[Vision2020] Murtha's Iraq Plan Is Wrong And Right

[Tom Hansen]

>From Bob Schieffer's commentary at the end of today's (February 18, 2007)
"Face the Nation" -

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Murtha's Iraq Plan Is Wrong And Right
By Bob Schieffer

Pennsylvania's Democratic Congressman John Murtha has a clever plan to block
the President from sending more troops to Iraq. 

He's proposing a law that bars the President from sending troops in Iraq
back to the war zone until they have spent one year being retrained at their
home base. It forbids troops from being kept in Iraq longer than the one
year tour they were promised and prohibits any troops from going to the war
zone until they are fully trained and have the proper equipment. 

That is no way to stop a war. 

If Congress wants to stop the troops from going to Iraq it should just cut
off the money to send them there. 

But here's the other part: Everything that Murtha proposes should be done -
should have been done - a long time ago. Not for Murtha's reasons but
because it is right and the troops deserve it. 

Too many times the government has broken its word to the troops - held them
in the army beyond their enlistments; kept them in the combat zone longer
than they were told they would be there; cut short their time between combat
assignments; and, worst of all, sent some into combat without proper
training or equipment. 

We owe it to our troops to keep the promises we have made to them and, at
the very least, to insure they are never sent into battle without the proper
training and equipment. 

That should have been a given, regardless of whether we believe this war is
right or wrong.

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Seeya round town, Moscow.

Tom Hansen
Moscow, Idaho

"Patriotism is not a short and frenzied outburst of emotion but the tranquil
and steady dedication of a lifetime." 

--Adlai E. Stevenson, Jr.