Josh is the husband of one of our alumna, Liz. He writes from Iraq, where he has served since April this year after re-enlisting last fall.

I�ve almost quit reading the news paper over here because I am sick and tired of politicians and the news media telling everyone how terrible it is over here, how the administration is on the brink of losing this war all the while you offer up no real solutions. You say you have them but you never tell us what they are. If the only plan you can muster is firing Mr. Rumsfeld come up with a new plan because President Bush isn�t going to. The only other plan I have heard is that if and when the Democrats take back control of Congress they are no longer going to fund the war. Hey that makes sense; punish the troops by not giving them the funding they need to fight the war. That sure will teach President Bush. Then more of those people who �didn�t study hard� that are �stuck in Iraq� will die. Is that really your plan?

...The thing some people fail to realize is that we are rebuilding a nation and that too takes time, money, and other resources. That is what we are doing right now, trying to help the Iraqis rebuild their nation from the ground up. We are assisting them in rebuilding their government, their army and police forces, their economy, their infrastructure, bridges, roads, schools, hospitals, the list goes on and on. No nation, including Iraq, or Babylon as it was known thousands of years ago, has ever been good at nation building. Most of the time a nation was conquered, its spoils carried off by the victor and its defeated people were either carried off into slavery or killed on the spot. Times have changed and we are in a tough spot right now. Right now we have about 140,000 troops here in Iraq. Do we need more troops? Maybe, but what we really need is a solid plan on how we are going to assist this nation rebuild its self and a willingness to let the soldiers finish the job we started.

Amen.