False posturing in Congress
Bookworm on Jul 18 2007 at 3:06 pm | Filed under: Anti-war, Congress, Democrats, Iraq, Jihad, Muslim violence
Neo-neocon is an elegant writer, so I like her summary of the theater in which the Democrats engaged last night when they called for a slumber party to dramatize their desire to withdraw from the Iraq War immediately. I left a comment at her blog, which I like enough that I’m reprinting it here as a post:
I was talking with a friend today [DQ, of course] about the vacuum behind the Democratic calls for withdrawal. Unlike the Republicans, who constantly talk about (a) the threat of worldwide jihad if we pull out; (b) the risk to Iraqis themselves if we pull out; and (c) the long term benefits, both in Iraq and vis a vis jihadist terrorism if we stay in, the Democrats never talk about anything beyond the day of withdrawal. All they can imagine is turning back the clock to the day before the Iraq invasion. Their unspoken belief is that, if we do that, the jihadists will themselves retreat and make nice with us forever after.
The Democrat viewpoint inverts and ignores a few things. First, while 3,600 American soldiers have given their lives for our freedom, the fact remains that it took 4 years for the jihadists to snuff out those lights. Before we got into Iraq, on 9/11, it took the jihadists three hours to snuff out almost as many people. And since we’ve been in Iraq, there have not been any attacks on American civilians, barring contractors who have operated within the theater of war.
Additionally, during this same period, jihadist attacks have escalated, not just against Britain which is our ally, but against all sorts of other people who have nothing to do with Iraq (attacks in the Philippines, Indonesia, and Russia spring to mind).
In other words, despite Democratic rhetoric, as to both Americans and many other nations, there is no corollary between increased jihadist violence and involvement (or lack of involvement) in Iraq.
The Dems’ posturing therefore is especially despicable because it’s selling a bill of goods to credulous Americans who are not tightly tied into the news and have not realized that (a) American civilian risk peaked before we entered Iraq and (b) worldwide civilian risk from jihadists in countries unaffiliated with the Iraq war continues to escalate dramatically.
Email This Post To A Friend
5 Responses to “False posturing in Congress”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
I see you sometimes get your inspiration for posts from comments as well ; )
Eloquent, persuasive, perfect. You should be a lawyer:)
That or a therapist.
I’ve said it before and say it again: the difference between Congress and a wax museum is that the museum exudes more warmth and sincerity.
[...] Bookworm Room, “False Posturing in Congress” [...]