We will do what it takes. We will not leave until the job is done.

On Wednesday, February 4, 2004, President George W. Bush "used a routine speech on Winston Churchill to defend his own wartime leadership," Knight Ridder Newspapers' Ron Hutcheson wrote:


 * "'In some ways, our current struggles or challenges are similar to those Churchill knew,' he said at the opening of a Churchill exhibit at the Library of Congress. 'We're at a point of testing, when people and nations show what they're made out of. ... We will do what it takes. We will not leave until the job is done.'"

"Even the words are the same," Sidney Blumenthal said in the September 22, 2005, issue of Salon.


 * President Bush, regarding the crisis in Iraq, "declared" on February 4, 2004, "We will do what it takes. We will not leave until the job is done."


 * President Bush, speaking about post-Hurricane Katrina reconstruction, "eerily echoed" on September 15, 2005, "We will do what it takes. We will stay as long as it takes."

"It was reassuring for the nation to be told by the president in his televised address that he intends to 'stay' in the United States and not cut and run," Blumenthal wrote. "Perhaps a White House speechwriter hit the copy-and-paste function on his computer or the word 'stay' simply popped into the president's mind as he contemplated the crisis, straying into improvisation."

Crisis in Iraq

 * "President Bush Discusses Importance of Democracy in Middle East," Remarks by the President on Winston Churchill and the War on Terror, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., February 4, 2004.
 * Text of Bush, Blair press conference, Associated Press (Boston Globe), April 16, 2004: "And our plan to do this is clear and we shall see it through. Our strategy, political and military, is as follows. ... First, we stand firm. We will do what it takes to win this struggle. We will not yield. We will not back down in the face of attacks, either on us or on defenseless civilians."

Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina

 * "Bush: 'We will do what it takes'," CNN, September 15, 2005.

Related SourceWatch articles

 * Georgeland