Posted on 02/22/2003 9:18:34 AM PST by Tunehead54
DEMOCRATS PUTTING PARTY OVER COUNTRY
The day before President Bush delivered the State of the Union address, Sen. Tom Daschle (D, SO) and Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) marched to the National Press Club to declare, "The state of the union is anxious." Whatever anxiety existed, they exploited with gusto.
In a jaw-dropping performance, the Senate and House Minority Leaders mounted a venomous State-of-the-Union "pre-buttal," proceeding to rip the President on everything from the economy to the war on terror. Not much, according to these Democrats, was right with the way America was being governed, and they were just the folks to catalog the wrongs.
Daschle went straight for the jugular, attacking President Bush's strength: his credibility. Daschle claimed Americans hear "mixed signals from the White House on everything from the economy to Iraq to North Korea. They sense the indecision on what to do about the war on terrorism. They see the shifts in direction, the false starts and the backsliding on basic promises."
"History is full of politicians whose rhetoric is out of step with reality," intoned Daschle, who promise something and then fail to deliver. But the Bush Administration offers a credibility gap with a new twist: This is a White House that promises one thing knowing full well it is delivering another."
After the previous eight years, uttering those words required uncommon chutzpah. Washington Post congressional reporter Jim VandeHei wrote, "In recent days, Daschle has accused the President of essentially lying to the American people." That was the explicit plan. According to another Washington Post news article: "Democratic strategists said the party, smarting from losses in November's elections, is determined to use Bush's address to spread doubts about his leadership, which have become evident in recent polls."
Spread doubts about his leadership. As we move closer to war, my friends, this is what passes for the latest Democrat Party agenda: undermining the credibility and leadership of the President of the United States.
Indeed, the unprecedented and unrestrained attacks on the Administration Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter, and much the Democratic leadership is starting have an effect ... a very detrimental effect. These onslaughts are not only intended for domestic consumption, but, by demonstrating that the U.S. is not united, are also meant to evoke rancor from our "allies." It's increasingly open season on America, and foreign officials who would have thought twice before publicly rebuking us now feel little restraint.
This is why the left drools over the U.N., and its vaunted "multilateralism" the whole point of which is to elevate hapless, weak countries to the position of global critics (sort of like Tom Daschle sitting on a phone book) and to give them a platform to bash America.
When it comes to Iraq, the political calculations that Democrats are making almost obscene. The New York Post's intrepid reporter, Deborah Orin, dug up a quote from an unnamed Democrat strategist: "If you support Bush on Iraq and wins, you gain zip. If you support him and he loses, you lose along with him. But you oppose him and things go bad, you stand to be a big winner."
This is the once-great Democrat Party, my friends. You thought I was exaggerating when I told you that the one thing animating Democrats these days is the prospect of reacquiring power. They're not even concerned about whether the country ends up winning, whether the country does the right thing, whether the outcome is good for America. They're solely focused on how they can personally benefit from it.
Orin reports: "At a time when U.S. troops seem headed in harm's way, this strategist - and several other Democrats who are disgusted with their own party - suggest some Dems are calculating they could gain politically if there are body bags."
This is vile. And the problem is, there just aren't enough Democrats who are "disgusted" with these tactics. As a result of the party being thoroughly Clintonized, the current Democratic Party structure embraces this power-at-any-price approach unequivocally.
And it infuses everything. In their view, the formula holds. For them to succeed, George Bush must fail. His policies must fail. The economy must implode. The war must be a debacle. Citizens must be in pain. These Dems are convinced that what's good for the economy is bad for the Democrat Party; what's good for the prosecution of the war on terror is bad for the Democrat Party. There is no other conclusion possible: to the present leadership, the interests of the Democratic Party and the interests of the United States are, sadly, at odds.
In fact, the Democrats once again are shooting themselves in the foot. President Bush, like it or not, has decided to remove Saddam Hussein from the seat of power in Iraq. Bush has made it rather plain that he will accomplish this. It's going to happen one of two ways: either by the irresistible force of the U.S. military, or by the irresistible force of world opinion.
And this is what's stunning. If these lunkheads at the U.N. Security Council, the whole membership of the United Of Nations, and the whole Party would simply unite behind the proposition that Saddam Hussein is persona non grata, he couldn't survive. If world opinion were united against (strangely in my scan "against" was picked up as a single capital "W") him, then he would take the exile option. But as long as he's got Democrats in this country, in essence, protecting him, as long as he's got rogue nations making his case in the United Nations, then the military option is guaranteed.
For all these people to claim they don't want the military option, the protesters who don't like war, they don't like death, there's an easy way to avoid it. Just join the chorus that is condemning Hussein - for his human rights violations, his lying to the world, his violation of resolution after resolution, his buildup of weapons of mass destruction and he'd be finished, without a shot being fired.
The antiwar movement would get what it wants; the French would get what they want; Tom Daschle and Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and Ted Kennedy would get what they want. The Democrats don't want Bush to have a successful war.
Well, all they'd have to do is simply join the chorus. If the world were genuinely united in opposition to the existence of Saddam Hussein, I don't think he'd survive a month.
But the more the United Nations and American Democrats disrupt option two, the irresistible force of world opinion, the closer they steer events to option one. The Democrats and the antiwar crowd and the Security Council of the United Nations are actually themselves, I think, steering us toward military action, by virtue of their refusal to join the chorus of condemnation against Saddam Hussein. The more these self-annointed peaceniks protest, the more they weaken the irresistible force of world opinion, which leads events to the irresistible force of the U.S. military.
But the problem for Democrats is the burden of Bill Clinton's legacy: everything to them is spin. They're spinning a war! They're trying to game their position on Iraq. Instead of, "What's the right thing to do?" their approach is, "What's the best way to position ourselves politically to hurt George Bush?" Their foremost concern is not the best interests of the country but rather the reacquisition of their own power.
And here's the rub. They have chosen to oppose an honorable man. And that has put this current crop of Democrats completely at a loss. Here is a man of character, totally motivated by fulfilling his responsibilities to the country by doing the right thing. How can they compete with that?
I know, my friends, it is difficult to listen to the slings and arrows, the insults and sneers aimed at George Bush by leftists - both foreign and domestic. And I must warn you, this international rabble-babble will swell, the closer we get to actual war.
But have no fear - the moment the American military is fully unleashed, the only sound you'll be able to hear will be the deafening cheers of the American public.
As President Bush said in the State of the Union address: "Our war against terror is a contest of will in which perseverance is power. In the ruins of two towers, at the western wall of the Pentagon, on a field in Pennsylvania, this nation made a pledge, and we renew that pledge tonight: Whatever the duration of this struggle, and whatever the difficulties, we will not permit the triumph of violence in the affairs of men - free people will set the course of history."
That, my friends, is wisdom based in truth - and moral clarity. And that is what's good for the country. Let's roll.
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