Deb Riechmann at AP is an old buddy, and not among the flappable. I wonder how she handled this, from a transcript of her interview today with Vice President Dick Cheney:
But I don’t agree with those who say nothing good happened before the surge. I think if you go back and you look at what we were able to do in that period from ’03 when we entered Iraq until, say, the end of ’06, when we basically decided on the surge and we’ve got a lot done that had to be done, including — mentioned everything from taking down Saddam Hussein’s regime, capturing and bringing him to justice and his sons, those constitution-writing exercises, three national elections.
All of those things happened before ’06. Getting rid of Abu Musab al Zarqawi, who’s the head of al Qaeda in Iraq; we killed him in June of ’06. All of those things happened before the surge, and they were vital.
A fly. We’ve got a fly swatter over here. I’ve been trying to kill him before you came in.
Those were all important pieces of businesses to get done. Also, the question of creating and building and training Iraq — new Iraqi security forces.
*Apologies to Jimi Hendrix
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