Losman-McGahee-Evans

You are correct. It would not be a very Christian thing to do so I believe you misunderstood my words. I was merely pointing out that you demeaning the loss of my son by simply labeling it a "sacrifice" and I pointed out things that could rightly be labeled that while explaining how insenstive it was to label my son's death as such. As far as your other points -- A) That is your summation but it directly contradicts my words. I believe that is shows how far we as a nation have lowered ourselves that we are even entertaining the idea. B) If approved it must be approved by the President who is the most partisan President our naiton has ever had even among us Republicans. C) No one has ever argued that and again it's your summation and not my words. If you are going to insult me and dishonor the death of son at least have the decency to not misrepresent my words to do so.

As I said I'm a true Christian who actually believes in what the bible says. It is that faith that gives me that strength. It also provieds me the clarity to relaize exactly why he died and it wasn't because "they hate our freedom". It is becuase in the eyes of the Iraqi people and of all the neighboring populations, the U.S. mission in Iraq lacks legitimacy and credibility. My belief is that only by dramatically recasting the American role in the region can such perceptions begin to be changed. Until then, U.S. military operations in Iraq will continue to inspire local resistance, radicalize neighboring populations, and discourage international cooperation.

So the answer is too make this worse?

As a Republican my beliefs are based in less government and opposing huge pork barrel spending by Democrats. This is what the party opposed and what I identify with to this day. The current form of ideology steering my party is supporting the obscence, wasteful use of taxpayer dollars (SS reform - 2 trillion at least, Medicare reform - 8.1 trillion, making tax cuts permanent that benefit only the wealthy - 11 trillion) and pork barrel spending is out of control. We as a party have indeed lost this mantle to the Democrats according to all 6 exit polls from the most recent election. They now (According to the American voters) are the party of fiscal responsibility and the party that they most trust in the handling of the economy. To their credit they balanced the budget through the deficit reduction act of 93 and we failed to get onboard with pay-as-you-go rules and we are now getting hit over the head with it. The worst thing that could happen is SS reform being passed as our achievement. Why? Because it's an argument based upon a lie and when you must lie to the American people in order to gain support for something odds are you're argument is fatally flawed. If this happens we as a party will get hit hard when the true cost of destroying SS is realized. Same goes for the medicare reform that takes effect in 2006. Like I said I'm a REAL Republican, not a Bush-Republican.

Actually I'm arguing both in this case. As far as an individualistis perspecitve it wasn't successful. From a societal perspective it is also not a success. In fact is has made it worse. As far as hunting down and murdering people it may have been successful in El Salvador but it's at least debatable that it would be successful in a muslim country such as Iraq since it is no longer a secular nation and is well on its way to becoming a Shi'ite theocracy. I agree that the reason we are heading toward not winning in Iraq is indeed at a far more basic level than the obviously depserate tactics now being considered. But not doing this earlier is not the reason why we are facing defeat. The beginning of wisdom is to recognize that the ongoing war in Iraq is not one that the United States can win. It is a result of its initial miscalculations, misdirected planning, and inadequate preparation, Bush has lost the Iraqi people's confidence and consent, and it is unlikely to win them back. Every day that Americans shell Iraqi cities they lose further ground on the central front of Iraqi opinion. The surest way to send this into an irreversible downward spiral is to sanction death squads and become no better than the regime we liberated them from.

It's been close to two months now so it is still rather tough for us so thank you for your words.

So become what we despise most? So create a larger version of Lebannon on the border of Saudi Arabia therby destabilizing the entire region? That is an apples and oranges comparsion and one that is intellectually dishonest. As a Republican who supported Reagan's effort in Central America what was effective there in a political struggle will never be effective in a religious revolution being waged to dispel an occupying imperial power.

Unfortunately that's pure assumption on your part. If by "the people of Columbia" you include those who lost family members and friends in the effort to get Escobar who are living in a country that is more vioent than it was at that time I'd be willing to wager a billion dollars that they do not. If by "the people of Columbia" you mean those that have no direct connection to anyone who died in that effort then you are correct. That's why people on this board argue in support of the direction, execution and prosecution of this war (Notice I did not say "support of the war") much too easily.

Great Blue North Draft Report.

Travis is exactly the back they need and we could get an starter at any of our need positions such as CB, TE, or OL. Heck we could even go DT as insurance against Pat Williams leaving.

I don't read things from instapundit. It's spin, not journalism. Newsweek isn't Drudge, etc. It's an actual respected news source.

The mere fact it is being considered shows the failure of the mission in Iraq under their direction. As far as the point made about Escobar it's moot since we are still losing the drug war even after his death. So in reality hundreds died in vain.

As a real Republican the current Democratic party is closer to Reagan-era Republican Party than this version of it. While you can argue that all you'd llike I'd prefer you disprove it. Also, I think the statement was made in comparison to not an absolute statement. Like I said I am loud and proud Republican but the current version is immoral from top to bottom. Lie after lie I sit here and count the days until this term is over. My only hope is that his incomptence on both domestic and foriegn policy isn't too much to come back from as a party.

Thank you sincerely.

My son's "sacrifices"? He didn't sacrifice, he died. What his widow is goign through with our grandson is a sacrifice. What our family is going through is a sacrifice. Unfortunately I am unable to not be a Christian as easy as it may be for you to not be one so it's difficult for me to endorse the "kill everybody" line of thinking. Winning wars has and always will be about winning hearts and minds. My son had said many times that due to catastrophic failures of the DOD (Rumsfeld is the most hated man in the military nad has been for some time) we had lost the Iraqi people.

When we leave Iraq we will have installed a religious theocracy and created a much more powerful enemy than Saddam ever was to us. We will have created an even angrier version of Iran because we never killed over 100,000 Iranian civilians. And we will have killed hundreds if not thousands of Americans to create an enemy.

Read the bible much? As a Republican who actually believes the teachings of the bible (Not just uses it as a political tool) we must help this nation, period. We are the lone super power left and this is the role we must play like it or not. If we were not bogged down in Iraq and suffering under these massive deficits and a stagnant economy this wouldn't be that much of a burden. Even so we must help as much as we possibly can.

I think there are going to be two TE's in this draft that could be stars : Heath Miller (6-5 255) from Virginia and Alex Smith (6-4 255) from Stanford. No way Campbell is the same player after his injury and it's even less likely he will be ready to start the year. Of course I would take a talented big,physical CB over either of these players but they would have to drop and considering everyone wants one of them I just don't see that happening.

First and foremost I am a Christian. If one can argue in favor of this they are not. If they don't agree I'll pass on that debate and let you ask your own pastor and see what he or she tells you. I guess we should have known this was coming since we put the same person who organized and directed death squads in Central America (The same ones that killed the three Catholic nuns). "What to do about the deepening quagmire of Iraq? The Pentagon's latest approach is being called "the Salvador option"--and the fact that it is being discussed at all is a measure of just how worried Donald Rumsfeld really is. "What everyone agrees is that we can't just go on as we are," one senior military officer told NEWSWEEK. "We have to find a way to take the offensive against the insurgents. Right now, we are playing defense. And we are losing." Last November's operation in Fallujah, most analysts agree, succeeded less in breaking "the back" of the insurgency--as Marine Gen. John Sattler optimistically declared at the time--than in spreading it out." It goes on to say -- "Now, NEWSWEEK has learned, the Pentagon is intensively debating an option that dates back to a still-secret strategy in the Reagan administration's battle against the leftist guerrilla insurgency in El Salvador in the early 1980s. Then, faced with a losing war against Salvadoran rebels, the U.S. government funded or supported "nationalist" forces that allegedly included so-called death squads directed to hunt down and kill rebel leaders and sympathizers. Eventually the insurgency was quelled, and many U.S. conservatives consider the policy to have been a success--despite the deaths of innocent civilians and the subsequent Iran-Contra arms-for-hostages scandal. (Among the current administration officials who dealt with Central America back then is John Negroponte, who is today the U.S. ambassador to Iraq. Under Reagan, he was ambassador to Honduras.) Following that model, one Pentagon proposal would send Special Forces teams to advise, support and possibly train Iraqi squads, most likely hand-picked Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and Shiite militiamen, to target Sunni insurgents and their sympathizers, even across the border into Syria, according to military insiders familiar with the discussions. It remains unclear, however, whether this would be a policy of assassination or so-called "snatch" operations, in which the targets are sent to secret facilities for interrogation. The current thinking is that while U.S. Special Forces would lead operations in, say, Syria, activities inside Iraq itself would be carried out by Iraqi paramilitaries, officials tell NEWSWEEK. " My son died in Iraq in November and he had told me that things there were detrioriating so rapidly that he and his unit had considered the war all but lost. I guess this is a sign that things really are getting desperate over there if has to come to this. This President is destroying everytihng Reagan, his father and all the came before him accomplished for my party. What a sad day this that we must become what we despise, what we ourselves are fighitng -- murderers. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6802629/site/newsweek/

I'm a lifelong Republican but I'm also honest. Just to keep up with the number of new entries into the workforce each month we must create 150,000 jobs. In reality (Not spin) we only created 7,000 jobs this month which is abissmal and something that Democrats will be beating us over the head with. This was the first election in my lifetime I was unable to vote for President because of the directionh this country is heading in. Have you seen what is happening to the dollar? Every investor I know is saying we are in for a "hard landing" whatever that is and these are fellow die-hard Republicans. They all believe we are heading toward a huge financial crisis and there won't be any way to push the blame onto anyone but ourselves. This may be an unpopular opinion but George W. Bush will go down in history as the person who destroyed the Republican Party, mark my words. No will ever trust us to run this country again if this economy begins to collapse under the weight of these deficits. Same goes for SS "reform". If the Democrats had half a brain they let Bush run through his plan without their support and once it fails and with it goes our economy they will beat us over the head with it for a couple of generations. Don't take my word for it, ask Newt Gingrich. He's completely against it for the same reason.

There is simply no way we will find a C or G at our pick that will make the immediate impact that Chris Villareal has. To me the impact he has made on this team is that he has started and played at high level from the day he got here. With Eric Moulds restructuring there must be money spent on another OL who can step in from day one and play at the level needed for this team to go to the playoffs (Let's hope Drew follows Eric's example.). My hope is that we will get a late 2nd rounder for Travis Henry and a mid-2nd for Jonas Jennings if we tag him as I expect we will. While I like Jennings he is going to price himself out of Buffalo and he's just not durable enough to make a long-term and Pace-type investment. That opens a hole at LT that I believe must be filled with a 1st round LT or FA, not a 2nd round project. My vote goes to picking up two FA OL, LT and LG. If we have to draft these players I feel we will be taking a step backward and with a new QB this could make the transition a painfull one. If it's my call I trade our 2nd and next year's 1st to get into the 1st round of this draft and grab the best available TE which is what this offense will desperately need with a rebuilt OL and a new QB. Then I'd use our two remaining 2nd rounders (1 for Travis and the other for Jonas) on a CB, OC, FS, or OG. Not a chance I'd use it on a K. I would use a 3rd on a K though. Just my opinion....

If we are able to acquire an additional 2nd rounder i would definitely do that. otherwise no chance.

My dream of course would be that we tag Jennings and get someone to give us a late first for him but honestly I'd take a 2nd for an oft-injured OT. Same for Travis but I'm so over him I'd take a 3rd (Which is more realistic). In my opinion, I would package both 2nd's or a 2nd and next year's first to get into the first round.

We certainly have the team for it with JP at QB.

I lean that way as well since Vincent seems to be breaking down and I like big, fast CBs like Clements over small guys like McGee.