Does Bush have a dilemma?

Keep the war going, and pretend to be a "wartime" president, while Americans soldiers keep dying everyday, for no good reason and with no exit plan. (Every wartime president has always been "re-elected" in US history).

Or, hand it over to the UN, whom the republicans have always despised and Bush ignored and invaded illegally anyway, via lies about WMD and pull the troops and bail out. (And then call it a success).

Which way do you think BushCo is leaning?

which the Freepers will... aplaud.

Sad is, the photos have ensured that we have lost the war

has the goods on the Oil-for-Food dealings in the UN...therefore, they are made Russert show that they have what is needed to twist arms and blackmail the UN members to have them do what they want and come out smelling like roses.

but he'll also try to keep the War President thing going by continuing to play on the Fear of imminent terrorist attacks.

republicans will point the finger at the UN and blame everything on them...

Do they have any shame?

who didn't even bother to change uniforms.

They're pretty much fucked no matter what they do at this point.

Unfortunately a ton of other people are fucked right along with them.

Now, once he realizes that these deaths could hurt his standings in the polls, then yes, that is a true crisis.

and he has to make it look close in order to get away with it, again.

Fucking fascist!

He chose not to run. He may not have won renomination, but if he did, he certainly may not have won the election.

1968 is the closest comparison we have.

Decided not to seek re-election.

Johnson or Nixon, perhaps a toss up, we'll never know...but even VP HHH made it seriously close...Johnson would probably of won...Nixon wouldn't of even entered the race, if Johnson stayed in. (And the republicans had no one else, hence Nixon).

Johnson quitting, opened the door for the republicans...Johnson never gave any support to Humphrey.

see below.

This counts, even semantically: you said that they were all re-elected; Johnson didn't want to have to drop out, and he wasn't re-elected.

(RFK)?

However, Johnson did indeed bow out and so "re-election" is NOT even a question here, cuz, we are dealing with facts, no?

See below.

You say that every wartime President was re-elected. Johnson wasn't re-elected. Truman wasn't re-elected. Your writing doesn't even imply that you're only talking about Presidents who make it to the general election, nor does it mention whether they attempt to get re-elected or not, much less at what point of their campaign they can drop without it being a defeat due to the war.

You ARE implying that sitting Presidents in wartime don't get sent packing by a dissatisfied public, when two prime examples flamed out just that way.

You're saying that every wartime President was re-elected. Was Truman re-elected in 1952? Was Johnson in '68? Kefauver didn't win the nomination, and neither did McCarthy; THESE FACTS WORK TO THE ADVANTAGE OF MY ARGUMENT, NOT YOURS: they weren't "first rank" competition, and the two Presidents saw that they were not only vulnerable, but vulnerable to back-benchers. These defeats (called "elections", incidentally) showed them that they were in real trouble BECAUSE of the relative weakness of the victors.

Sheesh.

First off, there are very few examples upon which to call: The Undeclared War with France was over by the time of the 1800 election, the War of 1812 didn't span an election, the Mexican War was a tidy enterprise of Imperial thievery engineered by a man who openly pronounced early in his term that he had no interest in a second term, and the war didn't span an election cycle either.

Yes, Lincoln did win the 1864 election, but it was a bit of a struggle, even though well after Vicksburg and Gettysburg had pretty much shown what the outcome would be. The Spanish-American War was a lickety-split bit of larceny, also not spanning an election cycle. Wilson ran for re-election in 1916 promising to keep us out of the two year-old World War 1, even though election day was a year and a half after the sinking of the Lusitania, so this doesn't fit the bill either; indeed, promising to keep us free from this ugly entanglement was key to re-election. FDR won a wartime re-election, but by that time, we'd already turned the tide in a very obvious way in both theatres.

Harry Truman was defeated by Estes Kefauver in the New Hampshire primary in 1952, thus causing "Give 'em Hell" Harry to abandon his bid for a second full term; the ongoing Korean War was a major issue, and this is a direct refutation to your contention. Gene McCarthy beat LBJ in the New Hampshire primary of 1968, specifically over the issue of Vietnam, and Johnson dropped out; this is huge: LBJ's 1964 election was one of the biggest blowouts in the history of Presidential elections. These last two are specifically the dynamic of which you speak.

So, sorry to bust your chops on this one, but it IS a big issue. Roosevelt had some competition in '44, but he'd saved this country, pulled us out of the depression and was simultaneously leading a booming economy and winning the biggest war in human history. Lincoln, likewise had some serious trouble even though the war was very much a foregone conclusion by that time too.

War sucks. Mercifully, given a little exposure to it even from a distance, most people agree on that point. Gallivanting across the globe to smite people who had nothing to do with our major problems and DOING IT BADLY will not sit well for long with people.

The "inevitability" and "momentum" are tools to keep us wringing our collective hands, and they have very little basis in reality.

As for the ending question, I think they're going to do what they always do: do exactly as they're still doing. We can't give that oil to anyone, so we have to stay and make it ours. Some things are complex, but that's not one of them

Conjecture, hypostasis, speculation and assumption.
Still, the facts remain...
Facts!

Here's your original statement: (Every wartime president has always been "re-elected" in US history).

There's no provision in your statement that they even had to run; your claim is that every President sitting during time of war has been re-elected. We're quibbling over semantics. What you were truly contending is that we don't change horses in the middle of the stream, right? The writing of your post more than just suggests this, and it's simply not true.

Johnson wanted a second full term and so did Truman; faced by a shocking defeat from within their own party, they both realized that it just wasn't worth the fight. They were attempting to get re-elected, even though it was just the beginning of the primary season. Regardless, your statement doesn't even give you the "out" of the incidents not counting because they chose not to run; your statement is simply that all have been re-elected.

Let's be serious here; I've copped to many a mistake here and elsewhere, it's just sorta neighborly. The only reason I'm persisting is the snottiness of the "facts" quip. You may have thought you were saying something else, but you weren't. Moreover, the core contention is simply incorrect.

Beyond all that, I'm just amazed at all of the doom saying and misinterpreting of history. These guys are no geniuses, they're vulnerable and they make plenty of mistakes. There's so much bemoaning of our tactical situation that it's just nuts.

Anybody want to join me in ending this silliness?

that gonna bury HIM.