President Bush will unveil his new approach to the 46-month-old Iraq war on Wednesday at 9 p.m., the White House announced today.
"This is the president's proposal for moving forward in a way that he believes is going to be conducive to producing results," White House spokesman Tony Snow said this afternoon.
Bush is widely expected to announce a boost in U.S. military forces in Iraq by as many as 20,000 troops, a jobs program to put Iraqis back to work and political benchmarks that the U.S. expects Iraqi leaders to meet in forming a national reconciliation government. Snow repeatedly declined at his daily news briefing to respond to questions about specifics in Bush's speech, which, he said, is still being written.
"All I can tell you," Snow said, "is that the president is going to be talking about a way forward that can help address the concerns about sectarian violence, developments within the country, the need for economic growth, political reconciliation, national security, Iraqi responsibility."
Snow said Bush's new war plan will reflect consultations that administration officials have had with members of Congress, U.S. military officials, the Iraqi government, foreign heads of state and scholars.
"There's been a lot of time and effort put into trying to figure out: How do you try to set the conditions that are going to enable you to move forward so that you have an Iraq that can stand up on its own?" Snow said.
Snow suggested that Bush continues to believe the war is winnable.
"I think millions of Americans believe that this war is winnable," Snow said.
I was expecting President Bush to announce his proposed troop increase during the State of the Union address, but I guess that Bush needs to make a separate address--especially if he wants to expand upon his "sacrifice" PR-theme. What is even more ironic is how the Bush White House still spins this fantasy view that the American public still believes that the Iraq war is winnable. I have a December 11, 2006 CBS News poll reporting that 75 percent of the American public disapproves the way President Bush is handling the war in Iraq. According to this December 11, 2006 CBS News poll:
Opposition to the war is now taking on historic proportions, with 62 percent saying it was "a mistake" to send U.S. troops to Iraq — slightly more than told a Gallup Poll in 1973 that it was a mistake to send U.S. forces to Vietnam.
Americans generally agree with the assessment of the Iraq Study Group, which called the situation in Iraq "grave and deteriorating." But fewer than half — 46 percent — think Mr. Bush will seriously consider the bipartisan panel's recommendations; 43 percent think he will not.
Seventy-one percent say the war is going badly, including 39 percent who believe the war is going very badly. Just 25 percent say it's going well. The negative assessment of the war was shared by a majority of Republicans, Democrats and Independents.
Half of all Americans believe the situation in Iraq is getting worse, while fewer than one in 10 think it's getting better.
Only 15 percent of Americans — the lowest number ever — say the U.S. is currently winning the war. And for the first time, a majority (53 percent) believes it's not likely that the U.S. will ultimately succeed.
Sixty percent think that Iraq will never become a stable democracy — the highest number ever — while 85 percent now characterize the situation there as a civil war.
Then again, if you think about it from a different perspective, White House press secretary Tony Snow is correct in his statement that "millions of Americans believe that this war is winnable." The current population in the United States is just over 300 million people. Multiply 300 million by 15 percent of the Americans who believe the U.S. is winning the war in Iraq, and you get an incredible 45 million people who actually believe that the U.S. is winning in Iraq. Of course, Snow fails to take into account the CBS poll results showing that 18 percent of Americans (Or 54 million Americans) believe that the Iraqi resistance is winning the war, and that 63 percent of Americans (Or 189 million Americans) believe that neither side is winning the war in Iraq.
Then again, when does the Bush administration even bother reading the polls?
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