The Skinny: The Speech Aftermath

(CBS)  The Skinny is Hillary Profita's take on the top news of the day and the best of the Internet.

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After about a week of being bandied about in the news cycle, President Bush's new Iraq strategy was officially unveiled to the public last night, an event that crowds all the front pages this morning. Previews of the speech (official and unofficial) made the headline of last night's speech essentially old news – that Bush plans to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq, a number that the Los Angeles Times places in its headline.

Also expected, after White House counsel Dan Bartlett's public previews of the speech earlier yesterday, was Bush's admission in the speech that "[w]here mistakes have been made, the responsibility lies with me," he said. Admission of such "mistakes" ends up as the headline in USA Today's front pager on the speech. The President also "acknowledged for the first time that he had not sent enough troops to provide security in Iraq last year," as the Washington Post put it.

A Non-Binding Reaction. For Now

After the shakeup in Congress and the release of the Iraq Study Group report garnered weeks of media attention, The New York Times notes that Bush's strategy rejects those "advocated by newly empowered Democrats, restive Republicans and the bipartisan Iraq Study Group, describing them as a formula for deepening disaster." Bush argued instead that "[t]o step back now would force a collapse of the Iraqi government."

As for the potential success of Bush's "controversial strategy" for Iraq, the Wall Street Journal writes that it "depends on the cooperation of an Iraqi government paralyzed by sectarian tensions and a Democratic Congress that appears increasingly eager to challenge the administration's handling of the war."

So far, however, Democrats' challenge to the White House is set to be in the form of nonbinding resolutions opposing the troop increase. "Their strategy involves persuading more Republicans to go on record opposing the White House plan, as a way of gauging the depths of opposition to the war plan," writes the Journal, adding that in the weeks ahead Democrats "may test … whether to use Congress's power of the purse to impede the troop increase."

The Post is more specific, writing that during "a closed-door meeting of the House Democratic Caucus" yesterday morning senior House Democrats said "that they will attempt to derail funding for President Bush's proposal to send an additional 21,500 troops to Iraq…"

House Appropriations Subcommittee Chair John Murtha (D-Pa.), is set to report to members today "on hearings and legislative language that could stop an escalation of troops," writes the Post.

Several papers note the potential explosiveness of such a confrontation between Bush and Congress.

The New York Times writes in a front page analysis that Bush "is not only inviting an epic clash with the Democrats who run Capitol Hill. He is ignoring the results of the November elections, rejecting the central thrust of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group and flouting the advice of some of his own generals, as well as Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki of Iraq."

The Outlook In Sunny Iraq

Three front page articles outline the outlook in Iraq itself. The Post reports that Bush's proposed troop increase is "likely to touch off a more dangerous phase of the war," one that "former military officials" said would include months of urban street fighting.

The White House's "insistence on confronting all insurgents and militias, both Sunni and Shiite," may result in the US military fighting with Moqtada al-Sadr's military. "Fighting it could resemble on a citywide scale the sharp combat that took place this week along central Baghdad's Haifa Street, in which U.S. jets and attack helicopters conducted airstrikes just north of the U.S. Embassy in the protected Green Zone."

In what might be the most disturbing story you read today, the Wall Street Journal meets a 5-year-old Ali Hussein in Baghdad whose favorite game, like most children, emulates the world around him.

Writes the Journal: "When he plays with friends, the boys divide themselves into two groups -- one Shiite and the other Sunni -- and shoot at each other with pellet guns, lurking behind cars and in roadside ditches. 'Kids always refuse to be Sunnis, but because they need to play, some of them have to pretend to be Sunnis,' said Mr. Hussein, who often watches his son's hours-long battles."

The LA Times looks into the US military's plan in Baghdad, which has changed focus from primarily training Iraqi soldiers to a primary mission of protecting the city's residents.

That has led to plans for "gated communities" in Baghdad, that is, "sealing off discrete areas and forcibly removing insurgents, then stationing American units in the neighborhood to keep the peace and working to create jobs for residents." It's a plan that has had "mixed success" in other wars and some critics doubt its effectiveness given the city's size and population of 6 million.

But one "Defense official" compared Baghdad's layout to that of Los Angeles. "You do it neighborhood by neighborhood. Think of L.A. Let's say we take West Hollywood and gate it off. Or Anaheim. Or central Los Angeles. You control that area first and work out from there."

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[bluestardad]

This escalation of Iraq combat has not been approved by Congress and the President does not have the right to escalate the war. It is time the Iraqi people took responsibility for their own country. The President%u2019s stated reasons for war with Iraq in the original mandate from congress does not apply and has been proven false on every point, at the cost of 3 American lives a day and two billion tax dollars a week. Congress must act to stop all funds for this war now and bring our troops home. November 7, 2006 was a mandate to stop the war in Iraq and the Culture of Corruption in Washington. What great things could American domestic programs do with two billion dollars a week we are spending in Iraq?
Billions of Dollars in Job Creation funds have been spent in Iraq and are now requested for Iraq. What elected official either in the House of Representatives or the Senate could with good conscience vote to send Billions of American Tax Dollars to create Jobs and rebuild infrastructure in Iraq while in America coast to coast infrastructure needs repair and the Midwest Rust Belt States have lost millions of Manufacturing Jobs because of unfair trade practices and the political decisions to send jobs to foreign countries? When will our elected officials turn their priorities to support the will of their electorate?

[long_rider]

IMPEACH the chimp, and put cheney in jail.