Moral Testing Ground

President Bush's policy in Iraq has been tragically irresponsible. The US went to war because the President said Iraq had weapons of mass destructions and ties to the attacks of Sept 11, 2001. Iraq had neither. Our government had no good plan after the fall of Saddam Hussein. With no plan, insurgency took hold and chaos has rained ever since. There does not look as if there is an end in sight. We have lost 2000 soldiers with 14,000 wounded. We need to change directions but the only way this can happen is if our leader put forward real solutions and a time table to bring the troops home. If our troops are removed it does not mean we are abandoning Iraq, we will still provide military training and advice as well as political and economic support as we do for lots of nations. If we stay in Iraq until a stable government and military are in place we will never leave. If the goal was to establish a stable government we should have had more boots on the ground a long time ago, but it's too late now, the public will not stand for more troops.
The global war against terrorism has become one big moral testing ground for the Unites States. The choice is not as simple as do we fight the terrorist thousands of miles from home now or fight them later on our own streets. Do not confuse morality with responsibility! Real responsibility means not just saying what you believe in is right but also working to make it happen in a timely manner. Only when we move beyond finger pointing and political rhetoric will we arrive at real solutions that can end this war.