Undefining success in Iraq

President Bush today undefines success in Iraq.

I saw a Marine yesterday -- came out of Anbar. His brother, who was in the Army, was lost. And I was comforting his family as best as I possibly can, or could. And he said, we're making great progress in Anbar, I just wanted to tell you that, President. You know, is he the kind of guy that tells the President what he wants to hear? I don't know. All I can tell you is what he told me. And I told that to David Petraeus, who confirmed it.

But slowly but surely, the truth will be known. Either we'll succeed, or we won't succeed. And the definition of success as I described is sectarian violence down. Success is not, no violence. There are parts of our own country that have got a certain level of violence to it. But success is a level of violence where the people feel comfortable about living their daily lives. And that's what we're trying to achieve.

So, "Success is not, no violence." It's some level of violence he deems acceptable.

(And, If you happen to catch a video of this, the "Either we'll succeed, or we won't succeed" line feels remarkably flip considering he's talking about 100 US soldiers dying a month from now until he reassesses in September.)

Oh, and 9/11 has been defined down as well,

You can attack a nation several ways. One, you can get 19 kids to fly airplanes into buildings, or you can gain control of something a country needs and deny that country access to that, in this case, oil, and run the price of oil up, all attempting to inflict serious economic damage.

Those crazy kids..... (And, oil is now equivalent to the 3,000 Americans killed on 9/11.)

But in the end, the reality comes down to this.

The question is, who ought to make that decision? The Congress or the commanders? And as you know, my position is clear -- I'm the commander guy.

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