Bush has no regrets

In a speech today at the Pentagon, George Bush declared that he has no regrets about an unnecessary and costly invasion of Iraq. Bush might have been drawing his inspiration from Edith Piaf, whose 1960 recording of Je ne regrette rien was dedicated to the Foreign Legion then fighting to subdue Algeria.

No! No regrets
No! I will have no regrets
All the things
That went wrong
For at last I have learned to be strong

No! No regrets
No! I will have no regrets
For the grief doesn't last
It is gone
I've forgotten the past

One thing we can however say with certainty is that Bush was taking little notice of the death toll in Iraq. Exactly as on first anniversary of the invasion, the war dead earned only a single, fleeting mention at the very end of his long speech.

You will always remember the comrades who served with you in combat [but] did not make the journey home. America remembers them as well. More than 4,400 men and women have given their lives in the war on terror. We'll pray for their families. We'll always honor their memory.

The best way we can honor them is by making sure that their sacrifice was not in vain. Five years ago tonight, I promised the American people that in the struggle ahead "we will accept no outcome but victory." Today, standing before men and women who helped liberate a nation, I reaffirm the commitment.

Another anniversary of the invasion, and once again Bush promises to honor the war dead by tossing more lives into the Iraq quagmire. Bush can't see his way to honoring them by attending even one of their funerals.

Indeed, I recall that in 2004 on the first anniversary of the war Bush visited the wounded in Walter Reed. But not today. Nor last year. Nor the year before last. Nor the year before that. Remember it the next time Bush talks of "progress in Iraq". That's what "progress" looks like – hiding from the dead and wounded of your war.