The NutraSweetness of Victory

The problem here is a Progressive one. In a letter to the House of Representatives in 1951, General MacArthur wrote, "There is no substitute for victory." With the election on the horizon and Bush's approval rating at an all time low and the Iraq war/Presidency/time in office proving to be an utter failure, it would seem that at the surface a cumulative Progressive "I told you so" would be appropriate. After all, all of those kooky liberal radical left wing conspiracies about Rumsfeld, about the lack of WMDs, about the massive slaughter of innocent people in Iraq in retrospect, were slightly understated. The war in Iraq is a dramatic exaggeration of our (Progressives) worst fears.

So in the backtracking (retreat if you will) Conservatives are now making ("I never supported the war, I just supported and voted for its creator and its executors"), there seems to be a marginal victory ideologically for the Progressives.

General MacArthur’s pronouncement became famous in the literature of war precisely because there was no "victory" and his statement was in fact a "substitute" for victory. So let it be said that among all of the forth coming "can't say I didn'ts..." there is NO victory. The loss is still ours as a nation and the victory of Bush and his supporters nationwide and worldwide embarrassment is merely a substitute.