Where do we go from here?

I'll admit right up front that I'm a liberal democrat. I've also been against our folly in Iraq since the beginning. I've written editors, bloggers and my circle of friends and I haven't been shy in sharing my views. I'm also not a big fan of this President.

Given my views and the path this war has taken, it would be easy to just say "I told you so" and to demand that we pull out of Iraq. It would also be easy to ask that we impeach this President.

But I'll do neither. We are where we are and "I told you so's" won't do anyone any good.

I'm also not a big believer in solving problems with military muscle. But I'm a realist. Sometimes the only options you have are bad and worse.

Iraq is one of those problems. We've created a hell of a mess in Iraq. And its a bi-partisan mess at that. While I supported President Clinton, the eight years of "no-fly-zones" and almost daily bombings has contributed to the mess we're in. So I don't lay the entire blame at Bush's feet (just most of it).

Its pretty clear that we're in the middle of a civil war. Not only that, its a war between religious factions. So its highly unlikely that one side will ever surrender. So all of the military muscle in the world won't 'fix" Iraq.

The best we can hope to do at this point is to try and limit the collateral damage. The current shift in strategy in Iraq changes our mission from defeating the insurgents (which will never happen) to protecting the civilian population. I cannot dismiss this change out of hand. Its currently the right thing to do and pretty much our only course.

In my opinion, it would be immoral to leave the civilian population to the mercy of these fanatical religious groups. We broke Iraq and we have some moral obligation, at the very least, to fix it.

As for Bush. I don't want him impeached. I want him jailed, and in Gitmo if possible.