Common Sense with the Commander-in-Chief, Plus Input From the Front

As a perfect antidote to an exasperating exchange today with one of my most recklessly liberal friends about the upcoming election (in which we ended up speaking at, not with, each other), here's a calm, deliberate, judicious, informed, and articulate hour-long session with President Bush, provided by Michael Barone. It's the president along with leading conservative journalists, including some of my favorites Byron York, Mark Steyn, and Charles Krauthammer. It's such common sense. So break out your earphones and listen to this timely and vital update from the Commander-in-Chief himself. (And big thanks to Ms. Malkin who flagged this item as as soon as it broke.):

We're in this grand ideological struggle. It is a struggle between moderate people and a struggle between ideologues who are totalitarian and who kill to achieve an objective without conscience....

My biggest issue that I think about all the time is the next attack on America. Because I'm fully aware that there are people out there who would like nothing more than to have another spectacular moment by killing Americans....

We need to be on the offensive all the time....

Now it's an interesting world in which people are not willing to listen to the words of an enemy. But in this case we're able to listen to the enemy, find out what the enemy thinks, and publish their thoughts. The Commander-in-Chief must listen carefully and take their words extremely seriously. In other parts of the world and some [people] here -- I'm not casting aspersions, I'm just giving you a sense, I'm telling you what's on my mind -- I am in disbelief that people don't take it seriously as if they are some kind of incompetent and isolated people. They're plenty competent, they're plenty tough, and they're plenty ambitious....

Protecting this country is the number one issue....

It looks grim right now, because murder is the tool of some, revenge is the tool of others. In this different kind of war the propaganda of the enemy is brutal and effective, and it upsets Americans because we value life.  My responsibility is to speak as often as I can to the American people and explain the stakes and how we will succeed....

If we leave, they will follow us here. That's really different from other wars we've been in....

If we don't deal with it, the rest of the world won't deal with it. It's really important for the United States to stay in the lead....

I view this struggle as a struggle of Good vs. Evil, by the way. I don't think religious people murder. I think people are misusing religion to justify their murder. A lot of Americans understand it that way. Maybe it's not nuanced enough for some of the thinkers, and all that stuff. That's fine. But that's exactly what a lot of people like me think. My job is to make it clear to the American people the stakes and to spell them out as plainly as I can. A lot of people understand it.

Another thing that is really interesting about this particular part of the War on Terror and the overall War on Terror is that we've got a military that is full of decent, honorable, courageous people who strongly support what we're doing. Strongly. I find it really interesting that those most attuned with the stakes of the struggle are those who are right in the middle of the fight....

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And these excerpts are from the first portion of the recording.

Update (10/26): Roger Simon interviews Michael Barone for Pajamas Media. They get into the elections, blogging itself (Barone started his back in 2002), and even a mention of the recently completed interview with the president.

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That's the macro-perspective. For the micro, see James Taranto's "Best of the Web" for October 25 at WSJ Opinion Journal, from which I pulled the following nitty-gritty input from an Army sergeant who specializes in intelligence gathering and stationed near Baghdad [emphases added]:

If we continue on as is in Iraq, we will leave here (sooner or later) with a fractured state, a Rwanda-waiting-to-happen. "Stay the course" and refusing to admit that we're screwing things up is already killing a lot of people needlessly. Following through with such inane nonstrategy is going to be the death knell for hundreds of thousands of Sunnis.

We need to backtrack. We need to publicly admit we're backtracking. This is the opening battle of the ideological struggle of the 21st century. We cannot afford to lose it because of political inconveniences. Reassert direct administration, put 400,000 to 500,000 American troops on the ground, disband most of the current Iraqi police and retrain and reindoctrinate the Iraqi army until it becomes a military that's fighting for a nation, not simply some sect or faction. Reassure the Iraqi people that we're going to provide them security and then follow through. Disarm the nation: Sunnis, Shias, militia groups, everyone. Issue national ID cards to everyone and control the movement of the population....

The short of it is, the situation is salvageable, but not with "stay the course" and certainly not with cut and run. However, the commitment required to save it is something I doubt the American public is willing to swallow. I just don't see the current administration with the political capital remaining in order to properly motivate and convince the American public (or the West in general) of the necessity of these actions.

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And that's the thought I'd like to leave you with.

PS - Rick Moran's got a thing or two to say as well.