Must Read IMHO

Putting the invasions of Afganistan and Iraq on a credit card has always made sense to Bush because that's the only way he ever pays in private life. But, he also had the cash to pay the bills when due. Now he doesn't. That's to be left to future generations of Americans.

This a rather long snippet of an excellent article. It addresses issues ignored by most people and all of the Bush gang.

Believe it or not, winning the war in Iraq was never the Bush administration’s highest priority. Saving its tax cuts was more important. That was once spoken of as a moral problem. Now, it’s a practical barrier to a successful outcome.

Until recently, President Bush’s refusal to scale back any of his tax cuts was debated around the question of shared sacrifice: How could we ask so much from a courageous group of Americans fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan but not ask even the wealthiest of their fellow citizens to part with a few extra dollars to support an endeavor supposedly central to our nation’s security? On the contrary, even after we committed to war in Iraq, the administration pushed for yet more tax cuts in dividends and capital gains.

Now we know that the decision to put the war on a credit card is not simply a moral question. The administration’s failure to acknowledge the real costs of the war—and to pay them—has put it in a corner.

The president’s options in Iraq are severely constrained because our military is too small for the foreign policy he is pursuing. Sending more troops to Iraq would place even more excruciating burdens on members of our armed forces and their families. And the brass fears that an extended new commitment could, quite simply, break the Army.

Yet instead of building up our military for a long engagement and levying the taxes to pay for such an enterprise, the administration kept issuing merry reports of progress in Iraq. Right through Election Day this year, the president continued to condemn anyone who dared suggest that maybe, just maybe, we should raise taxes to pay for this war.

I think it would be a mistake to send more troops to Iraq. But for the sake of argument, let’s take seriously the idea that doing so might help, as Sen. John McCain and other staunch advocates of the war insist. By not matching the military’s size to what we are asking it to do, we have hugely raised the costs, including the human costs, of such a policy.

(read more)

Cross posted at Brilliant at Breakfast