Posted on 11/15/2007 5:10:16 PM PST by ConservativeMajority
By every measure, the tide has turned in Iraq. American troop deaths are on the decline along with the number of roadside bombings and incidents of sectarian violence. The flow of refugees out of Iraq has reversed course and those displaced within the country are returning to the neighborhoods where they once lived.
Several factors came together to change what many believed to be a quagmire for the United States and an intractable civil war between Shi’a and Sunnis into a hopeful scenario of a secure and democratic Islamic nation in the heart of the Middle East. The dramatic shift in the conditions on the ground in Iraq can be directly attributed to the “surge” of troops into areas held by insurgents and al Qaeda. The show of American military strength and resolve convinced insurgents and rival factions to turn on al Qaeda and drive them out. Consequently, the terrorists were routed from their safe havens and security began to grow from the bottom up. The turnaround in a western province nearly given up for lost in 2006 is referred to as the “Anbar Awakening.”
Insurgent militias and al Qaeda forces ruled the territory, but the terrorist group’s imposition of a Taliban-style of sharia law antagonized the population. Sheikh Sattar Abu Risha led a movement to oust al Qaeda from the region. President Bush visited Anbar province in early September to demonstrate how much the situation had changed. Similar awakenings have spread across the country enabling Iraqi forces to take control over more aspects of their own security.
Gen. David Petraeus reported all of this during in his testimony before Congress in the despicable “Betray-Us” hearings. Gen. Ray Odierno expressed a similarly positive assessment in a much less publicized presentation at the National Press Club in October. In the wake of these reports an amazing political transformation has been taking place on Capitol Hill. President Bush and his most loyal supporters do not appear to be standing so alone on the war anymore. Once wary Republicans closed ranks behind the President to sustain his vetoes that ruled out timetables for withdrawal of troops and other legislative tactics that would micromanage conduct of the war. The voices of war critics within the Republican Party have also grown faint. All of the GOP presidential candidates except for long-shot Ron Paul have strongly endorsed completing the mission in Iraq.
The evidence of success in Iraq can be gauged by how few stories about the war end up on the front page of The New York Times and The Washington Post or lead the nightly network newscasts. Recently, Charlie Gibson opened ABC’s World News Tonight broadcast by saying: “One item from Baghdad today. The news is… that there is no news. The police told us that, to their knowledge, there were no major acts of violence. Attacks are down in Baghdad and today no bombings or roadside explosions were reported.”
In July, liberal Brookings Institute foreign policy scholars Michael O’Hanlon and Ken Pollack wrote a piece for The New York Times suggesting that the United States might prevail in Iraq. More recently, the liberal punditocracy has begun to fret that Democrats’ opposition to a war that America was winning could haunt them in 2008 and beyond.
However, there is a problem with the Democratic leadership. Who will lead the Democrats’ Anbar Awakening? Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman might have been able to pull it off, except for the fact that he got bounced from the party in 2006 because he supported the war and had to run as an Independent to retain his seat. Last week, he chastised Democrats for their obsession to pull troops out of Iraq in order to hand a defeat to President Bush.
Democratic leaders in Congress are unlikely to bring the party’s thinking into line with reality. In April, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid declared, “The war is lost.” Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have introduced over forty bills to cut off funds or force a premature withdrawal with such increasing urgency as if desperate to secure defeat before victory can be achieved. None of the Democratic presidential candidates would risk the wrath of the hardcore antiwar base of the party by suggesting the Iraq war is winnable and that the mission deserved a chance to succeed. Alleged Democratic hawk Rep. John Murtha, who has been pushing a “cut and run” strategy of “redeployment” away from the battlefield for over two years could never admit that antithesis of his plan was working.
Such is the political quagmire for Democrats. The party is so invested in the defeat of its country’s own military that it cannot admit its own defeat in bringing it about. Anyone breaking ranks with the defeatists is severely chastised by the radical groups like MoveOn.org and Code Pink that have a stranglehold on the Democratic Party. Rep. Brian Baird, a Washington Democrat returned from Iraq in August and suggested that the surge was working. The leftists savaged Baird and called for his head. If no Democrat steps up to lead the awakening, the party’s reputation of weakness, defeatism and cowardice will be affirmed in the minds of Americans for another generation.
Which is precisely what happened to them after being in control of Congress for 12 years. Their defeats last year reminded them that we, the voters, are paying attention and will punish them when necessary.
Jeff Gannon??? Are you kidding?
Oh well ... /sigh
Sure, why not? He makes a good point about the defeatocrats and how hard it will be for them to deal with victory in Iraq.
True. But more fundamentally, we have a war going that is going to last 20-40 years. Iraq is but one campaign. We need to find a way to let the dems get some political credit for success. Otherwise, they will continue to obstruct and work for defeat. I'm not sure how to do that. But we have to get there somehow because we cannot fight a war of this duration with half the public actively invested in defeat.
In the cold war, the dems were on the side of America until about 1972, when the McGovernites took over the party. For the next 18 years, they did their best to make the US lose the cold war. Today, they are doing the same in the WOT. How do we get them back?
Morning drive time radio, which I believe is the most biased and poll skewing medium of all (everybody listens for traffic and weather), hasn’t changed . This morning:”More American blood shed in Iraq; one soldier was killed and four others were wounded in a roadside bombing in Delali province. This brings to 3,800+ Americans killed since 2003.” That’s the only news, a soundbite with no context, move on to the next story. It sounds like every other morning, and who notices when they don’t have anything to report? Therefore , the perception of most people, who aren’t paying close attention is that “nothing has changed.”
At some point, when there is no bad news to report, there will be no reports about Iraq. The MSM has already moved the goalposts to focus on veterans making up 25% of US homeless, many suffer from PTSD, poor conditions at Walter Reed, suicide rates, etc.
I agree that's part of the game also. As well as the expense and the corruption.
There’s still only one credible democrat on the war: Joe Lieberman.
This little thing called credibility. Mr. WhateverTheHellHisNameOrSexualOrientationIsThisWeek has none.
I’m not pleading his case, I’m looking at what he has written. What is your opinion of that?
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