Carol Shea-Porter: Reasons why the U.S. has to return troops from Iraq now, By CAROL SHEA-PORTER Another View

THE UNION LEADER editorial on July 18 misinterpreted both my political leanings and my reasons for leaving Iraq, and I appreciate the opportunity to correct that.

My mother, who has been a conservative Republican all of her 82 years, is volunteering in my campaign because she knows that I am a centrist Democrat who will represent all of us in Washington. I will speak clearly and I will not hide my convictions and I will listen to everyone. New Hampshire voters of both parties care about the same issues.

We need affordable education and good jobs. We need universal health care. We need a plan to reduce the deficit and fix our energy problems and we need to be strong and confident in our national defense.

These are centrist positions.

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The majority of Americans ‹ 59 percent in last month¹s AP poll ‹ know that we need to get out of Iraq. We are not breaking any commitments. The people never asked us to come and they want us to leave. It is their nation. We also have to leave because it is sapping our money and our military strength and we need to now concentrate on the whole region and on Asia. While we squander our resources in Iraq, the region and the world continue to grow more dangerous.

Our brave soldiers have spent three long, hard years in Iraq and the American taxpayers have spent billions of their hard-earned money. The United States government has borrowed billions from the Communist Chinese to finance the budget deficit.

What are the results and what are the goals now? The result of our invasion is a civil war in Iraq. The Bush administration and its followers in Congress don¹t consider the daily slaughter of Iraqis by other Iraqis the definition of a civil war, but Americans are too smart to be fooled. Conservative columnist George Will wrote in the July 18 Union Leader that ". . . it is not perverse to wonder whether the spectacle of America, currently learning a lesson . . . about the limits of power to subdue an unruly world, has emboldened many enemies."

So much for the results. What about the goals? George Bush and our congressmen from New Hampshire are doing what business leaders and military leaders always warn against: mission creep. This happens when an organization reaches its set goals and then expands the goals. It¹s usually disastrous because there is no planning, and execution is poor. That is exactly what we have in Iraq. The stated goal was to remove the weapons of mass destruction. They weren¹t there. The second goal was to remove Saddam Hussein. Done. A third goal was to put a democratically elected government in place. Done. Now what?

Our President and our New Hampshire congressmen have moved the goal post again. Now they say we will leave when Iraq can stand on its own. When is that and who defines that? And will America go broke before then? We have to leave Iraq.

We should say we met the stated goals and cite them.

We should tell the world we are not abandoning the area, that we will leave troops in the Middle East in countries that want us. We then must set a date in the near future, although initially we do not have to announce it.

We should return home in a confident, organized fashion. We do still have another mission there, though. We must renew our friendships with other nations so we can work together to calm tensions, thwart terrorism and find diplomatic solutions to crises whenever possible. We must respect the cultural and political differences.

The world is watching to see if we can once again be a respected leader in this region. I am optimistic and believe we can. Indeed, we must.

Carol Shea-Porter is running for the Democratic nomination for Congress in the 1st District.