Bush uses more Fuzzy Math - How do we get out of Iraq?

In a speech today, Bush estimated that only 30,000 Iraqis have died since we invaded Iraq. "I would say 30,000 more or less have died as a result of the initial incursion and the ongoing violence against Iraqis," the president said. "We've lost about 2,140 of our own troops in Iraq."

This must be more of Bush's fuzzy math, because he "misunderestimated" the fatalities by about 70,000. The study, conducted by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, estimated that 100,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed since the US invaded Iraq. "The researchers called their estimate conservative because they excluded deaths in Fallujah."

Also interesting were the results of a poll or Iraqi citizens that found "More than two-thirds of those surveyed oppose the presence of troops from the United States and its coalition partners and less than half, 44 percent, say their country is better off now than it was before the war, according to an ABC News poll conducted with Time magazine and other media partners."

All of this has had me thinking recently on how exactly we can get out of Iraq without making the situation worse there. Everyone seems to offer criticism and want us to pull out right away, but how do we feasibly leave this mess we created?

In considering the current realities in Iraq, I keep hearkening back to the lessons we learned from World War II and the Marshall Plan. Now that was a plan to "win the peace." Not only did it rebuild Germany and Japan, but helped shape them into the economic powerhouses they are today. One of the key elements was that it put the German people to work, rebuilding Germany. Iraq has a mind-boggling unemployment rate estimatedbetween 27 percent and 40 percent. By comparison, the U.S. unemployment rate during the Great Depression peaked at around 25 percent. And what is the only job we seem to be offering them? Police officers or military personnel? One of the most dangerous positions around.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out people who don't have a job and means to support their family are not the happiest people around. You can look at the statistics of any city in the US and the areas with the highest unemployment are the areas with the highest crime rates. So how do we curve the violence and improve the image of the US? Give the Iraq people jobs - not just soldiers or policemen. We need to stop outsourcing the rebuilding of Iraq to Haliburton and other American companies that are making millions off of American taxpayers, and give the Iraq people a chance to rebuild their own country.

Until Iraq has a rebuilt economic base and a lower unemployment rate, the violence will continue and the US will be stuck there with continuing casualties. I think we should take a look back at what FDR once said "Take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly, and try another. But by all means, try something. "
"True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made." -FDR

Please, feel free to leave your own thoughts on improving the situation in Iraq. There certainly haven't been any plans coming out of the government, perhaps it is time for "we the people" to lead.

posted by Sarai @ 2:39 PM