Bush asks for patience with Iraq policy, Democrats say 'No'

AgapePress: In yesterday's State of the Union, President Bush discussed the economy, federal spending, health care, energy independence, immigration and education before broaching the topic, of the war in Iraq. The president implored Congress to allow him to continue engaging Islamo-facist terrorists -- and helping the governments that share America's interests -- on foreign rather than American soil. "The great question of our day is whether America will help men and women in the Middle East to build free societies and share in the rights of all humanity," Bush said. "And I say, for the sake of our own security ... we must."

"This is not the fight we entered in Iraq, but it is the fight we are in," the president continued. "Every one of us wishes that this war were over and won. Yet it would not be like us to leave our promises unkept, our friends abandoned, and our own security at risk. Ladies and gentlemen: On this day, at this hour, it is still within our power to shape the outcome of this battle," Bush added. "So let us find our resolve, and turn events toward victory." The president reiterated his plan to send an additional 21,000 U.S. troops to Iraq to finish what the U.S.-led coalition has started there. But Democrats rejected both the president's new plans and his assessment of the purpose of U.S. troops in the region.

"The president took us into this war recklessly," Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA), who gave his party's response, acccused. "We are now, as a nation, held hostage to the predictable and predicted disarray that has followed." Webb said Democrats are willing to wait for the president to take "the right kind of action" in Iraq, which he defined as "a policy that takes our soldiers off the streets of Iraq's cities and a formula that will in short order allow our combat forces to leave Iraq." Read More

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Tags: Iraq, President George Bush, State of Union, 2007