Posted By:
MAF Blogger Danny
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Helen Thomas has written another scathing opinion dripping with contempt for General Petraeus, Ryan Crocker and of course, we can’t forget, the President.

Surprisingly even Democratic would-be presidents Obama and Hillary could not escape her livid criticism.

In their disappointing comments, the Democratic rivals were as cautious as Petraeus.
Clinton said “it’s time to begin an orderly withdrawal of our troops.”
Obama told Petraeus that while he wants U.S. troops out of Iraq, he “would not initiate a precipitous withdrawal.”

Watching the testimony myself, and looking at the comments of liberal columnists, I cannot believe the complete willingness to ignore the situation. Liberals continue to stump from their imagined moral high-horse of ‘we should never have gone in the first place’ and draw the (il)logical conclusion of ‘lets pull-out and withdraw immediately’

Thomas pointed to the testimony of a dissident-general – oh wait, he was fired because he couldn’t do his job.

Odom testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week and urged an immediate withdrawal from Iraq. He claimed the troop surge (escalation) has prolonged instability in Iraq and that the only “sensible strategy” is “rapid withdrawal.”
In a separate speech last week, the outspoken general said, “We are certainly to blame for the chaos in Iraq” but “we do not have the physical means to prevent it.”

I had never heard of this remark before, but now that Thomas has brought it up, I can’t believe this guy ever made the rank of 3-star general! I mean just take ONE good look at any of the charts that Petraues had as part of his testimony and you can easily see that…the troop surge caused a drop in violence.

Charts from Patreus Testimony HERE

Not only do we HAVE the physical means to prevent this ‘chaos’ but Petraeus has DEMONSTRATED the ability to do so! No one can be given more credit than Petraeus for the success in Iraq, and it is he who is responsible today, for the fact that many Iraqis still live safely and feely in Iraq who otherwise WOULD HAVE been murdered or blown up in IED attacks in this past year – if not for the Surge.

When Hugh Hewitt Interviewed Odom over a year ago, it was clear from this excerpt that Odom does not think our forces being present kept anyone in Iraq any safer.

HH: But if we precipitously withdraw, do you expect genocide?
WO: I would call some of the things…I mean, you know, that’s a definitional term.
HH: Do the numbers…
WO: I mean, it depends on what you define as genocide.
HH: Do the numbers matter at all to your analysis? If someone came to you and said 100,000 people will die…
WO: Yes, they matter, and what I’m telling you is that we can’t affect, we cannot improve the numbers of survivors by staying longer.

Well I think its been a year since this statement…and we have stayed longer…and if you just looked at the charts then it’s obvious we HAVE improved numbers of survivors…by staying longer.

General Petraeus is the only person who had demonstrated an ability to make decisions that cause less chaos, less death and increased security…so who’s do you think is the more credentialed opinion?

Helen Thomas is just so funny, in another part of her opinion, she talked about Lyndon Johnson having the cajones to say no to sending more 240,000 troops to Vietnam in 1968. Well what a GREAT decision that was…why just look at what happened as a result.

Even a college student has a better understanding of Vietnam than Thomas, who probably only remembers the LSD-induced love-ins that did SOOOO much to accomplish peace...pat yourselves on the backs hippies.

Thomas wants President Bush to respond like LBJ despite the fact that all the evidence points to another Vietnam-like massacre occurring in the absence of US Military-provided security. Millions died in the violence that followed and if we pull out of Iraq, the same will happen here.

It is clear from this liberal’s interpretation of Petraeus’s expert testimony...no amount of evidence can sway the liberal mind.