By Scott Wright

I was sitting at home Wednesday night taking notes as I watched President Bush offer up his latest plan to try and win the war in Iraq. (Pretty sad, huh?) By the time I went to bed around 11:30 p.m., I pretty much had this week's column in my head. All that was left for me to do was come in the next morning, sit down at my keyboard, and hammer out the words.

But who the heck am I to try and dissect the president's latest war plan? I had a preconceived notion that he wasn't going to say anything to convince me he has any idea how to extricate our troops from the mess they're in, and good 'ole Dubya surely didn't disappoint.

I basically believe George W. Bush has concocted this plan to send 21,500 more American soldiers into harm's way in the hope that the war in Iraq will drag out past the end of his second term, in January 2009. That way, I figure he figures, the next guy will inherit the problem and perhaps, eventually, the blame for all the mistakes this administration has made in conducting the war -- not to mention the fact that they chose to conduct it in the first place.

Blah, blah, blah. You get the idea. Long story short, there are plenty of people in Washington, D.C. who are a lot more qualified to debunk Dubya's deliriousness -- Republicans, at that.

So instead of me yammering on as usual, I'll let people from the president's own party tell you what they think about Bush's new plan:

_ The morning after he heard the plan, Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel told Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice President Bush's plan was "the biggest foreign policy blunder since Vietnam."

At one point in a hearing Thursday morning, Rice attempted to correct Hagel, telling him he was wrong to use the word "escalation" to describe the president's latest plan for Iraq.

"Putting in 22,000 more troops is not an escalation?" he asked, incredulously. "Madame Secretary, Iraqis are killing Iraqis. We are in a civil war. This is sectarian violence out of control."

_ Another Republican Sen., Bill Voinovich of Ohio, told Rice the president could no longer count on his support. "You're going to have to do a much better job" explaining why the plan makes sense, he told her, "and so is the president."

He added: "I've bought into this dream and at this stage of the game I just don't believe it's going to happen."
 

_ Rep. Ric Keller, a Republican from Florida, said last week in a speech that he's run out of patience with the president. "At this late stage, interjecting more young American troops into the crossfire of an Iraqi civil war is simply not the right approach," he said.

_ Conservative stalwart Patrick Buchanan wrote last week that he believes the president -- and probably VP Dick Cheney, too -- are sending more troops to Iraq in anticipation of soon becoming involved in a major conflict with Iran over that country's suspected nuclear weapons program.

"Will Congress be duped again into giving Bush a blank check for war?" Buchanan questioned in a column at HumanEvents.com dated Jan. 9. "We are thus forewarned. A propaganda campaign ... is being prepared to stampede us into war with Iran."

Buchanan concluded his column with this stinging rebuke: "If we are going to war, let us do it constitutionally, for once, and not leave it up solely to George W. Bush and (Dick) Cheney."

Hooray! I believe these Republicans, many of whom haven't been able to find their spines for six years when it came to dealing with this run-amok administration, have finally found some courage. I imagine the fact that 70 percent of Americans don't want more troops in Iraq has a few of these politicians fearing for their phony-baloney jobs, too.

I could run a few dozen more quotes from Republicans who've come out of oversight hibernation since Wednesday. It may be too little, too late on their part, but at least they're finally trying to do the jobs we pay them $165,000 a year to perform on our behalf.

Sadly, though, until the buffoons in the White House come up with a brain between them, I'm afraid the situation in Iraq will only get worse. In fact, experts on both sides of the aisle are already saying that more troops is exactly the wrong message to send the Iraqi government.

Hey, don't take my word for it. The Republican lemmings who followed Bush off this cliff are going to scream and flail all the way to the bottom. Serves them right, too, for being asleep at the switch for the last three years.