President George “Foot-in-the-Mouth” Bush vowed that the U.S. would not give up the battle for Iraq until “every last American is dead and buried.” Though it came out, hopefully, not as the president intended, it showed that growing discontent over the Iraq problem has not yet shaken the administration’s resolve to stay in there and really fuck things up until the Republican reign is over.

Speaking to a large group of soldiers at a U.S. military base in South Korea, also known as “the other front,” the president pledged to keep a troop presence in Iraq “until the war on terror is won,” demonstrating once again the president’s unfailing optimism/ignorance that a war on a concept is winnable. Look out, anger!

“The insurgents who strike at our troops… at Iraqi civilians… at the every constructive effort in the newly liberated Iraq… these cowards want the U.S. to withdraw its soldiers, so they can undo what we’ve already done there. We will not give them what they want,” said Bush. Also not getting what they want are the millions of American citizen who had believed the troop presence would be withdrawn, and the thousands of American soldiers in the region who would prefer to spend their holidays with their families, alive and not being shot at.

The speech sounded almost too perfectly timed with a vote in the House of Representatives on whether or not to bring American soldiers home from Iraq, which ended in a resounding victory for the people who want them dead. The House voted down the initiative, proposed by hawkish Democrat Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania and denounced as a stunt by other Democrats, by 403-3.

Speaking for the majority, House Speaker Dennis Hastert (big-ass Republican, Illinois) said, “We will not stop supporting our troops when they need us most. We will not retreat. We will support our troops until every one of them is underground.”

It echoed the promise of the president as he spoke to our boys overseas: “Even when every American soldier is killed by Iraqi insurgents, we will not surrender. We will give them more soldiers, fresh by the barrels, run too fast through the boot camps to be properly trained. And we will hold them there, like, ‘Eh? Eh? Why don’t you kill these troops now? We’ll just make more.’ And we will continue with that response, until every last American is dead. This I promise you.” The passionate speech was met with the most awkward applause ever heard in history.

The mixed message of the comment, mixed with the recent “Jesus was a fag” gaff by the president, has left some critics charging that the president no longer thinks himself fallible, safely in the beginning of his second term; others, on the other hand, charge that he just don’t give a shit anymore. This reporter sought the expert opinion of Newark University’s Noam Chauncey, not only to fill out column space, but also because it pisses off the bosses I despise so much.

“Public opinion has always been split largely down the middle on support for the Iraq War, and whether or not the American people believe the president is an asshole,” said Chauncey, sipping a fine international coffee in his office at the not-fake university. “One issue decides the other. However, now the majority is moving toward War-no/Asshole-yes standing, which leaves the president with two options: One, to bow to increasing pressure and call the soldiers home, or two, to pretend he has a mandate to whatever the hell he wants while ignoring the world around him and the ever-present facts of reality. This president made his decision long ago. In fact, I don’t even know why you’re talking to me about it. We’ve known this for a long time and I’ve got shit to do.”

The president cared so little about American response to his most recent approach, he promised us a quote for the article. Then, however, he had his press secretary pretend to search for something in his jacket only to pull out an extended middle finger.