The War on Terror is dead

Excellent, depressing article from RealClearPolitics. I'd like to see what theory conservatives settle on for why such a result came about. The leading candidates right now are "our military is stretched thin" and "the Democrats are hurting the effort." I'm not impressed by either of these arguments. After all, the military is not substantially different from right after the 9/11 attacks. If anything, we're spending a lot more money, especially in Iraq. So what changed?

Also, I can't see how the Democrats' opposition prevented Bush from carrying out his promise. First of all, most Democrats were on board even for the Iraq invasion. Bush had a window of opportunity to expand the war to the rest of the terrorist sponsoring states. Second, he did win the last election. It may indeed be too late now, but that doesn't mean he didn't have the political opportunity to begin with.

What are some other theories? Hmm. Maybe Bush realized that a regional war in the Mideast would skyrocket oil prices enough to crush the American economy. But we have enough in SPR to last us more than a year. Is that not enough time to destroy the regimes of Iran, Syria, and Saudi Arabia, and secure the oilfields?

I have no idea. I'm speculating out of my ass. I just don't see the conservatives credibly addressing this issue. And I don't think they will, at least until the Supreme Court vacancies can be filled. After that, Bush is expendable, and the "cleansing" can begin. I suspect we'll see plenty of Bush-bashing from conservatives as he's about to leave office, just as there was an unbelievable amount of Clinton-bashing from liberals as he left office. Politics these days just depresses me. What happened to the slash-and-burn Republicans of '94?