1,703 American soldiers have been killed in Iraq...all because George Bush claimed Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction he did not have. Our President took us to war on a sham. Now, over 1,700 American soldiers have paid the price for his incompetence.

Unfortunately, we're stuck. We're in it for the long haul. I do not subscribe to notions that we should pull out or set firm time tables for doing so. The only choice left is to succeed at this no matter what the cost - in lives and dollars. We owe these 1,703 American heroes nothing less than that. To fail at stabilizing Iraq would be disasterous.

But lets be clear. George Bush is to blame for this horrific travesty. He exaggerated the case for starting an unjustified pre-emptive war on the basis of erroneous intelligence. He did so not for the best interests of the American people, but for political purposes, driven by a naive, simple-minded neocon vision of how the world works.

Now, even Republican lawmakers are recognizing the scope and scale of this awful judgement. Unfortunately, they are jumping on "time table" bandwagon - again for utterly political purposes.

The only choice is to persevere, knowling full well many more American soldiers will die and billions more will be spent. But as the count of those lost rises, be mindful of who it is that took us here in the first place - and upon what falacious basis he made his call to war.