Democrats approach Iraq with a rational, logical mind: the country is in civil war. We've lost 2,318 Americans, with another 16,653 soldiers
coming home maimed and wounded. (
Update A reader pointed out that 16,653 is the total number wounded, including those who return to duty within 72 hours. 7,912 casualties are so serious so that they do not immediately return to active duty. I just wanted to clarify the numbers). It's costing us about $200 million per day. It will cost us up to $2
trillion dollars to possibly end up with a fragmented state governed as an Islamic theocracy (quite a change from a formerly secular state). Our mission in Iraq is over. We went in looking for WMD. We didn't find them because they weren't there. Bush says we went to "liberate" the Iraqi people. They're liberated. They voted in several elections. Parliament has met. It's time to come home.
While Democrats embrace the facts to shape Iraq policy, Republicans embrace--well, the words of a monster. Take Bill Bennett yesterday. The CNN commentator said this on CBS Sunday Morning (the only transcript is at Powerline, so sorry, no linky for that site):
We cannot leave today. In three years, Iraq has gone from an entrenched tyranny to a fledgling democracy, but it cannot YET stand alone. Terrorists, insurgents, dead-enders, and tyrants either want Hussein back, or their own version of a perverted rule of Nazism. Don't take my word for it, just read the last several messages of Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri-they want us OUT, and they want us out NOW.
If we heed the desires of bin Laden, Zawahiri, and Zarqawi rather than our own soldiers and our allies, we will hand the terrorists a victory, we will endanger the entire region, and we will be taken less seriously on the world stage-something we cannot afford. Especially now. Radical Islam is on the march, we must stop that march.
Remember, bin Laden said we were a paper tiger: he said we would leave when the going got tough. We must prove him wrong.
I can only imagine bin Laden huddled in some cave in Pakistan (Afghanistan, wherever the hell he is this news cycle), listening to Bill Bennett and other conservatives quote his words on some crappy satellite radio, smiling to his egomaniacal self as he realizes he controls American foreign policy. Why do Republicans let the world's most dangerous terrorist dictate our actions in Iraq? Why do they base our actions on his words rather than the facts on the ground? If bin Laden put out yet another tape and said he wanted us to stay in Iraq forever, would that mean we could leave? Pretty please? After all, apparently the only compass for our foreign policy is to be the "north" to bin Laden's "south." Funny how bin Laden is a mass murderer, a liar, a propagandist, a monster (all true) yet the administration refuses to recognize him as the sadistic manipulator that he is.
If Democrats want to change the Iraq debate, they should point out that bin Laden's stated goal is not to take over Iraq. It is to bankrupt the United States through war:
"We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy. Allah willing, and nothing is too great for Allah," bin Laden said in the transcript. [...]
"We, alongside the mujahedeen, bled Russia for 10 years until it went bankrupt and was forced to withdraw in defeat," bin Laden said.
He also said al Qaeda has found it "easy for us to provoke and bait this administration."
Bill Bennett, President Bush, and the rest of the illogical Republicans claim withdrawing from Iraq would "hand the terrorists a victory." Yet every day we remain in Iraq under the auspices of democracy-building (when we're really there because of fear) is another day which brings a smile to bin Laden's face. We defeat terrorists by not letting them control our foreign policy. We defeat them by having the facts, not their rhetoric, dictate our actions in war. The facts in Iraq say it's time to leave, to take the target off our soldiers' backs and to let the Iraqis build their own democracy. Only when we act in such a reality-based fashion can we declare a victory for the American people.
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