Full Text of Bush's Saturday Address
On Friday, I was listening to Jim Lehrer Interview President Bush on NPR. Personally, I'm really surprised that Bush's handlers let him speak without a puppeteer. What's really interesting is if you listen to the interview and then read the address, you realize just how much difference a day makes.
Jim Lehrer Interview (Dec. 16, 2005)
PRESIDENT BUSH: I-- Jim, I know that people are anxious to know the details of operations, they-- people want me to comment about the veracity of the story. It's the policy of this government, just not going do it, and the reason why is is that because it would compromise our ability to protect the people.
National Address (Dec. 17, 2005)
PRESIDENT BUSH: The authorization I gave the National Security Agency after September the 11th helped address that problem in a way that is fully consistent with my constitutional responsibilities and authorities. The activities I have authorized make it more likely that killers like these 9/11 hijackers will be identified and located in time. And the activities conducted under this authorization have helped detect and prevent possible terrorist attacks in the United States and abroad.
Of course, the most infuriating thing in the interview is this part, regarding the casualty rate:
JIM LEHRER: The war has now been going on 2-1/2 years. This week in fact the one-thousandth day went by, and more than 2,100 Americans have died.
PRESIDENT BUSH: Yes, sir.
JIM LEHRER: When you made the decision to go to war, did you expect this kind of casualty rate?
PRESIDENT BUSH: First of all, I knew there would be casualties. I never tried to guess.
He never tried to guess? Don't they teach cost analysis at school anymore? Isn't part of miltary strategy determining the casualties and determining whether "the objective" is worth those casualties? What kind of commander-in-chief sends men off to war without knowing how long it's going to take, and what it's going to take to win? How can you possibly formulate any kind of strategy without knowing the cost and the losses?
JIM LEHRER: Did you ask General Franks or Secretary Rumsfeld, what's the risk here, what's the casualty possibility?
PRESIDENT BUSH: I think everybody understood the risks, Jim. I'll never forget making the decision in the Situation Room, and it affected me. I mean, it was-- I got up out of the chair and walked around the South Lawn there and I thought, you know, I knew the decision I had just made, a decision, by the way, that I had been wrestling with for months, was the right decision in my judgment, or obviously I wouldn't have made it, but also one that would have consequences for Americans and families and members of the soldiers who died.
We run a danger of trying to say the casualties are less than other wars or more than expected. It's just everybody matters, every person matters, and what really matters is having the strategy and the will to make sure any death is not-- is honored by achieving an objective.
If everybody matters, if every person matters, isn't it better to say "we've lost 2,100 people, let's not lose another 2,100 by staying here"? Does President Bush really understand that so far on this war of terror, we have lost over 5,000 people, and not saved a single person? This war has ruined lives -- so many of our soldiers come back wounded, missing limbs, injured, crippled. Our country has killed an estimated 30,000 Iraqis over the past two and a half years. We have spent close to half a trillion dollars, and for what? It's costing the American people five billion dollars a month. We have a population of 297 million people. That's almost 17 dollars a month for every citizen of the United States. Each Iraqi killed has cost us close to 17 million dollars. It takes the money of a million of us to kill just one of them. I don't know about you, but I can think of much better uses for 17 million dollars than to kill just one Iraqi soldier. Like, how about making America better for the people living in America?
