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Mr. President:
We seem to have a difference of opinion concerning your role in our government. You say you are "The Decider." I respectfully disagree. That role belongs to the American people. Your role is to listen AND HEAR the voice of the American people, to seek to discern the will of the majority, and to attempt to accommodate that will while preserving the rights of all Americans.
In your defense, I don't envy your job. No one can blame you for tsunamis, 9-11, or hurricanes -- but your pursuit of Saddam wasted all of our international goodwill and smacks of personal vendetta. Saddam's fall couldn't have happened to a more deserving person, and we could debate the faulty intelligence issue all day, but the bottom line is you let your own feelings cloud your judgment. I'm sure you're aware of the old saying: "Figgers don't lie, only liars figger." Your clouded judgment got us in the mess in Iraq, and you relied on faulty "facts" to justify your actions. Now you are ignoring the voice of the American people. Americans aren't LOSING patience, we have LOST patience. This Vietnam-esque approach needs to stop NOW.
Admitting mea maxima culpa and then continuing failed policies is a sure way to finish destroying your legacy. Look at LBJ. He did a lot of good things during his Administration, and the Vietnam War wasn't even his making, yet it will forever be the albatross around the neck of his legacy.
You seem to be justifying your current approach with elephant repellant. You cannot logically conclude with certainty that your policy works because we haven't seen any elephants.
I am not a dove, but I have begun to believe that Iraq is not worth one more American life. Believing that the Middle East political environment will change radically for any extended period smacks of Carter
naiveté. It hasn't changed for centuries.
The lives of too many of America's children have now been expended on Iraq. It is time to listen to America and bring them home.
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