Answer to Bush's Speech: It's our Foreign Policy, Stupid

What do you do when your Administration is losing in the second half? You talk "terror."

And what an opportunity for the President on Veterans Day. It was also the day after my nephew's 22nd birthday. Marine Lance Cpl. Chase Comley wasn’t celebrating on Thursday though. He’s one of "those lost in our current struggle." He died in Iraq on August 6, 2005. Maybe, that’s why I didn’t push "mute" as I usually do when Bush stumbles through a speech. I wanted to see how he’d honor my loved one. I was hoping the President might finally admit the big mistake, apologize to the country and say, "I'm gonna bring 'em home." Stupid me.

Instead, Mr. Bush, with awestruck and applauding-on-cue supporters, sitting behind him, tried to hit a three-pointer and restore some credibility to his Office. Stupid him.

"Terrorists are evil but not insane," G.W. said.

"You’re both," I yelled at the screen.

"The enemy seeks to end dissent in every form," Bush orated.

"Seems this Administration has painted anyone who dissents from its position a traitor to Democracy," I answered.

But when he said, "Radicals try to exploit young men and women," I lost it.

"We're the exploiters, you miserable excuse for a human." I shouted at him. "We've exploited people all over the globe. Why, that's what you were doing in Latin American last week. Remember? But back to those young Arabs who are learning to hate us in their mosques--no, no, no. Let's talk, instead, about how you’ve manipulated our young with your nationalistic rhetoric about evil doers, WMDs, Biblical references, like a coach before the big game in a huddle of prayer and then a whoop to win. And all those military recruiters out there, trying to make their quotas before the monthly buzzer sounds, are just more of your equipment to maneuver young men and women with promises of support when they return. If they return."

Then, when Bush said something about a "strategy of replacing resentment with hope," I wanted to gag.