New Data Derails Another Democratic Talking Point

Call back the speechwriters!

New data released today derails another Democratic talking point.

Miserable Donuts brings miserable data to the quagmire bunch.(via the Washington Times):

The Army has exceeded recruiting goals in the first two months of this fiscal year, reversing a trend that had some Iraq critics saying the armed services branch was “broken.” (Who might that be? )

The Pentagon yesterday said the Army signed up 5,856 recruits in November, 5 percent above its goal. It previously announced the Army also exceeded its target in October, the first month of the 2006 fiscal year.

The Army has that hit its recruiting mark for six straight months, a promising development for the Bush administration. President Bush’s critics had cited the Army’s failure to achieve its recruiting goals in fiscal 2005 as proof that the war in Iraq is breaking the force.

Rep. John P. Murtha, Pennsylvania Democrat and one of the party’s chief Iraq war critics, has called the Army “broken” and urged the White House to withdraw all U.S. troops from the country.

But Lt. Col. Bryan Hilferty, an Army spokesman at the Pentagon, said the service is more confident of filling the ranks as the recruiting year unfolds.

Ouch!

Also, yesterday ABC-TIME released a poll that shows that Iraqis are optimistic. This is similar to the polling results from the Internatinoal Republican Institute but is a far cry from the Democratic Party’s talking point of “80% strong opposition” to the Allied soldiers in Iraq:

An ABC News poll in Iraq, conducted with Time magazine and other media partners, includes some remarkable results: Despite the daily violence there, most living conditions are rated positively, seven in 10 Iraqis say their own lives are going well, and nearly two-thirds expect things to improve in the year ahead.

Surprisingly, given the insurgents’ attacks on Iraqi civilians, more than six in 10 Iraqis feel very safe in their own neighborhoods, up sharply from just 40 percent in a poll in June 2004. And 61 percent say local security is good — up from 49 percent in the first ABC News poll in Iraq in February 2004.

Nonetheless, nationally, security is seen as the most pressing problem by far; 57 percent identify it as the country’s top priority. Economic improvements are helping the public mood.

Oh, and one other thing, the unemployment in Iraq is not “60%”!

Most agree that the unemployment rate in Iraq is somewhere in the 20’s and one media outlet puts it at 18%. This is not a good number, but certainly not 60% and certainly not as high as it was when Saddam was milking the economy and the people.

Unlike what we are hearing from certain politicians, the gallantry in this country runs deep.

Hat Tip Terry Harris

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