News over the weekend continues to show that October has been deadliest month for American soldiers in Iraq since the fall of Baghdad more than three years ago. October has also resulted in the tragic and steadily increasing number of Iraqi deaths due to sectarian violence between Sunnis and Shia.

Despite serious criticism of the Iraq war strategy from within the ranks of the military, and despite repeated calls by Democratic members of Congress and even a select few respected Republican senators for a new policy in Iraq, the President refuses to make any changes in strategy and refuses to begin the phased withdrawal of American troops and turn the protection and control of Iraq over to the Iraqis.

But apparently the one thing the Administration will change is its rhetoric and its spin.

This war is too deadly to leave it to propagandists like White House Counselor Dan Bartlett to explain. On CBS television news, Bartlett actually said that the President is constantly changing its ‘tactics’ in Iraq and that ‘Stay the Course’ has never been the President’s policy. Never? Why is Dan Barltett, a communications spin doctor guru, allowed to discuss Iraq policy in public?

As you can see in these two videos, President Bush’s policy in Iraq is now and has always been ‘Stay the Course,’ even if Dan Bartlett says on TV that it has never been the policy. Take a look.

It is time for a new direction in American policy toward Iraq and the war on terror that will make Americans safer.