In the year 2013, after McCain’s first term in office...

David M. Reisner
360° Digital Producer

John McCain highlighted his plans as president Thursday and predicted the war in Iraq will be over by 2013.'

Bloggers,

Wanted to share another speech today that’s making headlines.

Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, made a speech in which he envisions the state of affairs at the end of his first term if he is elected president.

"What I want to do today is take a little time to describe what I would hope to have achieved at the end of my first term as president. I cannot guarantee I will have achieved these things,"

In this speech he lays out benchmarks during his first term in office on which he could be judged.

"By January 2013, America has welcomed home most of the servicemen and women who have sacrificed terribly so that America might be secure in her freedom…”

"The Iraq War has been won. Iraq is a functioning democracy, although still suffering from the lingering effects of decades of tyranny and centuries of sectarian tension…"

“[The] threat from a resurgent Taliban in Afghanistan will be greatly reduced but not eliminated" ... U.S. and NATO forces will remain in the country "to help finish the job, and continue operations against the remnants of al Qaeda."

McCain envisions that Osama bin Laden, and his chief lieutenants, would be captured or killed.

He also believes that in 2013, there still will not have been a "major terrorist attack in the United States since September 11, 2001."

Here are a list of other milestones McCain hopes to see at the end of what would be his first term:

•  The United States will have a smaller military presence in Iraq that will not play a direct combat role, and he predicts that al Qaeda in Iraq will be defeated.
• Witnessing Russia and China cooperating in "pressuring Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions, and North Korea to discontinue its own."
• Significantly increasing the size of the Army and Marine Corps, which will be "better equipped and trained to defend us."
• The application of "stiff diplomatic and economic pressure" by the United States - acting in concert with a newly formed League of Democracies - to cause Sudan to agree to a multinational peacekeeping force, with NATO countries providing logistical and air support, to stop the genocide in Darfur.
• Several years of robust economic growth.
• Taxpayers filing under a flat tax.
• The world food crisis ending, low inflation, and a "much improved" quality of life "not only in our country, but in some of the most impoverished countries around the world."
• More accessible health care for Americans and an easing of pressure on Medicare because of lower health care costs.
• A United States well on its way to "independence from foreign sources of oil."
  A Social Security system that is solvent, does not reduce benefits for those nearing retirement and includes individual retirement accounts
• The confirmation of "scores of judges" to the federal district and appellate courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court.
• A secure southern border for the United States after "tremendous improvements to border security infrastructure and increases in the border patrol, and vigorous prosecution of companies that employ illegal aliens."

I have included a clip of the speech here
So what do you think of the speech? Please share your thoughts