Comments (18)

r€nato wrote on September 10, 2007 2:27 PM:

test

r€nato wrote on September 10, 2007 2:29 PM:

I'm glad you guys are keeping track of the Bushit. I can't bear to listen. It's 100% propaganda and I've had enough after 4 1/2 years of this FUBAR war.

security code: army

heh

bianc wrote on September 10, 2007 2:38 PM:

eisenhower he aint.

tpm devotee wrote on September 10, 2007 2:45 PM:

5 stars. military connection. or perhaps left over from elementary school - stars for good behavior.

jeffgee wrote on September 10, 2007 2:50 PM:

And on and on until the dirty diaper gets handed to the next president and Georgie goes to the fantastic Freedom Institute and gets bored.

ahem wrote on September 10, 2007 2:53 PM:

Note the QUESTION MARKS next to the stars past the initial post-surge™ drawdown.

There's now, there's 2008, and the other steps are scheduled for fuck-knows-when.

Richard wrote on September 10, 2007 2:54 PM:

"eisenhower he aint."

He's as worthy of respect as Neidermeyer from "Animal House".

PurpleAvenger wrote on September 10, 2007 3:00 PM:

July 2008. Just in time for the real heat of the presidential campaign - so the Repubs can say, "See, we're bringing the troops home now!" What other possible reason could there be for such a date?

Jolly Ranchero wrote on September 10, 2007 3:20 PM:

Can we please get units on the x-axis? "Time"? Are you f'in kidding me? Months, days, years, decades, eons? WTF?

This graph wouldn't pass a 3rd grade science fair.

r€nato wrote on September 10, 2007 3:34 PM:

Jolly - try, 'forever and ever'. There's your time scale.

what use are their charts anyway? Anyone who's paid attention knows that six months from now they still will not have found the magical ponies, so they will come up with new timelines and new charts and new excuses to dump this mess onto the next president.

talk about kabuki theater.

JosephP wrote on September 10, 2007 3:35 PM:

I have been examining that graph closely. Mr. Ranchero is correct---the graph wouldn't pass grade school. However, there is some critical information in the graph (assuming that the Y-axis units are the number of soldiers in Iraq in tens of thousands).

The graph indicates that by July '08 we will be "down" to 140,000 troops in Iraq. After that, it will decline even more at undermined "decision points".

In other words, by the middle of next year we will be back to where we were nine months ago.

Josh wrote on September 10, 2007 4:47 PM:

I'd get fired if I turned in this chart.

Administration doesn't want to look weak so they handed this guy the report to read. This way they pull the troops because they know they have to.

Hasn't it already been established that we're literally running out of troops to send anyway and that if we didn't cut the staffing by... well I think it's pretty much the number that they announced today actually, then we would have a draft and all that nonsense that follows?

At this point I'm fairly certain that anyone that wants to be over there is already over there and the rest of us would be in proud possession of a Toronto apartment guide about the same time draft notices were printing out back in Kansas City or where ever they process junk like that.

It's probably the closest we'll get to a real live withdrawl and as crappy as it is, it's still an admition of guilt and/or failure. We know the republican MO. It should be obvious by now that this as good as it gets given the circumstances.

So stop voting for these fools.

Anonymous wrote on September 10, 2007 5:02 PM:

This schedule is perfectly consistent with the "surge" soldiers serving their 15 month tour and then leaving without being replaced. Most of them showed up in March-May of '07, so add 15 months (which is the current Army tour) and the obvious answer is roughly July '08 for a "surge conclusion". This probably doesn't represent a real choice to implement a drawdown, but rather a failure to detail forces to replace those scheduled to rotate home. Did anyone really think that the military was going to expend the resources to get those guys over there and then not extract the benefit of a full tour of duty?

Hedley Lamarr wrote on September 10, 2007 5:11 PM:

aWol's war-of-choice must not fall upon the next administration like the albatross it is to him.

TheraP wrote on September 10, 2007 5:17 PM:

It's because of reports and charts like this that some poor people got suckered into bad mortgages.

And right now the congress is being suckered into an extended mortgage with an adjustable rate - and a line of credit to boot. And it's all explained neatly in charts that seem to have some connection to certain realities, till the bubble bursts one day and it all comes crashing.

Can't these "leaders" see a con game when they meet one?

Howie Kurtznot wrote on September 10, 2007 10:39 PM:

Petraeus for Preznit! He'll be crushed!

Lord Balto wrote on September 11, 2007 6:49 AM:

I love that little "time" arrow on the chart. NO UNITS! They could be days or they could be millennia. Or eons....

zk0sm0 wrote on September 11, 2007 12:33 PM:

of course it will be summer of 2008 before the administration PRETENDS to bring any troops home. after they further over-extend the troops to 18-month tours, they won't have any choice but to rotate a few back home.

but late summer is also better than early spring for republican electoral politics. they'll get to say things are going so well that we've begun bringing troops home (never mind that as soon their time between deployments expires they'll be shipped right back).

of course by november the patience of the troops (who know better) will start running out faster than the republican slimeballs can play politics with them. expect to see more dissent among the troops and expect to see a mainstream 'news' media (gradually - in almost imperceptible increments) more receptive to the story.