly reduced--not to any acceptable level, but to a comparatively welcome one. A compliant American Embassy in Baghdad has said that the Iraqis have achieved most of the benchmarks set out by Congress. There's no doubt that things have improved.

However, we are still spending billions of dollars and the administration sees no clear end to this. Iraqi refugees both at home and abroad continue to be a problem with no solution. At home in Iraq, barriers separate Sunni from Shia and travel proceeds through checkpoints. The infrastructure is unreliable and subject to attack. Oil revenue sharing remains contentious. Political factionism is still volatile.

In my view, the greatest success of the surge is that it has made clear to the Iraqis that the US cannot stop the violence without disproportionate occupation. Faced with continued occupation and continued violence, the Iraqis seem now to prefer to go it alone. So if we surged in order to leave Iraq, to leave the expensive bases we have built there, to leave behind a fragile government, then I think you can say that the surge has worked.

However, that's a post hoc ergo propter hoc type of argument. Maybe what really worked was Cindy Sheehan or Democratic pressure to withdraw--without which we might still be at war with the army we had, not the army we wanted. And, for that matter, we don't know what would have happened if we had withdrawn and saved ourselves billions of dollars in the process. (If the patient be pale and drawn, bleed him. Then upon his recovery we shall surely say that the blood-letting has done its work.)

I think Petraeus says it most honestly when he describes the surge as producing gains which are promising but fragile. That is a far cry from "the surge has worked".

"It's all a matter of semantics."

Ummm.... no... semantics are when you take something and misconstrue what the person intended to say, for whatever reason. When you literally say the surge began before it did, there's nothing being miscontrued when people call you on it.

This guy's head is about to explose in yet another tantrum.

Maybe what really worked was Cindy Sheehan or Democratic pressure to withdraw--

Maybe it was Team America!

undecidedbout08,

Yes, I think you've got it. We're at the point we're at now. And a confluence of events brought us here.

If I want to improve my 450 TOEIC score and have a choice of School A or School B, if I choose School A and later score 500, I can say that School A worked. Never mind that even without School A, I might have scored 500 on a different day. And that's to say nothing about the possibility that after School B I might have scored 550.

A lot of the gains due to the surge are attributable to elements which were already in place as Cindy Sheehan was doing her work and as John Murtha and others were calling for withdrawal. I think it's reasonable to say that the surge helped to shore up those elements and to improve upon them. But that's not to say that it was the best course of action.

word games. I can't believe how much people fall for it.

"word games. I can't believe how much people fall for it."

Yeah, as though McCain were playing a trick on us all! hahaha... no, skip, he's already gaffed more times than bush, if you can believe it (though not as bad as the worst of bush's gaffes), and with all the bad press he's getting over it being the possible side effects of senile dementia and how that'll play in his election campaign, there's no WAY he's doing it on purpose. Hence, your idea that we 'fall for' word games is just plain silly. Speaking of 'word games', shouldn't it be 'fall for them' and not 'it'? Sorry if that's what falls into 'semantics' for some people, but since we're pointing out GAMES and all...

Yeah, as though McCain were playing a trick on us all!

he's already gaffed more times than bush, if you can believe it (though not as bad as the worst of bush's gaffes),

So you're voting for Obama. Seen or read of his gaffes? He's got nothing on Senator McCain...

"the recent $10-a-barrel drop in the price of oil"

And we haven't even started new off-shore oil drilling yet, which is going to happen despite Obama's objections.

sarge, by the time that oil is available, McCain will be what, 147 years old?

The poor old boy seems to be getting in a muddle on this issue, again. Yet another sign he's fit for the retirement home rather than the office of President.

Madverts, you're saying it will take over 70 years to get new oil? You're the one who seems to be getting in a muddle.

It's called sarcasm, sarge.

Undecided: "So you're voting for Obama. Seen or read of his gaffes? He's got nothing on Senator McCain..."

I have seen and read very well about Obama's gaffes, but I'm sorry they are few and far between in comparison, and the gravity of McCain's gaffes have in most cases been far more severe and led to much more of an uproar (as in this one). And every time either McCain says he never said it, or his statements (which can be played back over and over) are 'misunderstood' or that it's all 'semantics'.

Thank God for video tape so McCain, bordering on dementia, can't keep changing his poor overworked mind and try to yap his way out of yet another stupid, half-baked statement. If you say the lie "The surge has worked and I take credit for it because I know a Colonel in Iraq", over and over, does that make it true? And Sarge, I'm not surprised that you bought into that whole OCS argument. Hahaha, you are so easily duped by the Repub propaganda.

"Hahaha, you are so easily duped by the Repub propaganda."

Heh, thankfully, of late, they're but a few remaining dead-enders...

Madverts,

So, you're sarcastically saying it will take a long time to get new oil?

Papa: "If you say the lie "The surge has worked and I take credit for it because I know a Colonel in Iraq..."

McCain said that, did he? Link, please. Good luck.

No sarge, I'm saying McCain is a bumbling old fart not fit to be president. Heh, how come I always have to spell it out for ya?

"Link, please"

Sarcasm, sarge. You should really check that word out.

Madverts - "McCain is a bumbling old fart"

This, from the poster who said people who believe in any religion are weak-minded.

And, so you're saying that Papa's not going to be able to provide a link to back up his sarcasm? Heh.

McCain could lie his way out of a paper bag, assuming he was already outside it when he started.

"This, from the poster who said people who believe in any religion are weak-minded. "

Yes.

And?

I like atheists.

They've personally concluded that their very own existence is completely meaningless in every way. Everything they say, everything they believe, everything they do...

Of course there's that problem of them generally bein' bitter, smug, sinical human beans until their candle goes out.

Happy trails, amiga.

Hermione

McCain is a bumbling old fart that continues gaffe after gaffe. He 'aint going to prez boys, you need to start an awakening council, tee hee.

He's denying it yet this morning on "The Situation Room" he was saying the surge goes back to 2006!!!! He's turning the lie into a fact. Obama's people proved that his surge success claim was a fiery tale. The Sunni sheik's he's been calling a result of the surge actually inspired the surge through their revolt against Al Quaida in Iraq. And their work had changed Iraq - Ramadi a good half year before the bleedin' surge.

The Sunni sheik's he's been calling a result of the surge actually inspired the surge through their revolt against Al Quaida in Iraq. And their work had changed Iraq - Ramadi a good half year before the bleedin' surge.

Brilliant anaylsis of the Sunni and Shia divisions in Iraq. I have to bow my head in your Ramadi example. I do undertstand that Fallujah was all Sunni and the Marines had to flattened the city to get those Sunni's on our side. nothing like that to get an 'awakening' to support the U.S occupation