If you're wondering what Bush meant yesterday about a U.S. troop presence in Iraq until at least the next presidency, Barbara at the Mahablog reminds us that he's talking about permanent bases. As is noted in the news reports she cites, there's a lot of concrete being poured out there, and it ain't for schools or hospitals.

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... what nearly all suicide terrorist attacks have in common is a specific secular and strategic goal: to compel modern democracies to withdraw military forces from territory that the terrorists consider to be their homeland.

--Robert A. Pape, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism, p. 4