TURNING POINTS, ALWAYS WITH THE TURNING POINTS

From The Rude Pundit:

July 24, 2003 (from the New York Times, after the deaths of Uday and Qusay Hussein): "White House officials however exuded determination they had turned a corner in the increasingly difficult task of restoring order from chaos in Iraq."

August 13, 2003 (from Fox "News" show Special Report With Brit Hume, Fred Barnes speaking): "Now, Paul Bremer says -- who's over there running the American regime in Iraq, where they've turned the corner in defeating the Baathists and so on and most of the country is safe and stable, says we don't need more troops...I think Bremer also said it was only about 100 terrorists have come in from...outside the country from Iran. And that's not really that many. So I don't think it's that big a problem."

January 1, 2004 (from ABC News, after a bomb blew up at a Baghdad New Year's celebration): "Last night's attack came at a time when coalition officials were cautiously beginning to feel that they had turned a corner here in Iraq."

June 2, 2004 (from CNN's Inside Politics, then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice speaking): "The reason that we've turned a corner and, more importantly, that Iraq has turned a corner and the Iraqi people have turned a corner is that they now have a government in place broadly representative of, broadly capable, I think, of representing the views of the Iraqi people that can now accept sovereignty and can be a full partner in trying to secure Iraq and in accelerating its reconstruction. The Iraqis don't like occupation any more than we would like occupation. And it is time for that occupation to end."

September 14, 2004 (from CNN's Newsnight With Aaron Brown, Senator Lindsay Graham speaking): "And between now and our November election and between now and January there will be hell to pay in Iraq because the stakes are very high but, if we can make it through January, Aaron, then I think we've turned the corner."

February 9, 2005 (from CNN's Wolf Blitzer Reports, Senator Lindsay Graham speaking after the Iraqi - and American - elections): "If we think we've turned the corner, this is a misreading of what happened. The attacks are going to continue."

April 15, 2005 (from Fox "News" show The Big Story With John Gibson, Richard Perle answering a question about whether or not a corner has been turned in Iraq): " I believe we've turned a corner. And that was -- that corner was turned when 8.5 million Iraqis braved death to cast their first votes. Now a government is being formed. The Iraqi people are invested in the future of their own country. And that was the critical turning point." The next question Gibson asked Perle was whether or not he ever felt like saying "we were right."