I noticed an interesting gripe coming from freelance writer Ed Brayton over at his blog Dispatches from the Culture Wars.  Brad claims that the “latest conservative meme” he’s been “hearing over the last couple of days” is “that ‘military deaths’ under Bush are pretty much in line with ‘military deaths’ under Clinton.”

Don’t ask me why he has the scare quotes around military deaths.  Or why he links my post from a year and a half ago as evidence of the “latest conservative meme.” Here’s the gist of that post:

Here’s an interesting report compiled by the Department of Defense’s Manpower Data Center.

What I found most interesting was a comparison of the active duty deaths between the first four years of Bill Clinton’s term and the first four years of Bush’s term.

Active duty deaths during Clinton’s first four years (1993 - 1996): 4302

Active duty deaths during Bush’s first four years (2001 - 2004): 5187

The difference? 885 deaths over four years, or about 221 deaths a year. Of course, during Bush’s first four years in office we liberated both Afghanistan and Iraq. What did we accomplish, in terms of military victories, during Clinton’s first four years in office?

Brad claims that comparing active duty deaths under Clinton to active duty deaths under Bush is absurd, because the deaths under Bush happened because of combat.  Under Clinton it was (rather oddly) mostly murder and suicide.  But the point isn’t to compare combat deaths, but rather to put to rest claims that the casualties we’re sustaining in Iraq are, well, unsustainable.

Of course there’s been more deaths from hostilities under Bush than Clinton.  We’ve fought two major wars, Afghanistan and Iraq, under Bush.  But that the number of military deaths under Bush is even comparable to those under Clinton (at least at the time I ran these numbers) is worth noting.

Seeing our troops die on the battlefield is tragic, no doubt about that.  But if this country can’t abide fewer than 4,000 war casualties in a war that’s nearly 5 years old we’re in bigger trouble than anything the war on terror portends.

The war in Iraq isn’t unsustainable.  We’re just being led to believe it is because that’s what fits the political agenda of the people telling us that.