Mathew

Yes Erinz, I am one of the party faithful (er republican I think) and we were lied to by none other than Colin Powell. He was the sacrificial lamb in the Bush Administraton. There are now 4000 dead american soldiers on the field (in Vietnam we had 58,000 reported, much more than that in reality).
I can't help but think if all the billions we spent there would have been better spent on beefing up port security, protecting our own borders and actually switching our dependency on oil with solid research. The Bush Administration has broken a cardinal rule. The obligation that an administration has is to the american people first. It is not to fight a vendetta or to find your place in history. International decisions can only be based on facts. I am so upset with this guy. I supported him and voted for him in the first term. I did stop myself after I had the facts from all parties involved. Bush "jumped the shark" and never admitted that the intel or he was wrong in any way. I can't forgive him for that.
We have wasted the surplus we had on the onset of his administration and we are no closer to peace in the middle east when you look at the big picture. Meanwhile Iran is blustering and has nuclear capability...they are the real threat. Osama and company are really a side issue. We have wasted our military on the wrong war and we will have to fight the Iranians at some point. The fact is we are not ready for another ground war. Saddam was the counterweight to all this and we removed him. This emboldened the Iranians to go ahead with their plans. It all comes down to bad politics and an asshat president calling the shots. He has done what the democrats could not do...fragment the republican party...McCain is not the uber consevative that the neo cons would want to carry on for the Bush "legacy". McCain is the moderate candidate that the "voters" have nominated because they are disgusted with business as usual in the Bush Administration.
Obama will get the dem nod if Hillary does not find a way to steal the nomination. So it will be a moderate republican vs a liberal democrat. The choices are very different that what the pundits thought would happen a year ago.
This is because of Bush...he is sort of a spoiler. Conservatives who were aligned with Bush or had the nod fell away mainly because of the association they had with the administration. McCain is seen as the rebel ...moderates in the party like that and the independents out there really like that. Hillary was thought of a shoe-in to the dem nomination...but lo and behold someone who is more liberal and better spoken has captured the dem's hearts. He does not have the back room politics of a Hillary or the baggage of her husband.
Another ripple is that some conservatives are actually starting to support Obama. This is part of the disgust they have with their own party and also with the hope that maybe an Obama administration might shock the party back to it's past glory "Contract with America" days.
At any rate I just want to "upchuck" with all that has happened...and yes I am ranting....lol!

have you seen the new Frontline documentary on the war? The first part was on TV last night, and it's all online.

Pretty fascinating how after 5 years we (are at least I..) are able to step back and look at what happened from a semi detached POV.