Posted by
Kenneth G. Davenport on Thursday, January 17, 2008 8:05:37 PM
I’ve written frequently on these pages that I believe the Left lives in a different world than I do. They see the world through a prism of victimization and emotion, where good intentions are far more important than good outcomes, and where facts seldom get in the way of a good argument (or policy) that might make them feel better about the world they live in. In this vein, people are fundamentally not capable of making their own decisions or of providing for themselves. Whether it is from racism, sexism or other “ism” foisted on them by the “power class”, the answer is always the same: more government, more entitlements, more help for the huddled masses.
This is troubling enough on domestic issues, but it is downright dangerous when it comes to foreign affairs. Take the war in Iraq. It is now clear beyond dispute that the “surge” that began a year ago has made a dramatic difference in the war. U.S. and civilian casualties are down more than 80%, and life in Baghdad has returned to a state of normalcy not seen since the war began in 2003. In many ways life is actually better for Iraqis now than it was under Saddam – with free enterprise, music and culture now taking hold in areas that were subject to widespread oppression under Baath party rule. The Democrats believe that this can’t be true – that conditions in Iraq were better under Saddam’s iron rule, and that the war was a fundamental mistake. But if you ask the average Iraqi, I believe they would say that despite the violence of the past several years, Iraq is increasingly a place of hope and opportunity. It isn’t popular among the mainstream media, but Iraq is becoming a success story. We aren’t out of the woods, and we still could fail in the end; but the surge has largely worked in creating the security that was so badly missing in previous years.
So it is troublesome that the Democrats running for president not only continue to stick to their opposition to the war, but continue to state with a straight face that the surge is not helping. Hillary, for example, is sticking with her “suspending disbelief” statement to General Patraeus that the surge is working. She can’t seem to stomach the idea that maybe the US is winning now, and that we now have a very real chance of success there. Even the oft-repeated complaint that the political process is moribund is no longer accurate; at the province level in particular, former Sunni insurgents have turned against Al Qaeda and have now joined the political process, giving real promise to the possibility of a grass-roots accommodation between Sunni and Shia factions. Events on the ground in Iraq have overtaken the politics of Washington – and it seems that the Democrat’s are the last to acknowledge it.
Why so? Could it be because the base of the Democrat party is invested in our defeat in Iraq? That is doesn’t fit with the narrative they’ve created that paints the US as the misguided aggressor? Or that their hate of George Bush is so great that they can’t put patriotism in the place of partisanship? Though I can’t understand it, there is (and always has been) a sizable segment of our country who want to see America get its comeuppance -- for centuries of perceived imperialist oppression of those who (again) can’t fend for themselves. It’s the macro view of the victimization mindset – seeking defeat of power, even when it hurts the nation as a whole.
It’s a scary place to be when the prospective Commanders in Chief are so vested in minimizing the success of the very military that they are campaigning to lead. They can couch their oxymoronic “opposition to the war but support for the troops” any way they wish, but it would be a tragedy to reward such pessimism with power in November.
It would take a willing suspension of disbelief not to think so.