50 Years???

This new Bush analogy -- repeated by administration officials multiple times -- about leaving American troops in Iraq permanently, just like in Korea, is astonishing, one of the most bizarre and mind-blowing political statements I've heard in a long time. Americans by more than a two-to-one margin want us to get out of Iraq ASAP, not stay another 50 years. It is a frightening insight into the mindset of the president, and remarkably brazen at the same time. Bush is stepping up and saying "I want to be in Iraq permanently, and I really don't give a damn about what anybody else wants."

This should become the Democrats' number one talking point this summer and maybe all the way into November 2008: this guy wants American troops to be in Iraq permanently, just like Korea. We want to get the troops home. ASAP.

It's a pretty simple argument. Which side do you think the American public would be on?

Mike Lux is the president of American Family Voices, an issue advocacy group sometimes described as the "free safety" of the progressive movement, and consults for progressive organizations and donors through his consulting firm, Progressive Strategies, L.L.C.