The question the electorate asks is: 'What can you do for us? Are you just using us to defeat somebody because you have a personal grievance?'
The bottom line is that Daesh's defeat requires not just hammering them on the battlefield but, simultaneously, revived political reconciliation with Sunnis.
In 1975, the Americans suffered a spectacular military defeat at the hands of North Vietnam and the Vietcong, with U.S. helicopters seeking to rescue leading U.S. personnel from the tops of buildings as Vietnamese guerrillas closed in on the centre of Saigon.
I firmly believed throughout 1971 that the major hurdle to winning the presidency was winning the Democratic nomination. I believed that any reasonable Democrat would defeat President Nixon. I now think that no one could have defeated him in 1972.
Otherwise, we will not be able to defeat the U.S. imperialists who boast of their technological superiority.
The goal of all inanimate objects is to resist man and ultimately defeat him.
From Caesar's legions to the Napoleonic wars. From the Reformation, the Enlightenment and the industrial revolution to the defeat of nazism. We have helped to write European history, and Europe has helped write ours.
In the attempt to defeat death man has been inevitably obliged to defeat life, for the two are inextricably related. Life moves on to death, and to deny one is to deny the other.
The object of China's strategy is inexorably to supplant the United States as the world's premier economic power, and if necessary, to defeat us militarily.
Aggies have a really interesting way of admitting defeat. We've never been outscored. We just ran out of time.
Standardization of our educational systems is apt to stamp out individualism and defeat the very ends of education by leveling the product down rather than up.
I often get sent scripts about little men in big situations. There's a comic element to it, which is forces stacked against this little guy, and how is he going to defeat them?
A poor self-image is the magnifying glass that can transform a trivial mistake or an imperfection into an overwhelming symbol of personal defeat.
What will eventually cause the defeat of ISIL is that it will collapse under its own contradictions, frankly. When the populations in which it tries to maneuver realize that that ideology is not to their future benefit.
Marines don't know how to spell the word 'defeat'.
I am not leaving twitter. If the mindless few defeat the thoughtful majority we are all doomed.
Native Americans had only stone and wooden weapons and no animals that could be ridden. Those military advantages repeatedly enabled troops of a few dozen mounted Spaniards to defeat Indian armies numbering in the thousands.
In the time of darkest defeat, victory may be nearest.
I've had some dark nights of the soul, of course, but giving in to depression would be a sellout, a defeat.
Is the casual objectification of women so commonplace that we should all just suck it up, roll over, and accept defeat? I hope not.