I've heard it said that the drawdown of troops in Iraq is purely political and not "dictated by events on the ground" as the President had promised. That may well be true. I'm sure the White House is feeling tremendous pressure to begin to withdraw troops as their poll numbers have dropped, fatigue with the war is setting in with even its purest supporters and predictions of 10 year commitments of troops have begun to sound feasible.

But I wonder if there's not another reason.

Iraq hit a milestone with their election. They've also made enormous progress in curbing terrorist activity in the two weeks around the election. Could it be that the White House is talking about a significant drawdown of troops in order to assure the Iraqi people that we will give them their country back? To give them another incentive to keep the violence down? Not to mention to motiviate the Iraqi army to hasten their own training.

It can't be ignored that violence fell to almost nothing for 2 weeks in Iraq. That tells me that the powers that be - mostly Sunni Arabs - have the power to put it to a stop if they choose.

We may have seen the "tipping point" in Iraq with the series of events over the last few months: Zarqawi terrorizing Jordan and gutting his own support; American/Iraqi operations along the Syrian border; the election; the realization that terror can be controlled from within and now, the finding of another mass grave left behind by Saddam.

Now if civil war doesn't break out over claims of fraud, we may be seeing the birth of a new kind of Middle Eastern nation.

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And we had a great time. We had all 19 of us together yesterday afternoon and we had a great time (as usual). It's my wife's family and they are wonderful people.

My kids love their cousins and it's always a good time to get together.

Now, back to looking at the world as it is.

Iraq has become very concerning. The vote was an amazing event in the heart of the Middle East. But what concerns me is the near-riot situation, primarily in Sunni provinces. They believe there was fraud in the election. There probably was. There was probably fraud on their side, too.

We've yet to hold an election that didn't involve fraud in the U.S. Whether it was people voting illegally or ballot boxes disappearing or votes illegally counted or rejected, we have yet to have a perfect election.

The old saying that "Democracy is the worst form of government..except for all the others" holds true. So it's important to put the election irregularities into context. Did they alter the outcome? Probably only slightly. Do the people of Iraq gain representation that they've never had before? Yes, except for the Sunni's who were pretty well represented by Saddam.

And finally, how does this election compare to those prior to the war? Incredibly well. The fact is that Saddam won 99.9% of the vote in those campaigns. Amazingly, those he tortured and even many that he had already killed rose from the dead to vote for him.

So, the fraud probably won't render these elections invalid, but I'm concerned because of the history of problem solving and anger management in the Middle East. It pretty much boils down to blow up, cut off and threaten - in that order. I am hopeful that the religious leaders will want to avoid the massive bloodshed from a civil war, but reason doesn't always win out.

They are in my prayers. I'm still very optimistic, but this won't be a good situation until our folks are home and the Iraqi people have rejected terror and embraced peaceful power.

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Let the left show its true colors on national defense by impeaching a President for actions intended to protect America. Did he go too far? Absolutely not. Should he have done it a different way. Absolutely.

Still, during Clinton's impeachment hearings (another political circus to be sure) his poll numbers rose daily. And there's no doubt in my mind that Bush's and Republican's numbers would do just the same.

Yes, that would be a perfect Christmas gift. Call for his impeachment. Make it clear that there are no steps to protect America that partisan liberals won't get in the way of.

Do they have a point about civil rights? Yes, they do. But for them, this is about politics, not rights. And they're missing the big picture and it will bite them squarely in partisan patootie.

If they want to cement their image of not being trustworthy on security, the left should impeach the President.

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"Rasmussen Reports" has his approval and his disapproval ratings both at 50. That's his highest since February, I believe, when it hit a 54 - the high for the year.

Also, investor confidence hit its highest number in 18 months and consumer confidence hit its highest mark in 9 monhts.

In addition to that, durable goods orders leapt by 4% despite a 26% plunge in Defense captial spending (itself very good news). And unfilled durable goods orders grew by over 3%, which means that the good news will continue on for months to come.

So, Merry Christmas to the folks in the White House who will probably be glad to see 2005 end.

By the way, Rumsfeld also announced some troop withdrawals today. That should help the Iraqi people to believe we're sincere about getting out and giving them their country back.

And I can't think of a better present for the troops and their families than to begin to see an end to all of this.

Merry Christmas everyone.
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...would you?

I would. There are a thousand mistakes, a thousand memories I'd like to change. A thousand things I've said that I'd love the chance to unsay. Those things that I still think about from 25 years ago and cringe.

I would:
1) Change things with a girlfriend when I was a sophomore in college. I wouldn't end up with her, but I wouldn't have let it end that way.
2) Not broken hearts so cavalierly. It matters and I treated it like it didn't.
3) Recognized what awesome opportunities I had in college, music and church and I would have accomplished so much more.

And if there were only one thing you could change, what would it be?

Mine would be that girl in college. I still think about that 25 years later. I still regret showing such a lack of class.

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