USATODAY.com: Iraq - Americans deserve candor, not more hopeful ‘updates'

USATODAY.comIraq - Americans deserve candor, not more hopeful ‘updates'

Public support for the war in Iraq is slipping. Almost six in 10 Americans, in a Gallup poll this month, want some or all troops to come home. For the first time, a bipartisan group of congressmen is beginning to press for an exit deadline.

The White House response? A series of speeches starting this week intended, according to spokesman Scott McClellan, as an “update” for the American people. But far more is needed than another hopeful scenario, or a set of idealistic goals without a hard assessment of the realities on the ground and what has brought the USA to this point. That sort of assessment has been missing from the Bush administration, which still seems in denial that its Iraq adventure has strayed so far from the original plan.

Instead of candor, the administration has supplied a stream of shifting explanations about the reasons for the Iraq war, realities on the ground, expected costs, duration and outcome.
Start with the primary reason President Bush cited for the war: that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction that threatened the USA. No such weapons were found. Nor was any credible connection to al-Qaeda. The administration then switched to the argument that its chief aims were to remove a dictator and bring democracy to the region.

Or the low-balling on costs. Former Deputy Defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz, an architect of the Iraq strategy, early on estimated a “range from $10 billion to $100 billion.” The war tab so far tops $200 billion.