Raise your hand if you think al-Qaida's deadly bombing in Baghdad yesterday had nothing to do with Harry Reid's "the war is lost" pep talk for the enemy? The Arab and Iranian press certainly had a good time with his comments. The soldiers seem to think increased violence and defeatism at home could be related.
Even if a US leader honestly was of the opinion that a war was lost, why would you say it? Somalia didn't have anything to do with 9/11, but our defeat there certainly emboldened our enemy, encouraging them to attack us. If the Democrats aren't going to join the fight for their civilization, is it at least too much to ask that they not actively fight for the enemy?
This is the danger of being so politically invested in defeat. If Iraq succeeds, the Democrats will face resounding defeats at the polls - and they know it. They need not have put themselves in this position, but they have through the language they've used. But they've gone so far over the line in their re-treaded Vietnam "America-causes-all-evil" rhetoric, that anything other than total failure there will eliminate their credibility for decades.
I'd rather the Republicans lose every election for the next 20 years than have us surrender in Iraq. The security of America comes first. It's unfortunate that the Democratic leadership can't say the same for their own strategies for power.
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You should have more faith in human nature Orrin. Democrats are calling for a withdrawal because they believe that a withdrawal is in America's best interest - that staying in Iraq will only cost American lives and will not make the situation. They hope that by pulling out of Iraq, they will force the region's leaders to get involved and to pull the legs out from under the insurgency. No one is saying "America-causes-all-evil," and you know it. A majority of the democratic leadership, just like a majority of Americans, believes that this war was misguided, but not evil. A majority of the democratic leadership believes that president Bush mishandled this war, not that he sabotaged it. Please do not make the mistake of accusing fellow patriots of "fighting for the enemy."
Plenty of people are saying that America is the cause of the evil that is going on in Iraq. John Murtha talked generally of our troops killing in "cold blood". John Kerry called them terrorists. Accusations are made constantly of the dead Iraqis, placing the blame solely at George W. Bush's feet, as if the evil men who actually detonate the bombs simply could not help themselves. (And there is evil there - every time civilians or democratic government officials are targeted by siucide bombers, that is evil.) That's the argument for pulling out - that if only we weren't there "occupying" them, the Jihadists would settle down, work the farm, and raise a family in peace.
No serious person honestly thinks that pulling out now will make the country more stable. And even if they really do think that as opposed to saying it to hide their true intentions, we have plenty of evidence to the contrary on smaller levels. Up until now, whenever we've simply pulled out of a province or town, al Qaeda or one of the Shi'ite militia groups rushed in to fill the vaccuum. They then re-started their oppression of the locals, and re-established that area as a base of operations to expand their evil. Many soldiers died who didn't need to because we've had to re-take ground we'd already paid for. To think we should repeat that mistake on a grand scale is just madness, and bears no resemblence to sound military strategy. Iraqi leaders know it. Gen. Patreus knows it, and has told Congress that. What makes Nancy Pelosi the better military strategist?
Maybe the Dem leadership does believe that surrender and retreat is in America's interests. But if that's the case, the least I'd expect is for them to be upset that we couldn't accomplish what they had (supposedly) once supported, and morose about the fact that the greatest military in the history of the world had been forced to retreat by a gang of murdering thugs. But they weren't upset. Not in the least.
In fact, they were JUBULANT. After having just voted to surrender, they were downright giddy. Why? Because they'd worked HARD over the years to secure that surrender. If they'd invested ANY efforts into actually helping the President win this war, they would share disapointment at the lack of success for those efforts. I could respect a morose and reluctant conclusion that we could not advance our cause farther - sometimes retreat is the only option left. But I cannot abide the elation following what would be the total defeat of our nation in a time of war - a defeat that would not be limited to Iraq falling into chaos.
And even if they do think it's in our interests, how can anyone say these overt statements of defeat aren't encouraging the enemy? When powerful people in your enemies government start anouncing that "the war is lost," you rally and increase your attack to press your advantage - which is EXACTLY what happened. And we KNOW it happens, because they TELL us that's their motivation. Like it or not, they are helping the enemy - giving them encouragement that victory is in their grasp WHEN IT NEED NOT BE SO.
What if the Speaker of the House or the Senate Majority Leader had said during the Battle of the Bulge that the "war is lost, and the Secretary of War and President Roosevelt know it." We still probably would have won, but does anyone doubt that such words wouldn't have been broadcast all over Germany, spuring on those young Germans who up until then had worried they had no hope? Would anyone doubt that the extra casualties incurred wouldn't have been attributable to those words of defeat? Would anyone see that (thankfully) mythical Speaker as a patriot? Not by any definition I am familiar with.
So you'll forgive me if I'm unimpressed with the "patriot" Harry Reid. A patriot puts the good of the country above their own (or their party's) political ambitions. (Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer, on the other hand, don't even bother to hide their glee at the political windfall this war has provided to them.
Sometimes, dissent is NOT the highest form of patriotism, like when you give speeches that encourage the enemy in time of war.
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