Bush in Iraq

Today President George W. Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq. The visit comes 37 days before Bush steps out of office and hands the war over to President-elect Barack Obama. During Bush's two hour meeting with the Iraqi government, he defended his decision to invade the country nearly 6 years ago. "The work hasn't been easy, but it has been necessary for American security, Iraqi hope and world peace," the president said. "I'm just so grateful I had the chance to come back to Iraq before my presidency ends."

Bush's presidential legacy will forever be linked with his unpopular war. A war that has cost the lives of 4,209 U.S. troops, thousands more of Iraqi civilian lives, has injured thousands of troops and civilians, hundreds who will sit in wheelchairs for the remainder of their lives, and has put a burden on U.S. taxpayers of over $575 billion. Perhaps if we didn't get ourselves into this mess we wouldn't be in a recession, and wouldn't have needed to borrow $700 billion from China in order to stimulate our economy. But it is not fair, nor worth while to speculate on what could have been. We must deal with the present situation at hand. The fact is that we got ourselves into a huge, unnecessary mess and we still have close to 150,000 troops in the war torn country today. Bush insists that we are safer today than we were with Saddam Hussein in power, but was it all really worth it?

Recently the Iraqi and US government's have signed an agreement to withdraw all of our troops by 2011. The question is, is it worth staying in Iraq for another 2 years? Will 2 more years do more positive or negative to the 6 year impact we have already had on Iraq? If 2011 rolls around and the situation in Iraq does not improve, do we stay for another 2 years so that our 4,209 U.S. troops did not die in vain? Has the Vietnam War taught us nothing? Obama has vouched throughout his campaign that he will end the war within 16 months of his presidency. Either way, it appears that we are finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, it just may not be the brightest light. Enjoy the cartoons, and may God bless our troops.