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2007.04.25 Dem Perfidy // Islamism Delenda Est Roundup
-- Breaking: House passes Iraq bugout bill
See previous: 2007.04.24 Dem Perfidy // Islamism Delenda Est Roundup I don't think that Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi objectively want Al Qaeda to win. I'm sure that they have succeeded in deluding themselves that we are the problem in Iraq. I'm also sure that they believe that this is in the near term a political winner for them, and sadly, they may be right. But they're playing a dangerous game. What if they're wrong, and the people actually reporting success in Iraq are right? They're so heavily invested in defeat now that it could actually be an electoral disaster for them next year. I certainly hope that will be the case. For me, it would be win-win--we'd have won in Iraq, and the Dems would have lost precisely because they did everything they could to prevent it from happening. ...
[P]olitics aside, like it or not, and deny it or not, they are objectively providing aid and comfort to the enemy. The problem is that they won't start acting in the national interest until, to paraphrase Golda Meir, they start loving their country more than they hunger for power and hate George Bush.
-- Rand Simberg
Let's put it in even simpler terms: Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and a number of other powerful Democrats have bet the future of the Democratic party, and with it their own futures, on an American failure in Iraq. Having done so it's only natural and to be expected that they'll do everything in their power to make their dire predictions come true. Am I questioning their patriotism? Not at all; there's nothing there to question. It may be plainly said that the Democrats seriously intend to bring about U.S. casualties in Iraq by encouraging terrorist resistance, in the hope that they can use the slaughter for their personal political gain. The voice from the Left has gone full course from supporting the war and the men fighting it, to spiteful hate against everyone trying to win in Iraq or finish the job begun in 2003. There is no honorable debate among Democrats anymore on this point - they have established the defeat of the United States as their primary objective. What Democrats of honor remain, such as Senator Joe Lieberman, are silenced and suppressed, made outcasts and warned not to interfere with party objectives. Scarcely in human history has a major political party hoped such vile desires against its soldiers, and schemed such traitorous plots against the nation of their birth and heritage.
-- D J Drummond
Below the fold:
The Five Myths of Harry...plus calls for Reid to resign;
Breaking: House passes Iraq surrender bill
More: White House and GOP respond Rep. Hunter Calls on Harry Reid to Step Down as Senate Majority Leader House OKs War Bill With Iraq Pullout Date Harvard: How the Media Partnered With Hezbollah Rudy: Democrats Want A 9/10 World - White Flag Democrats or Fifth Columnists. Or Both.
- Why No One Wants An American Withdrawal
- Petraeus to Pols: Enemy is Listening
- Kirkuk cops go upside drive-by suspect’s head
- Haditha: Is McGirk the New Mary Mapes?
- Any way the wind blows...
- Bombshell Cripples Case Against Haditha Marines
- The Pelosi-trich
- Washington Times: Sen. Reid is lost
- Dems fail to back Reid's 'Iraq war lost'
- Ruminations On the State of Things In Iraq
- Nancy No-Show
- Burns of NYT: Insurgents Know U.S. Politics Moving in Direction Favorable to Them
- Harry's War
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Newer items are added at the top. Please treat this post as a blog within a blog, come back often, and scroll down till you see something that was here on your last visit.
*** The Five Myths of Harry...plus calls for Reid to resign;
Breaking: House passes Iraq surrender bill
More: White House and GOP respond
Michelle Malkin
The Five Myths of Harry: Debunked in one handy guide.
Update 930pm Eastern: FNC reporting that House has passed the Iraq surrender deadline bill.
Here's the AP story:
[...]
Update 946pm Eastern: Statement from the White House... Statement By Deputy Press Secretary Dana Perino
April 25, 2007
"Seventy-nine days after President Bush sent Congress a request for emergency war funding for our troops, the House of Representatives has passed disappointing legislation that insists on a surrender date, handcuffs our generals, and contains billions of dollars in spending unrelated to the war.
"Last November, the American people voted for a change in strategy in Iraq – and the President listened. Tonight, the House of Representatives voted for failure in Iraq – and the President will veto its bill.
"Democrats have forced this process to continue for too long. The President calls on the Senate to quickly pass this legislation so the President can veto it and then work with the Congressional leadership on a clean bill that funds our troops while respecting the judgment of our military commanders and helping ensure the safety of the American people."
Hill statements arriving in my e-mail box... U.S. Congressman Mike Pence issued the following statement today opposing the Democrat Iraq War Supplemental Spending Bill:
"The Democrat emergency supplemental appropriations bill is fiscally irresponsible and constitutionally flawed and I cannot support it.
"What the Democrat Congress has produced is a bill that violates the budget resolution that passed the House and puts forth a prescription for retreat and defeat in Iraq by tying war spending to congressionally mandated benchmarks and deadlines for withdrawal from Iraq.
"While I am opposed to this bill based on its fiscal irresponsibility, the real problem with this bill is that it contains the Democrats' blatantly unconstitutional attempt to manage-and lose-the Iraq War. ...
And: U.S. Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, today voted against the emergency supplemental bill citing its defeatist, artificial timelines and pork-barrel spending. He issued the following statement after the vote:
"Providing full funding for our troops in combat should be simple and straightforward. Any bill passed by Congress should not hinder their ability to successfully complete their mission, nor should it provide any signal to our enemies that our nation's resolve is weakening.
More: House Republican Whip Roy Blunt (Mo.) issued the following statement this evening after House Democrats sent to their colleagues in the Senate a final conference report designed to push through pork-barrel spending and tie the hands of our commanders on the ground.
"It's my hope that tonight's vote will mark the end of the Democrats' protracted campaign to undercut our mission by undermining the authority of our commanders in the field. It's now incumbent upon Senate Democrats to send this conference report to the president as soon as possible - so that a veto can be issued, and we can finally get back to work on passing a clean and responsible package of funds for our troops.
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Meanwhile, here's a reality-check report from Iraq filed by RedState blogger/embed Jeff Emmanuel.
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Audio: Sen. James Inhofe on Harry Reid... Asked if the Nevada Democrat should resign from his leadership position because of his comments, Inhofe said: "I think it’s more serious than that. I think there should be a recall . . . for saying something as un-American as that.”
Rep. Duncan Hunter: ...
*** Rep. Hunter Calls on Harry Reid to Step Down as Senate Majority Leader
WASHINGTON — The ranking Republican in the House Armed Services Committee called on House Majority Leader Harry Reid to resign Wednesday over his declaration that the Iraq war is "lost."
Rep. Duncan Hunter — a 2008 presidential candidate — wrote in a letter that Reid's comments "can have no effect but to demoralize the brave men and women, who are honorably fulfilling their mission in Iraq, and to encourage our adversaries."
"Even if you sincerely believe it to be true, your pronouncement of failure will undoubtedly be used by terrorist leaders to rally their followers — inevitably leading to increased attacks on U.S. and coalition forces," Hunter wrote. ...
In his letter, Hunter said that lawmakers need to give the surge of troops a chance.
"Currently, there are about 146,000 U.S. troops in Iraq. When the reinforcement operation is at full strength, this number will stand at approximately 157,000. How can anyone, including a United States Senator, possibly declare as a failure a reinforcement operation that is less than fifty percent complete?" ...
The ranking Republican wrote that he has always considered Reid a friend, but that "my highest obligation is, like yours, owed to our forces in uniform, especially during this time of war."
"Given your position of leadership within the United States Government, I find your pronouncement of failure irresponsible and disserving to America's armed forces. In light of the fact that this statement has both been used by our adversaries and has exhibited a marked lack of leadership to U.S. troops, I call on you to resign your leadership position," concluded Hunter. ...
*** House Passes War Spending Bill That Includes Iraq Pullout Timeline
WASHINGTON — A sharply divided House brushed aside a veto threat Wednesday and passed legislation that would order President Bush to begin withdrawing troops from Iraq by Oct. 1.
The 218-208 vote came as the top U.S. commander in Iraq told lawmakers the country remained gripped by violence but was showing some signs of improvement.
Passage puts the bill on track to clear Congress by week's end and arrive on the president's desk in coming days as the first binding congressional challenge to Bush's handling of the conflict now in its fifth year.
"Our troops are mired in a civil war with no clear enemy and no clear strategy for success," said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer.
Republicans promised to stand squarely behind the president in rejecting what they called a "surrender date" handed to the enemy. ...
*** Harvard: How the Media Partnered With Hezbollah
Charles Johnson (H/T: Michelle Malkin)
During Israel’s war against Hizballah, at LGF we were continually outraged by the media’s uncritical promulgation of terrorist propaganda, and their overwhelming bias against Israel. The barrage of staged and manipulated disinformation culminated in the infamous Adnan Hajj fauxtography incident; and it can be argued that the culture of tacit cooperation with terrorists was at least partly responsible for that stunning case of phony news.
How could Reuters’ experienced editors miss a fake picture that was so bleeding obvious, at every step of the way toward publication? Answer: because they just didn’t care. ...
Now the Harvard Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, hardly a bastion of neocon wingnut thinking, has issued a paper that absolutely skewers the media for their outrageously biased and terrorist-enabling behavior. Maybe this will be a little harder for them to ignore: How the Media Partnered With Hezbollah: Harvard’s Cautionary Report. ...
*** Rudy: Democrats Want A 9/10 World
Ed Morrissey
Of all the candidates running for president, Rudy Giuliani knows best what a 9/10 mentality means in an age of radical Islamist terror. He had to deal with the aftermath of bureaucratic confusion and politically-correct counterterrorism on 9/11 and the weeks afterward as the mayor of a city who saw almost 3,000 of his citizens killed by terrorists. So when Giuliani talks about the folly of returning to the defense against terrorists, he knows of what he speaks: Former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani wrapped up a day of campaigning in New Hampshire on Tuesday night by issuing a stark warning that Democrats would put the country on defense in the campaign against terrorism and needlessly prolong a conflict that he said America can and must win. ...
"If one of them gets elected, it sounds to me like we're going on the defense," he said. "We've got a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. We're going to wave the white flag there. We're going to try to cut back on the Patriot Act. We're going to cut back on electronic surveillance. We're going to cut back on interrogation. We're going to cut back, cut back, cut back, and we'll be back in our pre-September 11 mentality of being on defense." ...
Giuliani called the war on terror "the defining conflict of our time," and that cuts many ways. The conflict will define political parties and movements based on how they approach it; it will define nations based on whom they support; and it will define an era based on who eventually prevails. Rudy wants to continue the forward strategy of engaging terrorists and their sponsors abroad with the American military, rather than allow terrorists to gather their strength abroad for an attack on the US, with law-enforcement resources as our only defense. ...
*** White Flag Democrats or Fifth Columnists. Or Both.
Tom Heard (H/T: Dan Riehl)
Unlike the "fifth column" of old, there is nothing clandestine about this movement. Wikipedia defines fifth column thus "A fifth column is a group of people which clandestinely undermines a larger group to which it is expected to be loyal, such as a nation." The leaders of this group, Pelosi, Reid, Murtha, and many more including a few Republicans like Chuck Hagel are not only willing to raise the white flag of surrender but are openly and actively doing everything in their power to guarantee defeat and take us back to a 9/10 status.Are they doing this because they feel that it is best for the country? In a word, no. They are doing it for their own political/personal gain.They are so heavily invested in defeat that rational thought has no place in their agenda.
Harry Reid has gone so far as to declare the war lost, the surge a failure even though it has just started and is showing signs of progress, and then goes on the malign Gen.David Petraeus, whose report he dismisses as valueless. Here is the video at Hot Air. Unlike some Democrats, he’ll hear Petraeus out; he’ll just simply refuse to believe anything he says that doesn’t fit the left’s narrative.
Neville Nancy won't even deign to meet the the field commander. ...
*** Why No One Wants An American Withdrawal
Ed Morrissey
The Guardian (UK) has relentlessly opposed the war in Iraq for the past four years and more, giving its readers on the Left a steady diet of bad news and angry opinion based on its editorial policy. British newspapers have an open editorial bias, and readers expect news from a point of view. Guardian readers may find themselves surprised today, however, to find a detailed explanation of all the reasons why the nations in the Middle East do not want an American withdrawal from Iraq -- and the catastrophes that would follow one: The so-called axis of moderate Arab states - comprising Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan - dreads an early US withdrawal. First, because it would be widely interpreted as an American defeat, which would weaken these pro-American regimes while both energising and radicalising their populations.
Second, if the US leaves, the emergence of a Shia regime in Iraq - in itself an offensive prospect to them - would only be a matter of time. ...
Third, ...
The fallout of a withdrawal would not be contained within Iraq, either. An Iranian hegemony in Iraq would allow the radical Shi'a of both nations to export their destabilizing influence to other nations with restive Shi'ite populations, most notably Bahrain. From there, it could spread to the other smaller emirates in the region, destabilizing the power structure that the Sunnis have built in the last century -- a power structure based on oppression and religious fanatacism of their own, to be sure. Without American forces based in the region, we would have no ability to control or shape the outcome of such a collapse.
A partition of Iraq could prove even worse for the region. ...
*** Petraeus to Pols: Enemy is Listening
WASHINGTON — A Wednesday briefing by Army Gen. David Petraeus did not appear to quell concerns of House Democrats who are set to pass a veto-ready supplemental war spending bill that includes a timeline for withdrawal.
But the top commander in Iraq did warn lawmakers that their volatile rhetoric is being heard by the enemy.
"One thing that he reminded us was, this is a test of wills and he admonished us, reminded us that what we say to the world, to our adversaries and our allies, is listened to by the other side," said Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif.
Hunter said Petraeus "didn't try to sugarcoat the issues and the problems" that American forces face in Iraq, but noted that comments like that by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who last week said the war is lost, provide incentive for U.S. adversaries.
"It must come as a shock to Al Qaeda leaders to have an aide come into their safe house and tell them that Senator Reid has declared that, in fact, they are winning and the war is lost," Hunter said. "I think it's highly irresponsible for the leader of the U.S. Senate to have said that and, just speaking for myself as the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee, I think that the leader of the Senate should step down from that position."
*** Extreme heart-ache: Kirkuk cops go upside drive-by suspect’s head
Allahpundit
Gooood stuff here from Totten and Lasswell, fresh off their trip to the crucible of Kirkuk. You can watch the clip at either site but I recommend reading both posts. Totten is a tad more Sullivan-esque, shall we say, in his reaction to the violence, but he’s also got the better quotes: “His teeth were still intact,” Patrick said.
Mam Rostam laughed again. “Those slaps were advice,” he said. “Because the city is unstable, we have to be a little bit violent with people to stop them. Otherwise they won’t be afraid to do many other evil actions. We have to be a little bit severe.”
It’s the broken-lip theory of Iraqi crimefighting: break his lip now so you don’t have to break his head later. There’s also a great passage about Rostam, a Pesh Merga general, explaining the consequences for Afghanistan if the U.S. withdraws from Iraq. But as I say, you need to read Lasswell too; otherwise you won’t find out who the suspect was and why he was riding around with his pal popping off shots oh-so-impressively.
Rostam also explicitly blames Iran for most terrorism in the regime. A fellow Kurdish security chief tells the New York Sun the same thing, emphasizing that Tehran’s support isn’t limited to Shiite groups and implicating the Irbil Five — whom Condi Rice, you might remember, wanted returned to Iran — in jihad: ...
*** Haditha: Is McGirk the New Mary Mapes?
By Clarice Feldman
Evidence accumulates of a hoax in Haditha. The weblog Sweetness & Light has done an estimable service gathering together the articles which cast substantial doubt on the charge of a massacre of civilians at Haditha . Because the blog is too busy gathering and fisking the news, I offered and the publisher accepted my offer to put what he has uncovered in a narrative form.
Having done so, I can tell you that the story has a whiff of yet another mediagenic scandal like the TANG memos or the Plame 'outing.' While the Marines quite correctly will not comment on the case pending the outcome of their investigation, I am not bound by those rules, and I will sum up the story for you. ...
*** Any way the wind blows...
Jay Tea
One of the defining moments of the 2004 presidential campaign was John Kerry's explanation that we wasn't a waffler, wasn't a flip-flopper, wasn't indecisive. The killer quote, to many was his infamous "I actually did vote for the $87 billion -- before I voted against it" explanation of his two seemingly conflicting votes on funding for the Iraq war.
It seems that attitude is contagious, and has infected House Majority Leader Harry Reid.
Harry Reid yesterday called General David Petraeus a liar in saying that progress has been made in Iraq. On January 27, the United States Senate voted unanimously to confirm Petraeus as commander of the Multi-National Force in Iraq.
In other words, Reid was for General Petraeus before he was against him.
As commenter and blogger marc pointed out, last November Reid said "We're not going to do anything to limit funding or cut off funds." Reid then said, in February, that he will try to cut off funding for the Iraq war if President Bush rejects Congress' proposal to set a deadline for ending combat. Reid also said that "as far as setting a timeline, as we learned in the Balkans, that`s not a wise decision, because it only empowers those who don`t want us there. It doesn`t work well to do that."
In other words, Reid was against deadlines and funding cuts before he was for them. ...
*** Bombshell Cripples Case Against Haditha Marines
Philip V. Brennan
Convincing evidence that corroborates NewsMax.com's accounts of the Haditha insurgent ambush has compelled the prosecution to take extraordinary steps to bolster their crumbling case.
The stunning announcement that all charges are being dropped against Sgt. Sanick P. Dela Cruz, formerly accused of murder in the Haditha incident where 24 Iraqis were killed during an insurgent ambush against the Marines, is indication that the prosecutors have a very weak case against all the defendants, lawyers for the some of the accused say.
MurthaAllaphundit comments here.
*** The Pelosi-trich
Don Surber
Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi skipped a briefing on the Iraq War? Outrageous.
Republican Geoff Davis of Kentucky gave Pelosi the old what-for, saying: Some in the Democratic leadership have declared it the job of Congress to micromanage the war in Iraq, yet we learn today that the Speaker of the House has refused to even be seen face to face with the very military commanders whose hands will be tied by the Democrat war funding bill.
This latest insult to our troops should come as no surprise since others in the Democrat leadership have declared the war lost despite our military commanders’ statements to the contrary and before General Petreaus has even gotten the additional resources he’s requested.
His reinforcement hasn’t even been fully implemented before congressional leaders have called it a failure. ...
A Democratic Senate and a Republican House authorized this war. Congress has a moral duty to allow the troops we sent in to harm’s way to have the time and the tools necessary to win. ...
*** Sen. Reid is lost
2007.04.25 Washington Time Editorial (H/T: Michelle Malkin)
When Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid decided to take a shot last week at the president's Iraq policies, he missed, wide left: "This war is lost," he said. The remark prompted outrage in Washington -- how it was received by soldiers deployed in Iraq, or by those who would see America defeated in the region, is another matter. Democrats were quick to put their leader back on message. "As long as we follow the president's path in Iraq, the war is lost," Mr. Reid hedged later that day on the floor of the Senate.
That wasn't the first time Mr. Reid needed to be put back in line. In December he appeared on ABC's "This Week" and said, twice, that he supported a surge in troop levels that was temporary and a part of a larger plan, drawing the ire of the anti-war left. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Reid pulled a maladroit about-face. "The surge is a bad idea," he concluded in a Jan. 5 letter to President Bush.
Senate Democrats can rest assured that at least their leader has an eye on the bottom line, although they may be disappointed with his willingness to gab about it with the press. Mr. Reid told reporters this month that "we're going to pick up Senate seats as a result of this war. Sen. [Chuck] Schumer has shown me numbers that are compelling and astounding." Talking out of one side of his mouth, Mr. Reid claims not to follow polls but to hew only to his own sense of what is right. Out of the other, ongoing problems in Iraq mean electoral success. Political duplicity doesn't get any more transparent than that.
*** Dems fail to back Reid's 'Iraq war lost'
By: John Bresnahan and Carrie Budoff (H/T: Dan Riehl)
Several leading Democrats said this week that they did not agree with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's recent statement that "the war is lost" in Iraq, even while they support his broader message.
But they did agree that Reid's wording was clumsy and potentially damaging. Even the Nevada Democrat himself appeared to be backing away from his remark.
Jim Manley, Reid's spokesman, said earlier that the "war is lost" comment was not in Reid's prepared text for the news conference last Thursday. But from now on, Manley said, the senator will "couch it more": The mission in Iraq is not working and must be changed.
Democrats have long tried to shed their image of being soft on national defense. Recent polls suggest they are making strides, showing that more voters trust congressional Democrats than they do the president to handle the situation in Iraq.
But statements such as Reid's -- while delighting those who have turned against the war -- provided Republicans an opportunity to shift focus from the merits of President Bush's Iraq war strategy to the level of support from Democrats for the troops. ...
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Dafydd ab Hugh: Ruminations On the State of Things In Iraq
Just go read it; it's excellent from top to bottom and covers too much ground for me to make any attempt to summarize it or pull a representative excerpt.
*** Nancy No-Show
Ed Morrissey
Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have insisted that the American military has done nothing to improve the situation in Iraq. Reid has gone so far as to declare the war lost and to malign the character of General David Petraeus, whose report he dismisses as valueless. Pelosi has a simpler way of dealing with Petraeus and his briefing for Capitol Hill -- avoid him: As the House and Senate prepare to vote this week on the final conference report on the $124 billion troop funding bill — which would also mandate that U.S. combat troops begin withdrawing from Iraq on Oct. 1 at the latest — Gen. David Petraeus is scheduled to come to the Hill tomorrow to brief lawmakers on the progress of the recent troop escalation.
ABC News has learned, however, that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., will not attend the briefing.
"She can't make the briefing tomorrow," a Democratic aide told ABC News Tuesday evening. "But she spoke with the general via phone today at some length."
A Pelosi aide said the speaker on Tuesday requested a one-on-one meeting with Petraeus but that could not be worked out. He said their phone conversation lasted 30 minutes.
So what was so important that Pelosi could not attend a briefing on the progress of the war? It does not appear to be an emergency, since no one has suggested that she has left Washington in the middle of a work week. Is there another more pressing matter than the war in Iraq? Certainly the Democrats have not thought so to this point; they have made it their most pressing issue in attempting to force Petraeus into a retreat in the face of terrorists and gangsters. ...
*** Burns of NYT: Insurgents Know U.S. Politics
Moving in Direction Favorable to Them
Posted by Mark Finkelstein
Does it give the Dem leaders of Congress pause to realize that the enemies of the United States in Iraq, the people killing our troops, are banking on their political success? Reid and Pelosi might be tempted to dismiss this as the raving of a right-wing blogger. They shouldn't. It is in fact the considered view of someone they surely see as a respected, nay, an authoritative source: no less than the Baghdad bureau chief of the New York Times, John Burns.
Burns was a guest on this morning's "Today." In the set-up piece, NBC White House correspondent Kelly O'Donnell rolled a clip of precisely the kind of politics to which Burns later alluded, as Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid [D-NV] fumed: "No more will the Congress turn a blind eye to the Bush administration's incompetence and dishonesty." When's the last time Reid spoke with such vitriol about al-Qaeda? Just wondering.
View video here.
*** Harry's War
Democrats are taking ownership of a defeat in Iraq.
WSJ Review & Outlook
Gen. David Petraeus is in Washington this week, where on Monday he briefed President Bush on the progress of the new military strategy in Iraq. Today he will give similar briefings on Capitol Hill, but maybe he should save his breath. As fellow four-star Harry Reid recently informed America, the war Gen. Petraeus is fighting and trying to win is already "lost."
Mr. Reid has since tried to "clarify" that remark, and in a speech Monday he laid out his own strategy for Iraq. But perhaps we ought to be grateful for his earlier candor in laying out the strategic judgment--and nakedly political rationale--that underlies the latest Congressional bid to force a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq starting this fall. By doing so, he and the Democrats are taking ownership of whatever ugly outcome follows a U.S. defeat in Iraq.
This isn't to say that the Administration hasn't made its share of major blunders in this war. But at least Mr. Bush and his commanders are now trying to make up for these mistakes with a strategy to put Prime Minister Maliki's government on a stronger footing, secure Baghdad and the Sunni provinces against al Qaeda and allow for an eventual, honorable, U.S. withdrawal. That's more than can be said for Mr. Reid and the Democratic left, who are making the job for our troops more difficult by undermining U.S. morale and Iraqi confidence in American support. ...
The stakes in Iraq are about the future of the entire Middle East--and of our inevitable involvement in it. In calling for withdrawal, Mr. Reid and his allies, just as with Vietnam, may think they are merely following polls that show the public is unhappy with the war. Yet Americans will come to dislike a humiliation and its aftermath even more, especially as they realize that a withdrawal from Iraq now will only make it harder to stabilize the region and defeat Islamist radicals. And they will like it even less should we be required to re-enter the country someday under far worse circumstances.
This is the outcome toward which the "lost" Democrats and Harry Reid are heading, and for which they will be responsible if it occurs. The alternative is to fight for a stable Iraqi government that can control the country and keep it together in a federal, democratic system. As long as such an outcome is within reach, it is our responsibility to achieve it.
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