Responding to Bruce (Part 1)

Bruce:

Your political post has given me quite a large bone on which to gnaw. I copied it into a text file, and re-read it, making notes as I did. I have distilled the following topics for further discussion from it:

1) Securing the borders
2) Iraq as GWOT focus
3) What constitutes victory in the GWOT
4) What we have done to prevent domestic terrorism since 9/11
5) Global reach of terrorism/Iraq success not determinative of GWOT success
6) Domestic politicians and view of Iraq
7) Israel
8) Bush supporters/detractors - would they stay where they are if we had secured borders rather than attacked Iraq?
9) Bush as President
10) Murtha/consulting with opposition/too many yes men
11) Limits of military capability
12) Iran - are we creating a monster by our actions in Iraq?
13) Exit strategy/prolonged presence in Iraq

It will take quite a while to get through all of it, but I think the point of a blog is to have an open conversation. So as time goes on, I hope that we can explore these topics in earnest.