To say I'm disappointed is an understatement. Such an air of defeatism has seeped into the American psyche that it's just, I don't know. It's just disappointing. Somehow I had held out some hope that a group of experienced, elder statesmen could tell us something we didn't already know.

No, there is no "magic" formula that will turn Iraq around overnight. To expect that is completely unrealistic and a false premise. It isn't rocket science. What we need in Iraq, is a demonstration of American resolve to the world. I don't know why we can't seem to manage that, politics I suspect. But I think that a display of American resolve would turn the momentum around to our side. The insurgents are winning the all important propaganda war, America knows that the insurgents fight for the television cameras, and yet somehow, America perceives that we are losing this fight when we are at least maintaining a stalemate and if we would get serious about it, we could put this insurgency down.