Demagogue

FactCheck.org has some interesting analysis of a new Republican National Committee TV ad. The RNC ad airs excerpts of comments made by Howard Dean, Barbara Boxer and John Kerry about the U.S. presence in Iraq, intersperses images of white "surrender" flags, and then concludes with the phrase: "Retreat and defeat is [sic] not an option."

Of all the observations made by FactCheck.org, I found this piece of analysis most interesting:

After showing another white flag, the ad next quotes California Sen. Barbara Boxer advocating withdrawal of US troops from Iraq: "So there's no specific timeframe but I would say the withdrawal ought to start now, right after the elections December 15th."

... Is Boxer's call to begin withdrawal a call for "retreat and defeat?" Worth noting is that the Bush Administration itself plans to withdraw at least 17,000 troops from Iraq after Dec. 15, and more next year if "conditions permit." Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld stated this on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on Dec. 8, 2005:

Rumsfeld: We're [at] about 155,000 [US troops]. And we're going to go back down to our baseline of about one hundred and thirty-seven, thirty-eight thousand, after the elections. I'm sure of that.

So if proposing a troop withdrawal after the Dec. 15 elections amounts to embracing "retreat and defeat," then count Rummy as a defeatist.