Is the President Making Progress in Iraq?

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

By Martha MacCallum, Fox News

March 20, 2006

Transcript

Martha: President Bush in Cleveland this afternoon pointing out progress in Iraq three years after the war began, without glossing over that many challenges still remain. Take a look at this.

(video clip from President Bush’s speech) President Bush: “I believe that as Iraqis continue to see the benefits of liberty they will gain confidence in their future. And they will work to ensure that common purpose trumps narrow sectarianism.”

Martha: Joining us now with reaction to the president’s remarks former Indiana Congressman Tim Roemer, who was a member of the 9/11 Commission, also sat on the House Intelligence Committee. Good afternoon Congressman, good to see you again

Tim Roemer: Hi Martha, good to see you.

Martha: What did you think of the president’s speech today? It was very specific in its nature looking at Talafar as a specific example of some of the good changes that are taking place in Iraq.

Tim Roemer: Well Martha, you can look at it two ways. When the president spends as much time answering questions, as he does on his speech it means he is either really enjoying himself or he’s got an unpopular policy to try to explain. It’s probably both. He looked like he was enjoying himself doing the questions, but he does have some significant erosion even from the Republican base on this policy.

Martha: But you know we looked at sort of the three things; Bill Hammer is on the ground at Camp Fallujah this week, and I listened to him interview a general there and he talked about morale on the ground and talked about the very strong developments in terms of Iraqi police and the units there and the numbers of battalions and the growth that they’ve seen over the past year, and how impressed he is with them stepping up in front of the plate. Also David Nacius who we spoke to earlier, who has not been positive about this war for some time, just spending time in Iraq, saying he’s really impressed with how the leaders are coming to the table. So do you think the American people are down on this because they’re not getting the whole story?

Tim Roemer: Well, I certainly think that there are some positive things, and they start with our military. I’m very proud of that leadership and many of those accomplishments. Doing what they did in Samar last week that probably should have been done twp and a half or three years ago. Some of the security training and exercises are going well. Saddam’s gone and on trial, a parliament has been elected although they’ve only met once. Those are positive things Martha, but you know the political leadership here has been characterized by a triumph of wishful thinking rather than careful planning. While we’ve had great military leadership the political and the civilian leadership has been very slow, at times incompetent in terms of what we to so-called nation-build, after we went in there militarily. That has been way to slow, even though we had some good blueprints from Kosovo and Bosnia where we do have peace today, and nation-building, building some of the civilian institutions that are so, so important there and have brought us degree of – a ten year, a decade of peace in the Bosnia, Kosovo area.

Martha: I want to switch gears with you for a moment, to talk a little bit about a recent editorial called “A Third Term for President Bush,” by Fred Barnes where he lays out some specific changes, as he gives some recommendations, he’s a Fox News analyst of course, to what he thinks the President should do, and one of them is to move Vice President Cheney over to lead the Defense Department and to bring in Condoleezza Rice as his vice president. What do you think of those ideas, and do you think it’s likely that we might see changes along those lines?

Tim Roemer: Well none of those changes will get the president a third term since he’s term-limited, but he’s – actually Secretary Rice is doing a fairly good job there. I don’t think she’s probably anxious to move from that position as Secretary of State. I heard the Vice President Cheney say that he wasn’t going anywhere this past weekend, let alone to the Department of Defense and that would mean that the president has to do something with Secretary Rumsfeld, have somebody be responsible for Iraq and the mistakes made there and I don’t think that’s going to happen either.

Martha: Alright, we’ll see. Tim Roemer, thank you very much.

Tim Roemer: Alright Martha, great to see you.

Martha: It’s good to see you too.

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