Daniel Henninger has a blistering take on the political posturing going on in the House of Representatives right now over the war in Iraq. It isn't particularly pretty for either side in the debate, but there is a warning in the debate for presidential candidates.
Politics aside, the result on public view was a Democratic side that looked small, mired in talk of American "failure," while a number of senior Republicans–John Boehner, Pete Hoekstra, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, even Peter King–produced almost stirring speeches on the substance and meaning of the global threat.
Pete Hoekstra, recently chairman of the intelligence committee, gave what must be the severest attack on radical Islam ever by a U.S. public figure. Forget Pope Benedict; there was nary a genuflection to Muslim sensibilities in Mr. Hoekstra's argument that the enemy is not some vague thing called terrorism: "We are not at war with a tactic. We are at war with a group of militant Islamists who hate us and who hate much of the rest of the world."
John Boehner reviewed each Islamic terrorist act directed at the U.S. dating to the Iran hostage-taking of 1979. "Too bad it took so long to open our eyes," he said, "but they are open now." Ileana Ros-Lehtinen quoted the famous blueprint of al Qaeda No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahiri: "The first stage: expel the Americans from Iraq." Rep. Charles Boustany said plausibly that other Arab nations could never help with a political settlement if the region is engulfed in violence after a U.S. exit.
So one may ask: Where were you guys when we needed you? Republicans lost the election because most of them foxholed the past two years when the going got tough. Instead of this Kissingerian geopolitical vision, they let one guy carry the burden (they would reply that the "one guy" never asked for their help).
Sens. Clinton and Obama should take a long look at Tuesday's videotape of the Democratic House now shaping the party's foreign policy. Is this where they'll want to be next year?
Even allowing for the politics of the Iraq-only script, it got a little weird watching speaker after speaker (excepting freshman and former Navy admiral Joe Sestak) pretend that the world and all its troubles can be telescoped down to the Sunni Triangle. Rep. Tom Lantos, chairman of the foreign affairs committee and nominally responsible for a larger view, simply wrote off Iraq's government–"They have made minimal and cosmetic efforts"–and the entire Iraqi people: "Iraqis themselves don't seem to want it."
The Democrats right now are terrified of being labeled as defeatists which is why they refuse to stand up and vote for their convictions. Instead, they plot to slowly bleed American troops in pursuit of their quest for political power regardless of cost.
gaius said:
The Democrats right now are terrified of being labeled as defeatists which is why they refuse to stand up and vote for their convictions. Instead, they plot to slowly bleed American troops in pursuit of their quest for political power regardless of cost.
As loaded a statement as this is, I don’t completely disagree, and I would completely agree, except for the “plotting” part- the jury’s still out on that IMO.
Look, selling defeat is a hard task, arguably an impossible task. The American people have overwhelmingly decided they want to get out of Iraq, but they haven’t figured out how to get out, what with a Commander In Chief that absolutely refuses to get out. I speculate the American people have not figured out that a prerequisite to getting out is accepting the reality of defeat.
So, as disgusting as all this is, politicians are merely a reflection of the people, and unless and until the American people themselves accept defeat in the Iraq War (are polls even asking this question?), then politicians (of both parties) will hem and haw and do the least required of them. It really is up to the American people to push their politicians into a viable exit strategy.
And let’s have a little context on the ‘bleeding American troops’ comment. Democrats did not put those soldiers in Iraq- our Republican Commander In Chief did. And Democrats are not supporting putting more soldiers and spilling more blood in Iraq- again that’s the Republican Commander In Chief again.
This is a Republican war and a Republican escalation, managed by a Republican President, with (seemingly undying) Republican congressional support. The blood of our soldiers is on the hands of a lot of people in Washington, but let’s not forget where and with whom the buck stops.
John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, Harry Reid and a lot of other Democrats voted to send the troops.
This an American war. And the cost of a defeat will be on all Americans.
Is it a question of winning or losing? How do you win a crime? Preemptive war is a crime. America is better than that.
We Democrats vote to stop committing the crime. Put Bush’s mistakes behind us. Lets get together as a country and solve actual problems. We have real problems we need to fix. Iraq was a blunder.
But to just keep committing the blunder decade after decade after decade because otherwise Boehner says
“EEEkk! They’ll follow us home!” ?
That has been proved wrong war after war after war.
They will follow us. They say so on a regular basis.
Where? On Fox noise?
I never heard/read/googled it in any accountable media. Where are they gonna get an airline ticket? They have no infrastructure, 60% unemloyed. They have their own problems to solve right there. Frankly you are all being very alarmist.
We get out and leave them to sort out their problems on their dime. In 20 years we’ll have trade delegations visiting them, like we do in Vietnam now. And they’ll say thanks for getting rid of Saddam.
And hopefully they’ll forgive us for Abu Graib and Halliburton corruption and all the blunders in how Cheney ran this mess.
The sooner we put it behind us, the better the excellent Saddam removal looks, in retrospect. But if we spend 10 years there, chances are worse.
By your reasoning the World Trade center is still standing. Because they couldn’t possibly have actually brought the towers down and killed 3000 of your fellow citizens.
Because they couldn’t possibly have actually brought the towers down and killed 3000 of your fellow citizens.
That’s less people than died in motorcycle accidents in the same year. Try to keep a little perspective. There are significantly greater hazards to the life of the average American than terrorism.
It was not Iraqis that bought down the world trade center. It was Al Quaeda. We should have used our excellent military in Afghanistan where Al Quaeda was, not wasted it in Iraq. There was nothing in Iraq.
The first Trade Center bombers (1993) were competently found by the FBI, fairly tried in a court…
(WITH the right of Habeas Corpus, which has been part of Western law since 1215, another major step back by Bush into the Dark Ages when King John had “The Divine Right Of Kings” to imprison and torture anyone for life without charges)
…and put away for life. Same for Timpothy McVeigh, The Unabomber, also executed legally after a fair trial or imprisoned for life.
That’s how we Democracies have always handled crimes. The British used police work to find and imprison their terrorists. So did the Spanish after their terrorist attack.
When we return this country to being a democracy, we will run it sensibly again to benefit We the People, not the Paris Hiltons that Republican-Americans think need your help so bad.
The first step back to Democracy is making our representatives say where they stand on Iraq. Pelosi has the right idea. Next vote will be hard for them to shy away from after they told us where they stand.
Thats why Boehner cried.