The assertion of administration infallibility just wasn't cutting it. This puts a different framework and a different perspective on how he wants people to think about the war, which was long overdue.

202

We're trying to get out in front of this because we think this is going to be one of the most critical problems facing water managers in the Western United States in the next couple of decades.

191

Iraq has been the crucible that has shown us how limited our cold-war alliances were. It took us 50 years to build NATO; the challenge we have now is that we've got to come up with something new.

181

This is the kind of investment that is reflective of the strategic commitment and intention to continue a military presence in Iraq .

174

When it comes down to the real brass tacks, it really reflects not so much hardcore analysis as the best political and military judgment of the secretary and the senior Pentagon folks. Searching for the ways in which the gearbox is connected to the engine isn't easy.

160

I don't want to see Main Street vs. Putnam Place.

141

I think this is a very well organized effort, a very cooperative effort, ... You don't see that in a lot of these projects.

126

As shaky as a policy of containment is, it is certainly preferable to confrontation, 'rollback,' or 'regime change' through military force. Containment is, in fact, regime change by tolerable means, and the solution to the problems of Iran and North Korea lie in an indirect approach.

123

Although the costs of war have grown... the American economy is exponentially larger than it was in the Vietnam War years. When it [the Iraq war] is compared to the overall size of the American economy, it's really a drop in the bucket, certainly by historical standards.

122