Don’t blame Dems for Iraq woes

Re “Democrats take uncompromising stance,” news analysis, July 21

It is outrageous that The Times has the chutzpah to blame Senate Democrats for failure of efforts to pass a “bipartisan” law to end the Iraq war. At least two-thirds of the American people support a binding decision to end the war, and it is the White House and Senate Republicans who are refusing to follow the clear and insistent will of the people.

Arthur Waskow

Philadelphia

For six years, a Republican-controlled Congress unquestioningly gave President Bush everything he asked for. Now, even though an increasing number of Republicans argue that Bush’s Iraq policy is a failure, they refuse to break with him publicly because party loyalty trumps public policy. And this is the fault of the Democrats?

Robert Kaplan

Astoria, N.Y.

Re “Officials debate a sustained ‘surge’,” July 21

So, after four years of war, Bush-appointed Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno now says that September is too soon to assess Bush’s latest strategy. He wants to delay until November his final assessment to determine whether failure after failure will blossom suddenly into success.

How about January? Or maybe November 2008, when a new president will be elected and quickly blamed for the massive failures of this costly war? The Bush Library will no doubt claim that Bush would have succeeded had he had more time in office and wasn’t hampered by liberal softies who were unable to bear the loss of thousands of American and Iraqi lives and the loss of hundreds of billions of dollars.

Worley Thorne

Sherman Oaks