Speechless

You know, I had come around to the position that Bush isn't stupid or ignorant, just sort of... I don't know, just not a critical thinker. But this, THIS exchange from Editor & Publisher leaves me speechless:

Meeting briefly with reporters Monday aboard Air Force One, Trent Duffy, a White House spokesman subbing for Scott McClellan, said that President Bush believes that those who want the U.S. to begin to change course in Iraq do not want America to win the overall "war on terror."

Duffy spoke on a day when a surprisingly large antiwar protest met the president during his stay in Salt Lake City, Utah, where he addressed a Veterans of Foreign Wars convention.

Speaking to reporters, Duffy said that Bush "can understand that people don't share his view that we must win the war on terror, and we cannot retreat and cut and run from terrorists, but he just has a different view. He believes it would be a fundamental mistake right now for us to cut and run in the face of terrorism, because if we've learned anything, especially from the 9/11 Commission Report, it is that to continue to retreat after the Cole, after Beirut and Somalia is to only empower terrorists and to give them more recruiting tools as they try to identify ways to harm Americans.

"So he believes that people have a fundamental right to express their views. That's one of the reasons we're fighting this war on terrorism, to protect our fundamental rights. But at the same time, he disagrees strongly."

Uh, Bush himself is solely responsible for the 'front' of the "war on terror" being in Iraq: it wasn't before and Sadam wasn't a threat. Bush created that. He's the poster boy for Islamic extremism. But to say that those of us who don't support this war somehow want to lose the war on terrorism is... astounding.

No, I don't want to lose the "war on terror" but these folks have proven themselves criminally incompetent to plan & execute any aspect of this war. No, I want to win the "war on terror," but we aren't going to with the current administration and that much is clear.