Bush Makes More Muddled Statements

From the Washington Post:

"My message to the enemy is don't count on us leaving before we succeed," Bush said in the Rose Garden of the White House. "Don't bet on American politics forcing my hand, because it's not going to happen."

"I hope there's not an expectation from people that all of a sudden there's going to be zero violence," Bush said. "In other words, that's just not going to be the case."

I still want to know what victory looks like for us in Iraq. The real reason we don't have a time table for withdrawl, is because we have no definition of victory. Bush says we're not leaving "before we succeed," but the Iraqi civil war is not objectively getting any better. There may be more trained government troops, but the bombings, beheadings and ethnic strife continues. There may be newly elected ministers but the oil pipelines are still down, the electricity is out and the economy is worse now than before the war. And most importantly, it does not look as if it will get better in the next year.

Bush has created a tautological argument for success. We won't leave until we succeed, but the moment we leave will define success.