BCT Editorial – 6/21/05

This page was last updated on June 24, 2005.

Staying power; Editorial; Beaver County Times; June 21, 2005.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“The United States and the American people cannot walk away from the mess that is Iraq today.

“Instead, our nation needs to increase its military presence in order to stabilize the situation, no matter what the consequences in terms of military casualties and cost.”

[RWC] This is a poor attempt to goad the Bush administration into pushing Congress to institute a draft. A draft would allow liberals to say, “We told you Bush wanted a draft.” It would also make it easier to drum up widespread war opposition.

“Last week, a small bipartisan group of House lawmakers - including a Republican who voted for war - introduced a resolution that would require the president to announce by the end of this year a plan for withdrawing troops and steps for following through on that plan.”

[RWC] The author failed to tell us how small the “bipartisan group of House lawmakers” is. It is exactly 4! The author also neglected to tell us three of the four representatives opposed the Iraq War from the beginning, and one of them is Dennis Kucinich.

“Discontent with the post-war effort is not limited to a few disgruntled House members. The Associated Press reports only 41 percent of adults said in an AP-Ipsos poll this month that they supported Bush’s handling of the war in Iraq.

“A Gallup poll released last week produced the same results. It found that six in 10 Americans say they think the United States should withdraw some or all of its troops from Iraq.”

[RWC] Should we be surprised by these poll results? Democrats and the press constantly bash the effort, report in excruciating detail everything bad that happens, and completely ignore the good. We have Democrat senators making statements so anti-American that they lead the news broadcasts of anti-American networks like Al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya, et cetera.

“However, the consequences of walking away from Iraq without stabilizing the situation and securing its future as a viable nation-state would be enormous.

“Richard Whittle of The Dallas Morning News reported worst-case scenarios of a U.S. pullout could include:”

[RWC] Other than being an alleged reporter, what is Mr. Whittle’s expertise in this area?

· A civil war in Iraq resulting in far greater bloodshed than the current conflict, though presumably without further U.S. losses.

[RWC] There might be fewer short-term U.S. losses, but there would surely be far more deaths in the long term.

· The transformation of western Iraq, which is dominated by Sunni Muslims, into a haven for international terrorists from al-Qaida and other groups.

[RWC] Iraq was “haven for international terrorists from al-Qaida and other groups” before we got there.

· A collapse of U.S. credibility among nations of the Middle East, whose leaders would probably distance themselves from Washington.

[RWC] Isn’t that what folks like Senators Durbin and Kennedy are trying to accomplish via their comments?

· A collapse of the Bush administration’s push for democracy in the region.

“The United States simply cannot allow that to happen. Iraq can be saved, but not without an increased commitment from the Bush administration and the American people.

“New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman wrote last week that the situation is salvageable - if the United States doubles the number of troops it has in Iraq, if it redoubles its effort to bring the Sunnis who want to be involved into the process, if the insurgents can be put on the defensive.”

[RWC] Thomas Friedman is the NYT equivalent of a Gino Piroli or a BCT editorial author. I guess that makes him an expert.

“If, if, if, if, if.

“Unfortunately, the American people don’t want to hear ‘if this’ and ‘if that.’ The Gallup poll cited above found that 56 percent of those surveyed said that they would be upset if more troops were sent to Iraq.

“Even more revealing, the Gallup poll and an ABC-Washington Post survey both found that almost six in 10 in both polls said the war was not worth fighting.”

[RWC] Again, should we be shocked given the press coverage and the continuing drumbeat of anti-American comments made by Democrat leadership?

“Our support for the expansion of the effort in Iraq is not an endorsement of the Bush administration’s policies. Its smugness, its hubris, its lies, its deceits, its half-truths are at the bottom of this meltdown. American and Iraqi blood is on their hands.

“However, we must not punish the Iraqi people for our mistakes. We are responsible for the chaos in Iraq today, and we cannot treat that nation as if it were an insignificant toy that can be thrown away because we have gotten tired of it.”

[RWC] These two paragraphs help make my point about anti-American press coverage of the war. If you were of enlistment age, would you even consider military service if this was most of what you heard and read?

Once again we get the image that Iraq was a peaceful, non-threatening Arab paradise before we got on the scene.

“We cannot walk away as if nothing has happened. Too much is at stake, for them and for us.”