Free Republic

No matter where my colleagues came down in 2003 about the centrality of Iraq to the war on terror, there can simply be no debate that our efforts in Iraq today are critical to the wider struggle against violent Islamic extremism. Already, the terrorists are emboldened, excited that America is talking not about winning in Iraq, but is rather debating when we should lose. Last week, Ayman al-Zawahiri, al-Qaeda’s deputy chief, said that the United States is merely delaying our “inevitable” defeat in Iraq, and that “the Mujahideen of Islam in Iraq of the caliphate and jihad are advancing with...

Count me among those perplexed by John McCain’s decision to go negative. Does the Senator think he’s not coming across as curmudgeonly enough? Does he think he’ll reap some benefit from turning himself into the political version of Grandpa Simpson? If I were McCain, I’d go upbeat and explain my own positions and repair my own relationships with the party faithful. That’s what he has to do. Honestly, is there any Republican candidate out there that McCain would defeat (other than Larry Libertarian) in a head-to-head match-up? He has to tend to his own image. Knocking down nine other...