As time goes on, the more I am convinced that most people who are anti-USA (specifically Americans who are anti-American) don't get their information from things we call books. At best, it seems they get their "information" from the Internet or from some propaganda source.

You have the people who claim Bush "lied" about our reasons for going into Iraq. It's hard to conclude that these people are either mindlessly regurgitating things they've read on the net or they just have no idea what the hell they're talking about.  Bob Woodward, one of the preeminent journalists of our age and certainly no conservative, has written 2 books on Bush and it becomes bloody clear why we needed to go into Iraq and that Bush certainly didn't lie. At one point, in fact, Bush demanded certainty that Iraq had WMD stockpiles as well as WMD programs.

History would show that WMD stockpiles may not have been present in Iraq but WMD programs certainly existed. In either case though, Bush didn't "lie" anymore than Clinton "lied". In Woordward's new book, the Egyptian Foreign Minister told Bush that Iraq definitely had biological weapons on hand. So did Saudi intelligence.

Not that any of that matters to me. I could have cared less whether Saddam had chemical weapons on hand. I don't consider such weapons to be a threat. What I do care about are REAL WMDs like nuclear weapons and Saddam (or his sons) only had to wait out sanctions. The French and Russians were interested in getting them lifted. And we were only one Democratic administration away from likely lifting those sanctions.  That was why I wanted Saddam removed.

Which brings me to the point of this article - what kind of idiot sees a comparison between Vietnam and Iraq? First of all, for those not in the know, Vietnam was a civil war between the north and the south. The north wanted to conquer the south and was being supplied by the USSR and China, two of the world's most powerful nations who were right on the border. The North wanted to implement communism in the south.  The US supported the south but was afraid of invading the North for fear of escalation. So it was a no-win situation for the US. The US goal was to keep the south free.

By contrast, the goal in Iraq has already been accomplished -- the removal of Saddam Hussein and his regime. That was the whole "mission accomplished" thing that the left keeps spazzing about. Yes, anti-war people, the mission was accomplished. Saddam's gone. He regime is an ex-parrot. It's no more.

So why are we still there? Because the US wants to stay and help (key word HELP) build a stable liberal democracy to serve as an example to other nations in that region to "dry the swamp" of terrorists. 

So how does this compare to Vietnam? It doesn't. Not in the slightest. At this point, it's more akin to Kosovo or Bosnia. The US can stay or it can go. It just depends on mainly what the Iraqi's want. We want a stable democratic Iraq but we don't NEED it. We are willing to go through some pain because it helps the United States but it helps the Iraqi's more and we have a responsbiility to help them now as long as they want that help. I'm all for a referrendum in Iraq asking whether they want us to stay. If they voted no, I'd say we leave. It's no skin off our back.

By contrast, in South Vietnam, the people didn't want us to leave. We were what was keeping the murderous North from coming in. And when we left, the north conquered the south leading to the deaths of over 2 MILLION people and the spread of anarchy into Camobida, Laos, and other neighboring countries.  Not that the anti-war left of the 70s gave a rat's ass about the victims of communism. Didn't hear too much coverage of the massive slaughter of innocents once North Vietnam took over and led to such niceties as Pol Pot and more death and destruction.

It's really hard to think of any valid comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam -- superficial or otherwise.