"Once more into the meatgrinder, dear friends..." (Pt. II)

Well, this last-ditch-effort speech is over. The President looked nervous and awkward, I don't know what they were thinking having him stand up in front of that bookcase instead of sitting behind the desk.

In addition, I don't know what freaked me more... the very specific saber-rattling toward Iran and Syria, his invoking Joe Lieberman (and him alone) as indicating congressional support for this, or the constant revisionism used to blur the origins of this war. My eyes rolled when he tried to pretend oil revenues were going to the Iraqis, not of course mentioning that it's U.S. companies that will control the drilling. Also annoying was him spinning this as if we're sending in fresh new troops... instead of just speeding up the redeployment of troops and/or delaying those inside Iraq from coming home.

MSNBC is discussing the President's vague admitting of 'mistakes' as something new, but he's made such vague admissions before. It means nothing; he doesn't see mistakes in policy and ideology, just bad things that were out of our control. Also, one of the closing lines of the speech-- "The author of liberty will guide us through these trying hours"-- was just so very, very bad. This administration is all rhetoric, and their rhetoric isn't even good.

Sen. Durbin's Democratic response could've been better. And so the mess continues...

[UPDATE: RJ Eskow has a very good blog post on the calculated political moves behind the President's speech. He's taken withdrawal off the table; at this point the Democrats have to fight just to maintain the status quo. I felt the same way watching it too. It's all politics, and so a war that never should've begun likely won't end until a President who never should've been elected is gone from office.

UPDATE #2: The Washington Post's Will Arkin ponders Bush's threats toward Iran and Syria.]