Beyond Bush’s Vision for Iraq

As America prepares for the Petraeus report on Iraq, the Bush administration goes on the offensive. Last week, Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq. This week he gets ready to announce his “vision” for Iraq.

Notice that the Republicans are talking about vision in the article. While the Democrats, once again, appear to be complaining.

The successful strategy that the Republicans are using is to brand themselves as seeking victory and protecting our national security and to label Democrats as Defeatocrats.

Bush’s vision appears to be a shift towards local victories. In his speech, he is expected to tout success in Anbar province. Oddly enough, this success was not so much brought about by the surge as it was by Sunni tribal leaders getting fed up with Al Qaeda groups. Nevermind that there is no link, Bush understands that the important word in his speech is “success,” even if it is very limited. He will ignore any negative news and focus on the few successes and tie them back to his decision.

When will the Democrats catch on and discover their own vision for Iraq? A vision that does not fall into the Republican marketing scheme. As long as Republicans can segment the voting public into those who want “success” and those who want “failure,” who is going to vote for a Democratic president?

Rather than promoting a simple end to the Iraq war, which will be labeled as defeat, progressives should remember that we still have a mess on our hands overseas and we should stand for a successful end to the Iraq War.

If Republicans have any plans to successfully end this war, why are they building permanent bases in Iraq and a new $600 million embassy the size of 60 football fields?