Q You talked about seeking consensus with Congress. Speaker Pelosi said today that on Iraq, the President has dug a hole so deep that he can't even see the light. She says it's a historic blunder. Do you have any reaction to that? And given that statement, how do you reach a consensus?
MS. PERINO: Well, I think one of the things that's happening up on Capitol Hill is there is a sound bite war going on. For Pelosi to say, "The President knows that because the troops are in harm's way that we won't cut off the resources, that's why he's moving so quickly to put them in harm's way" is poisonous, and it's certainly not in keeping with the bipartisan spirit and civility that the Democrats pledged and that we looked forward to. The President will again call for that in his State of the Union.
Speaker Pelosi was arguing, in essence, that the President is putting young men and women in harm's way for tactical political reasons, and she's questioning his motivations, rather than questioning his policies. The one thing you can say about President Bush is that he's not moving forward with this new plan because he thinks it is popular; he is doing it because he thinks it is right. He is sending troops to Iraq quickly because he wants to win. General Petraeus and many of the President's military advisors believe that we still can win and that securing Baghdad is the way to do that.
[...]
Q To say that this is "poisonous" -- didn't you just escalate it by calling it "poisonous," if there's a war of words going on? Is this not an escalation just now?
MS. PERINO: I think that questioning the President's motivations and saying that he is sending troops into harm's way for political reasons was the one that -- I think she was being provocative in that statement this morning. And I don't think that just because -- I think that we should be able to defend the President's policy and his decision and his beliefs without necessarily calling that an escalation.
Okay. Now isn't wanting to win because you believe you're 'right' a 'motivation'?
Pot. Kettle. Black.
And, as an added bonus:
To say that this is only the President's war makes a mockery of the notion that when we are a nation at war we should all hang together. The President really hopes that in this time of an epic struggle against radical Islam that when we are facing an enemy that is determined to hurt us in Iraq and to hurt us here at home, that we can come together and be constructive.
Here's some rebuttal from the past:
Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.
~George Washington
Patriotism means to stand by the country. It does not mean to stand by the president or any other public official...
~Theodore Roosevelt
It is the job of thinking people not to be on the side of the executioners.
~Albert Camus
We are the ones responsible to determine whether the war that our marines, soldiers and airmen are fighting in is worth the cause...
~Scott Ritter
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