I overheard a sound bite of John McCain on one of the Sunday gabfests during NPR’s Sunday All Things Considered. He said that we needed to send in more troops and get rid of al-Sadr and the Mahdi militia.

John, we don’t have any more troops. The current level of 150K+ has been achieved by not letting people leave when their replacements arrived. The Republican executive didn’t expand the number of troops, and has been poaching the Reserves and Guard to reach this level. John, your party has controlled Congress in the 5 years since 9/11 and you haven’t pushed the executive to expand the armed forces, so this is your problem if there aren’t enough troops.

John, we don’t have the troops to neutralize the Mahdi Army, and suggesting that the US attempt to again take action against Hojatoleslam Sayyid Muqtada Al-Sadir, a direct descendant of the Prophet, the son and son-in-law of martyred Grand Ayatollahs, is grounds for commitment. Do you have any idea how much of the Iraqi army and police are loyal to al-Sadr before the government? Do you understand that al-Sadr is the only major figure in Iraq who wants to maintain it as a single nation?

Retire, John. Go away and shut up before you get more American service men and women killed with your foolishness. You were an airplane driver, you don’t know anything about the infantry. Ask Jack Murtha, he led ground pounders and knows what’s going on, which is why he wants our people out of Iraq.

We lost when we didn’t maintain security after the invasion, and let the Iraqi military dissolve with its weapons. We won the war, but never established the peace.

Atrios has more of the madness of John McCain.

Update: Don’t miss Steve’s latest doggerel: McLame.

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