Throwing Good Money After Bad? And Why "Enduring Bases"?

I'm including part of MoveOn's latest letter here, but before I do, I've got a question (or two depending on your answer to the first):

How comfortable do you feel with putting permanent and/or "enduring" bases in Iraq?
If you do feel comfortable with it, why?

Mr. Bush has given almost as many versions of why we're in Iraq as the number of cars I've owned in my lifetime. But NONE of them included a situation that leads to establishing bases and keeping them there.

* To free the Iraq people? Nah.
* To bring them democracy? Only in Bush democracy would military bases serve this purpose.
* To defeat Saddam? Done (wasn't tough).
* To destroy WMD? Didn't have any.

Only if you peg this to control the oil there or to continue to control Iraq does it make much sense.

From MoveOn:

Congress has barely debated the war in Iraq or its aftermath since it voted to authorize the use of force in October 2002. Now, the Bush administration is skipping the normal budget process to ask for an additional $82 billion to fund the American presence in Iraq. Among the big-ticket items, a $600 million embassy and some 14 "enduring" bases.[1] Those bases, and the absence of an exit strategy, will worsen, not improve the situation in Iraq.

And, remember the last $87 billion Congress authorized for the war: a whopping $9 billion of it is missing because of corrupt contracting.[2] We must root out the corporate corruption that has undercut the rebuilding efforts and lost billions of taxpayers' money.

As it considers another $82 billion for Iraq, Congress needs to insist that America has an exit strategy from Iraq with a timeline, that we do not construct permanent bases in Iraq and that we end war profiteering by corporations. Please sign our petition urging Congress to act today.