Posted on 12/27/2006 6:26:37 PM PST by RetiredArmy
George Bush Is a Hero
By: Edward I. Koch
Wednesday, Dec. 27, 2006
President George W. Bush, vilified by many, supported by some, is a hero to me.
Why do I say that? It's not because I agree with the president's domestic agenda. It's not because I think he's done a perfect job in the White House.
George Bush is a hero to me because he has courage.
The president does what he believes to be in the best interest of the United States. He sticks with his beliefs, no matter how intense the criticism and invective that are directed against him every day.
The enormous defeat President Bush suffered with the loss of both Houses of Congress has not caused him to retreat from his position that the U.S. alone now stands between a radical Islamic takeover of many of the world's governments in the next 30 or more years. If that takeover occurs, we will suffer an enslavement that will threaten our personal freedoms and take much of the world back into the Dark Ages.
Our major ally in this war against the forces of darkness, Great Britain, is still being led by an outstanding prime minister, Tony Blair. However, Blair will soon be set out to pasture, which means Great Britain will leave our side and join France, Germany, Spain, and other countries that foolishly believe they can tame the wolf at the door and convert it into a domestic pet that will live in peace with them.
These dreamers naively believe that if we feed the wolves what they demand, they will go away. But that won't happen.
Appeasement never works. The wolves always come back for more and more, and when we have nothing left to give, they come for us.
Radical Islamists are very much aware that we have shown fear. For example, we have allowed the people of Darfur — dark skinned Africans — to be terrorized, killed, raped, and taken as slaves by the supporters of the Sudanese government, radical Islamists.
The countries surrounding Iraq — Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan — made up of Sunni Arabs, know that for them, the wolves who are the radical Shia are already at their door. The New York Times reported on Dec. 13, 2006, "Saudi Arabia has told the Bush administration that it might provide financial backing to Iraqi Sunnis in any war against Iraq's Shiites if the United States pulls its troops out of Iraq, according to American and Arab diplomats . . .
"The Saudis have argued strenuously against an American pullout from Iraq, citing fears that Iraq's minority Sunni Arab population would be massacred . . . The Bush administration is also working on a way to form a coalition of Sunni Arab nations and a moderate Shiite government in Iraq, along with the United States and Europe, to stand against ‘Iran, Syria and the terrorists."
This Saudi response will take place notwithstanding that until now, according to the Times, "The Saudis have been wary of supporting Sunnis in Iraq because their insurgency there has been led by extremists of al-Qaida, who are opposed to the kingdom's monarchy. But if Iraq's sectarian war worsened, the Saudis would line up with Sunni tribal leaders."
The Times article went on to state the opinion of an Arab expert, Nawaf Obaid, who was recently fired by the Saudi foreign minister after Obaid wrote an op ed in The Washington Post asserting that the Saudis were prepared in the event of an American pullout to engage in a "massive intervention to stop Iranian-backed Shiite militias from butchering Iraqi Sunnis."
Obaid went on "suggest[ing] that Saudi Arabia could cut world oil prices in half…a move that would be devastating to Iran."
The Times reported, "Arab diplomats . . . said that Mr. Obaid's column reflected the view of the Saudi government." When writing about affairs of state in distant places, unless you are on the scene talking to knowledgeable participants, the most reliable sources to support conjecture with "facts" are the superb reporters of the great international newspapers like The New York Times.
Surely this turn of events in Saudi Arabia undoubtedly replicated in other Sunni-dominated countries — Sunnis are 80 percent of the world's Muslim population. This will give support to my proposal, advanced nearly a year ago, that we tell our allies, regional and NATO, that we are getting out of Iraq unless they come in.
That may well work, and they will come in, in large part and share the casualties of combat and the financial costs of war.
Doing what I suggest is far better than simply pulling out, which is the direction in which we are headed, notwithstanding the president's opposition. I think at the moment simply getting out and not making an attempt to bring our allies in is supported by a majority of Americans and would be supported by a majority of Democrats in the Congress.
For me, staying is clearly preferable, provided we are not alone and are joined by our regional and NATO allies, aggressively taking on the difficult but necessary task of destroying radical Islam and its terrorist agenda if we don't want to see radical Islam destroy the Western world and moderate Arab states over the next generation, or as long as it takes for them to succeed.
Two other requirements are needed to bring the war in Iraq to a successful conclusion: First, require the Iraqi government to allow greater autonomy for the three regions — Kurd, Sunni, and Shia. The second requirement is that the national Iraqi government enact legislation that will divide all oil and natural gas revenues in a way similar to that of our own state of Alaska.
The Alaskan state government takes from those revenues all it will need to finance government and provide services and the balance is divided among the population of Alaska, in a profit sharing program. That would settle the major Sunni problem which has been being cut out of oil revenues because the country's oil is located only in Kurdish and Shiite areas.
If the Iraqi government refuses our demands, our reply should be "Goodbye. You're on your own." This proposal was suggested to me by Mike Sheppard in Chapel Hill, N.C.
It won't be easy to implement this proposal. But President Bush has courage.
Now is the time to use it.
So you are holding the President responsible for the death of children.
That's what I thought. You'd better be careful about saying that too often around here.
You know what I'm referring to?? Your vile comparison of me with Cindy Sheehan? Remember that?
Of course I go to church. I've been a Christian for fifty years, Cobra, and have only missed church when I was too ill to get out of bed.
How about you?
How about you?
I am a Presbyterian, my wife is a Roman Catholic, our son is a Lutheran, and our daughter is a Methodist.
The laws of illegal immigration is not the responsibility of the President. It is the local State government that is responsible for enforcement. The laws are already on the books and have been there for the last 100 years.
To say that President Bush is at fault is to say that he planned or is to blame for 9-11 as well. (But I wouldn't put it past you either.)
My husband was raised in the Missionary Church and is now a Presbyterian as well.
Our kids are all still Presbyterian, but our eldest daughter, living in England, attends an Anglican church because of the great choral music.
In the context of current events, with enemies both foreign and domestic, I grade Dubya at about a B+, with his only real redmarks being on the dreaded (but potentially-overstated) II problem.
We should have held the Congress. That we didn't speaks poorly of our local organization. Let's get out there and give 'em hell in 2008. These next two years will be Dry Comedy.
We're all blessed to be Americans. Let's not screw it up by eating each other.
Rest assured of that.
But basically, are you are denying the fact that illegals are disproportionally perpetrators of crime?
The fact that 95% of L.A. County's homicide warrants are for illegals means nothing to you?
The fact that approximately one third of California's prison inmates are illegal aliens means nothing to you?
The author of this article has admitted his world starts and stops with New York City. I believe that he wants what's best for NYC, regardless of what label a particular politician wears.
He is correct to praise Dubya for stopping further terrorist acts against his beloved city.
The deaths of Americans, not connected with NYC appears to have no effect on him.
And if we are honest with ourselves, we'll have to admit that the death of a nun in Oregon or a family in Arizona, or those two kids in a Dodge minivan on the I-10 Freeway in California just don't come up on the politician's radar.
And why should it, Joe and Jane Sixpack aren't big campaign contributors.
Even politicians opposed to Dubya's Amnesty rarely bring up the high number of criminals that are coming in. The PC police would be fast to hammer them chanting "Our Diversity is our Strength".
Our good President will be seen very differently after the passage of time.
:-)
BUMP!!!
Nancee
I wholeheartedly agree.
But I'm not going to sit idly by while people claiming to be conservatives 'eat' the man who is leading us through the most dangerous time in American history.
At that point, the 'can't we all get along' mentality just doesn't hold water.
He's got two free years of vetoing whatever the heck he wants. History will be very kind to our 43rd Chief Exec.
Sad to see experienced Republican statesmen, you know, those who, already wealthy, decide to turn their gratitude into public service, dying off and/or retiring from public life.
To be a fly on the wall in, heck, Jerry Ford's Oval Office would be a moment of excellence in itself. Dubya has a terrific cabinet - though Rummy should NOT have been thrown under the bus.
All you have to do is start telling the truth, and you'll be welcomed here. The trouble is that you are not doing that.
And you have made heinous accusations against the President of the United States, and I'm not about to let that go by unquestioned.
Now you have added the accusation that the President allows children to die because those opposed to it don't have money for campaign contributions.
I hope the Mods are watching you, troll, because you are on very thin ice here.
The state's responsibility? You are kidding, I know you are.
As to 9-11, I think I'm one of the few posters who points out just how difficult it would be to 'wire up' a set of buildings like the WTC, just how long it would take to chip away the concrete around the vertical steel members so the charge would cut versus just warp. Just how many miles of wiring, all tested in place... (I better stop here)
So I hold Osama Ben Laudin & Co. responsible for that act of murder.
Please don't repeat the leftist lie that he was 'thrown under the bus.'
The terms of any high-level termination are always dressed up for gracious public consumption. Whether Rumsfeld was "asked to resign" or not is really academic and pedantic. The point is, the Commies scored a belt-notch. This cannot continue, and, frankly, I don't suspect it will.
Those dillweed Repubs in the Senate have a lot to answer for over the next two years, having effectively stalled most of the legislative agenda Dubya had coming forth, such as SS private accounts and the soon-to-expire tax cuts. He has no friends on the Hill, no political campaign to run, and his enemies are all in plain sight. He'll have a wondrous "lame duck" session, replete with his vision.
I'm not trying to be difficult, but did you see the interviews of both men? Unless you think they're both lying, it was Rumsfeld who submitted his resignation repeatedly and the President who finally accepted it.
There is no doubt that the reason for its necessity was the Democrat victory in November, for which they take full credit.
And I completely concur with your assessment of the Republican 'dillweeds.' They have been spineless and disgraceful.
And I have no doubt that the President will continue his full press offense for the next two years. He hasn't had real support in the past, and he sure isn't going to get it now........but fortunately, he doesn't care. He does what he thinks is right regardless of the opposition.
One would thought the world had came to an end.
But one LAPD homicide detective simply asked, "So where was your outrage when umpteen hundred other citizens were murdered?
But as other posters have noted, immigration is Dubya's weak point.
And if the Democrats were to take a strong position on sealing the borders, they'd sweep every office in the country, from dog catcher up.
But they too are indifferent to the carnage illegals aliens are committing.
We have no Sari Ribbicoff.
(For you youngsters, her uncle was an important and liberal US Senator)
It is quite another to say accuse him of being responsible for the deaths of children, and not caring.
Your accusations are hideous, and as far from knowledge of the character of the President as they could be.
I have no interest in continuing this conversation. Nothing you could say now could redeem the evil you have already posted.
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