America's Defeatist Politicians

America's Defeatist Politicians

By: Rachel Marsden

NEW YORK -- President George W. Bush asked Congress to approve funding for the U.S. troops in Iraq to be able to do their job. But before he could get through the cafeteria checkout, the Democrats insisted their heaping side order of surrender hitch a ride on his tray.

Democrats insisting that troop funding be accompanied by a U.S. surrender date for the Iraqi front in the war on Islamofascism is the political equivalent of, "Do you want fries with that? No? Well, screw you, you're getting some anyway."

Thankfully, Bush is still the president and can use his veto powers to send back the full meal deal. The problem is it's the troops who will end up starved.

General David Petraeus, for whom the Democrats actually voted to oversee the war in Iraq, said this week that Iraq will need "an enormous commitment over time," echoing what George Bush said in his 2002 State of the Union address: "Our war on terror is well begun, but it is only begun. This campaign may not be finished on our watch -- yet it must be and it will be waged on our watch."

Since it may be too much to expect people nowadays to recall what the President said five years ago when they strain to remember the name of last season's American Idol winner, here's a more recent version.

At last year's address, Bush reiterated: "Our own generation is in a long war against a determined enemy -- a war that will be fought by presidents of both parties, who will need steady bipartisan support from the Congress."

Why doesn't he just come out and say, "Hey, weren't you morons listening?"

Even back in 1899, in his book The River War, former British prime minister Winston Churchill wrote of Islam: "No stronger retrograde force exists in the world." In a 1996 lecture, the other great British PM, Margaret Thatcher, warned that "radical Islamist movements now constitute a major revolutionary threat," and cited the "intellectual climate" as the reason why the West probably won't deal with threats.

That "intellectual climate" is perfectly exemplified by leading Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama, who has never voted for military action to counter the murder of Americans and westerners. Yet he referred to outsourcing of American jobs as "the violence of men and women who have worked all their lives and suddenly have the rug pulled out from under them," and called radio host Don Imus' "nappy headed ho" comment "verbal violence."

I'd be hard pressed to trust the perspective of someone who appears prone to confusing a paper cut with a bloodbath. Perhaps if we could get the terrorists to engage in some aggressive carpet removal or hip-hop karaoke, Obama's interest in fighting might be aroused.

Obama says: "We know we can win this war based on shared purpose." Bill Clinton already tried dazzling extremists with his charm and charisma. It didn't work. Neither has 50-odd years of "negotiating" with Mideast radicals.

A "shared purpose" can only mean that we would all have to unite in wanting to kill the people who want us dead. And Obama has yet to prove that there exists a circumstance in which he'd be prepared to do that.

No one who initially voted against the war should get to vote in favour of doing nothing again. How about taking your dulcet tones to the local Toastmasters club, where you can refine your defeatist rhetoric while doing less harm to the world.

PUBLISHED: TORONTO SUN (April 29/07)