© David Burton 2005

I hear it every day and I see it every day. “I hate George W. Bush”; “George W. Bush is stupid”; “George W. Bush lied to us about the need to invade Iraq”; and George W. Bush is losing the war in Iraq”. A year ago, I also heard, “George W. Bush has led us into a recession”; “George W. Bush is causing high unemployment”; “George Bush isn’t the real president - he stole the election from Al Gore”. Bush haters seem to be coming out of the woodwork wherever we look. Their hatred and vindictiveness is palpable and their attacks are repugnant to the more moderate among us.

September 16, 2005: Within an hour of President Bush delivering a comprehensive plan for recovering from the disaster of hurricane Katrina, Democrats and Liberals were denouncing the plan for any number of reasons: too expensive, not enough money, not enough blame, no oversight, etc. This constant carping and negativity has worn thin. It wore thin a year ago and was part of the reason that John Kerry lost the election. Democrats and Liberals alike need to get the message. We’re tired of their constant complaining, grouching and unreasonable belligerency, without any positive and progressive recommendations for moving on. America is a country of optimists - not one of eternal pessimism. I am a conservative who typically votes the Republican ticket. Yet 5 years ago I voted for Bill Clinton instead of Robert Dole, and 9 years ago I also voted for Bill Clinton instead of George Bush, Senior. Why? Not because I had any great faith in Bill Clinton, but I had even less faith in the Republican candidates who sat back and offered no plans for advancement and instead campaigned with either a neutral or negative message.

Within minutes of the announcement that Judge Samuel Alito was being nominated as the next Supreme Court Justice, Senator Ted Kennedy was complaining the he was not qualified for the position because he was too conservative, i.e., he was not a strong proponent for abortion and women's rights.

Within a day of an indictment being handed in against Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby, Senators Kennedy and Kerry were railing against the “massive corruption in the highest echelons of the administration”. Never mind, that no trial had yet been held for Libby. Never mind the time honored American tradition of presuming innocence until proven guilty. Never mind that the indictment never charges Libby or anyone else in the Bush administration with corruption. Notably, the same could not be said of the previous Democratic administration.

On 9 December, it was reported that Sen. Kerry again called for returning 20,000 troops home after the December 2005 Iraqi elections [and before Christmas] and additionally, stated that the United States needed to reduce its forces in Iraq by “at least 100,000” by the end of 2006. (Ref. 1)

Another Democrat, Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont recently made a speech calling for the U.S. to get out of Iraq the same way we retreated from Vietnam. The Vermont senator announced that the U.S. could not win in Iraq and called for the president to tell just when the U.S. troops would leave Iraq. Our defeat in Vietnam led to the exile, torture, imprisonment, and murder of a multitude of Southeast Asians. “But for the left-wing Democrats it was a triumph. Forcing the mighty U.S. military to run away was the greatest victory they have ever known. Senator Leahy thinks that he can smell another Vietnam.” (Ref. 2)

The Demoliberals continue to aid the Islamofascists of the world by calling for a "timetable for withdrawal from Iraq" or for returning 20,000 troops home for Christmas in 2005. In continuing to make these pronouncements, Kennedy, Kerry and other Democratic Liberals reinforce the belief of the Islamofascists that America will capitulate in the war on Islamic terrorism and these murderers of innocent civilians will then once again be able to enslave, murder and oppress in the name of their version of Islam.

We can be grateful that Sam Adams and John Adams spoke for a majority of the citizens of Massachusetts more than 230 years ago rather than John Kerry and Ted Kennedy or else we would today be singing God Save the Queen instead of The Star Spangled Banner.

President Bush and other members of the administration have made clear what our strategy in Iraq is. Our strategy against the Taliban and al Qaeda terrorists was made extremely clear by our words and our actions in Afghanistan. But, as stated in the Boston Herald (Ref. 3), “Nothing, it seems, will stop the Democratic whining over Iraq - not position papers, not speeches clarifying this nation’s goals as never before. Not even the facts on the ground as outlined … by President Bush.

“There was a time when people of good will of all parties stood together in the face of a common foreign enemy. There was a time when only a fool or a knave would seek partisan advantage when this nation’s men and women in uniform are in harm’s way. Well these days are gone, with the possible exception of a few decent politicians - like Sen. Joe Lieberman (D -Conn.).”

The Boston Herald concludes with: “It is the most natural of instincts for Americans to crave peace, to want their sons and daughters home. Democrats who cynically play to those instincts for political gain do so at their peril. . . . There are no easy solutions in Iraq. There is only hard work - for Iraqis and for U. S. forces. And at the end of the day there will be the satisfaction of knowing that as a nation we have done the right thing.”

The Demoliberal opposition led by the ilk of Kennedy, Kerry, Dean, Pelosi and Reid either cannot understand the fact that Islamofascists are at war with the non-Muslim world and have been attacking the United States and the rest of Western civilization for the past 30 years, or, as I suspect is the case, they are completely blinded by their hatred of George W. Bush and the conservative agenda. In their unbridled hatred of George Bush and the Republican version of conservatism, they pray for America’s defeat in Iraq, they hope for an economic recession and a rise in unemployment. Their fingers simply twitch with the urge to point at the President and to be able to say “See, I told you so.” This was the failed Kerry strategy in 2000 and it remains the Demoliberal strategy today.

Rick Richman draws an interesting analogy between President Bush’s war against Islamic fascism in 2005 and Winston’s Churchill’s war against Nazi fascism in 1942 (Ref. 4). Commenting on President Bush’s “Strategy for Victory” in Iraq [and against world-wide Islamic terrorism] speech at the U.S. Naval Academy on November 30, 2005 Richman notes that the president did not deny the difficulties that face the nation nor did he predict an early end to the war. Continuing the warnings given early on by Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, President Bush told the country that the war on terror will take many turns in the years ahead. The president was not hesitant to acknowledge that the training of Iraqi security forces “is an enormous task, and it hasn’t always gone smoothly.” Furthermore, “over the past two and a half years, we’ve faced some setbacks.” On the positive side, however, there have been many historic developments. Iraq has been liberated from the terror of Saddam Hussein’s regime, free elections have been held, and a democratic constitution has been adopted. In words reminiscent of Winston Churchill’s World War II exhortations to the British people, President Bush said:

   “If we were not fighting and destroying this enemy in Iraq, they [the Islamic fascists] would not be idle. They would be plotting and killing Americans across the world and within our own borders. By fighting these terrorists in Iraq, Americans in uniform are defeating a direct threat to the American people. Against this adversary, there is only one effective response: We will never back down. We will never give in. And we will never accept anything less than complete victory.” [my emphasis]

In the very dark days at the beginning of 1942, Winston Churchill felt compelled to demand a vote of confidence from the British Parliament because of the constant sniping against him and his party. These events and words of this time period are recorded in Volume IV of Churchill’s The Second World War (Ref. 5). The following are quotations from this reference.

   “Two facts stood out in my mind. The first was that the Grand Alliance was bound to win the war in the long run. The second was that a vast, measureless array of disasters approached us …” (Pg. 60).

Among Churchill’s remarks to parliament, we have the following:

   “We have had a great deal of bad news lately … and I think it highly probable … that we shall have a great deal more. Wrapped up in this bad news will be many tales of blunders and shortcomings, both in foresight and action. No one will pretend for a moment that disasters like these occur without there having been faults and shortcomings. I see all this rolling towards us like the waves in a storm …” (pg. 65).

   “… I feel entitled to come to the House of Commons … and ask them not to press me to act against my conscience and better judgment and make scapegoats in order to improve my own position, not to press me to do the things which may be clamoured for at the moment but which will not help in our war effort, but, on the contrary, to give me their encouragement and to give me their aid. I have never ventured to predict the future. I stand by my original programme, blood, toil, tears, and sweat, which is all I have ever offered, to which I added , five months later, ‘many shortcomings, mistakes, and disappointments.’”[my emphasis] (pg. 70)

Churchill obtained his vote of confidence by a margin of 464 to 1. Too bad Bush’s current Demoliberal opposition can’t show the same intestinal fortitude and can’t behave in the same moral manner as Churchill’s loyal opposition in 1942.

Getting back to Rick Richman’s article, he rightly concludes with the following: “He [Churchill] was a person with strengths and weaknesses, operating in real time. But history remembers him as a giant, because he took a stand that was fundamentally right, and saw it through, overcoming unanticipated military setbacks, the inevitable mistakes of war, significant domestic political opposition, and an openly hostile press.
    “So it is useful to realize that, as history was occurring in real time, Winston Churchill faced the same obstacles that currently confront George Bush - setbacks, mistakes, political opposition and media hostility - and that these things always occur, and are not necessarily historically significant. History takes a longer view.
    “We know history’s ultimate verdict on Churchill, since his record is complete and can be viewed from the perspective of passing time. We don’t know the verdict on Bush, since we are still operating in real time. But he is on the right track, having learned the right lessons from history (including the need to act before the gathering storm bursts, and to see things through, notwithstanding unanticipated adversity) - and he is vastly underappreciated, in the same way Churchill was in 1942.” (Ref. 4)

Our objectives in Iraq and Afghanistan are clear - the defeat of the Islamofascists that have been fighting an undeclared war against the United States for some 3 decades. Our timetable for withdrawal from Iraq is simple - we will withdraw whenever the Iraqis can fight for themselves against those who would deny them their right to be governed by those whom they choose rather than by murderous dictators and unelected Muslim clerics. Similarly, the timetable for ending the war against the Islamofascists is when they are defeated. The same timetable existed in World War II. President Roosevelt, along with Churchill and Stalin, clearly enunciated the terms and timetable for the war’s end – the unconditional surrender of the Axis powers. We held firm to that timetable throughout the war. Our pacifists and Demoliberals should adopt that timetable and contribute to its rapid implementation rather than causing it to be stretched out, with the attendant loss of American lives and the lives of thousands of innocent civilians throughout the world. Dan K. Thomasson correctly accuses these Demoliberals of “unbridled cynicism” (Ref. 6). He wrote that following World War II, Republicans accused Franklin Roosevelt of ignoring intelligence that revealed Japan’s plans to attack Pearl Harbor. They charged that this was Roosevelt’s way of dragging the U.S. into the war after he had won a 3rd term on the promise he would never do so. Similar allegations were made against Lyndon Johnson following the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution that brought the U.S. fully into the Viet Nam war. These charges fueled the antiwar movement which heartened the North Vietnamese and encouraged them to prolong the war, thus leading to a greater loss of life. Similarly, the reckless behavior of the Demoliberals continues to hearten the Islamic terrorists and is prolonging the war on terrorism.

What the Demoliberals aren’t admitting is that the United States is under attack and has been at war with radical Islam for over 30 years. They have failed to respond to these attacks and they understand that this president has done what they have failed to do - take the war to the enemy. Instead of lining up with President Bush and pulling with him, they are now doing jut the opposite - giving the terrorists the hope they can wait us out and win. These Demoliberals need to learn the lessons of history and they need to look no farther then the Democratic Presidents of World War II. President Roosevelt understood the threats posed by Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and Imperial Japan. Even before we were attacked, he pushed for the imposition of the draft and gave all the support to England that he could in the face of those who were blind to the Fascist threat. President Truman understood that depriving Japan of any hope of victory and presenting them with the specter of total destruction would save American (and Japanese) lives. He used the atom bomb on Japan and the war ended. Fanatics like Hitler, Mussolini, Tojo, and bin Laden can only be defeated by being destroyed. Their followers can be defeated by making them understand that they have no chance of success.

Someone said that those who fail to learn the lessons of history are doomed to repeat their mistakes. We see just such a repeat of history in the current Demoliberal accusation that President Bush intentionally misused intelligence information to justify his leading the U.S. into the war in Iraq. As Thomasson (Ref. 6) writes, “Terrorist in Iraq, indeed the world over, can only be encouraged by the tenor of the debate over the war.” Encouraging these terrorists can only lead to the prolongation of their murderous actions and the unnecessary loss of additional American and Iraqi lives. The Demoliberals have presented no evidence to support their accusations and they are irresponsible in accusing Bush of knowingly distorting the intelligence reports for personal gain at the expense of U.S. Lives. While there can be honest debate over the President’s conduct of the war, the attacks on President Bush have now gone over the line and can be seen as giving aid and comfort to our enemy and of endangering the lives of the American troops fighting in Iraq. As Thomasson says, “Terrorists justify their actions by alleging that America’s leaders are evil.” What we don’t need are American politicians supporting the terrorists in their justification with unfounded and unsubstantiated charges that the administration is corrupt and that our leaders are liars.

We can look back to an editorial in the Boston Herald on February 1, 2005 (Ref. 7), following the Iraqi elections. The article reported that the Senate Democratic Leader, Harry Reid, along with House Democratic Leader, Nancy Pelosi, asked for “a plan for the unfinished work ahead” in Iraq and for “an exit strategy so that we know what victory is and how we can get there.” From what planet do these democratic congressional leaders come? As the administration has repeatedly said: The job is done when the Islamofascist terrorists are defeated, when Iraq can defend itself, and when the United States and its allies are safe from the global threat of fundamentalist Islamic terrorism. Going further than the two Democratic congressional leaders, Senator Ted Kennedy, the nominal head of the Demoliberals, has continually demanded a time-certain plan for troop withdrawal from Iraq. Even Senator Reid doesn’t go this far and admits “that’s not a wise decision because it only empowers those who don’t want us there.”

Those who continue to offer hope to the Islamic fascists are literally giving aid and comfort to the enemy. At the end of World War II, President Truman made the decision to drop the atom bomb on Japan. The war ended within two weeks. Why? Because Japan understood that we would not stop until we had achieved victory and they faced total destruction. Yes, even faced with certain defeat, there are many among the Islamofascists who will fight to the death as Adolph Hitler did. But, there are many more among the terrorists’ adherents who are pragmatic and fight on only because they believe they can win by waiting us out. Facing the realization that, “we [the United States] will never back down; we will never give in; and we will never accept anything less than complete victory”, they will back down and they will “go with the winner”. In order to achieve this result, both the supporters and the detractors of President Bush must present a unified front. The terrorists and their supporters must come to the conclusion that they can’t outlast us. It is equally important that our allies as well as those in the world who support neither the United States nor the terrorists come to the same realizations.

The Demoliberals have been blundering down this path for some time now. Many of us are tired of their finger-pointing, blame-placing, and name-calling and their failure to present a positive plan for alternative action. If they have a better solution to the nation’s problems, then let them present us with their plan instead of complaining and trundling out old charges and allegations. By the way, to many of Americans cutting and running is not considered a positive alternative plan when we are faced with a vicious enemy who is attacking us and who promises to continue doing so.

Liberals need to stop embarrassing themselves and the United States by complaining about the treatment of al Qaeda terrorists at Guantanamo Bay while remaining silent about the murder and maiming of Iraqi civilians by fellow Arabs.

As Deroy Murdock stated: “… Bushophobes should understand that America remains at war and the boys of Gitmo [members of the Taliban and al Qaeda] fought in this conflict    “Releasing them before victory makes as much sense as freeing captured Nazis in 1944.” (Ref. 8)

There is a glimmer of hope that the Democratic Party has some members that don’t buy into the Demoliberal stupidity. While the Demoliberal wing of the party wails that, “the president misled us”, “still no WMDs”, “if I had only known then what I know now …”, others, like Joe Lieberman, have been less strident. Victor David Hanson points out (Ref. 9) three reasons for some Democrats holding back on their condemnations of President Bush.

First, they want to avoid being associated with the crazies, such as Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore and Cindy Sheehan, who “have a propensity to go lunatic and say or do anything - like shamefully praising the murdering terrorists who blow apart Iraqi women and children and [identifying] U.S. soldiers as ‘Minutemen,’ or calling the president of the United States ‘the world’s greatest terrorist.’
    “Second, Democrats know that the records show that they “outdid themselves in calling for an invasion of Iraq.
    “Go back and read any of the statements of John Kerry, Hillary Clinton, or Jay Rockefeller about the dangers of Saddam Hussein and the need to take him out. Only then can you understand why the U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly, with a strong Democratic majority, to authorize war.
    “So up until now, Democrats had an embarrassing paper trail that … made it hard to claim that the war was Bush’s alone and not their own.
    “Third, most Democrats knew the history of the George McGovern pullout campaign of 1972 that ended in disaster for the party at large. It just isn’t smart to lose American wars by cutting out.”

What we now see among centrist Democrats and leftist Demoliberals is an uncertainty about how to proceed. Their greatest fear is that the United States might win in Iraq. So they have quibbled, and offer empty platitudes. They make headlines complaining about museum lootings, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, Scooter Libby, comparison of the U.S. military to Saddam Hussein, Adolph Hitler, Joseph Stalin and Pol Pot, white phosphorus and CIA prisons abroad. At the same time, they remain silent about the enemy bombing mosques, murdering Iraqi civilians and beheading Americans. These Democrats say that yes, they voted for the war, but the intelligence information they received was ‘not the same’ as the president’s.

While Demoliberals espouse a cut-and run position, others in the party, like Joe Biden, Joe Lieberman, Hilary Clinton, Dianne Feinstein and Chuck Shummer, hesitate to support this position because they feel that the American people are not ready to quit and give up on all that has been accomplished so far, leaving the Iraqi people to the tender mercies of beheaders and suicide-murderers. Also, the more astute of the Democrats are afraid that we might yet succeed in Iraq, especially with the December 2005 elections now successfully concluded, the public trial of Saddam Hussein, the continuing growth and maturity of the Iraqi security forces, and the changed attitudes in Europe, Jordan and Lebanon.

For now, These Democrats stammer, stutter and go the “Bush shoulda/Coulda route - not quite ready to take the McGovern sharp turn.” They hedge by praising Congressman Murtha who has advocated immediate withdrawal, but they overwhelmingly vote to reject his advice.

Despite the daily rants of Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi, Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, Al Gore and the rest of the Demoliberals, Hanson asks the following questions and then posits that the more sober and street-smart Democrats are not sure of the answers.

While the more moderate Democrats wait and hedge their bets, they allow the “usefully idiotic and irresponsible in their midst” to attack Bush, but they make no concerted move yet to undo what has been accomplished in Iraq. Despite the on-going acrimonious back-biting and libel taking place, our soldiers in Iraq, with the backing of the Bush administration in the United States, have almost pulled off the unthinkable - the restructuring of the politics of the Middle East in less than three years. At the same time, Afghanistan continues to be a success story - the Taliban has been defeated, al Qaeda and bin Laden are hiding in caves on the Pakistani border, and a freely elected government is in power. There have been no attacks on American soil since 9/11. The recession that President Clinton bequeathed to George W. Bush has been reversed. The stock market is now near its all-time high. The Demoliberal wailing over job loss at the end of the last Democratic administration has been stilled by the lowest unemployment rate in decades. Economic growth, as measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the envy of the rest of the world.

All in all, not a bad record for George W. Bush to leave for posterity.

1. Kerry urges drastic cuts to troops in Iraq by ’07, Associated Press, Boston Herald, Pg 24, December 9, 2005,.
2. Desire for Defeat, David Gelernter, from the New York Times as reprinted in Forbes, Pg. 36, December 12, 2005.
3. Bush’s Iraq plan clear and right, Editorial, Boston Herald, Pg. 38, December 1, 2005.
4. A Mid-War History Lesson: Bush 2005/Churchill 1942, The Jewish Press, Pgs 5 and 101, December 9, 2005.
5. The Second World War; Vol IV - The hinge of Fate, Winston Churchill, Houghton Mifflin Company Boston, Pgs 60-73, 1950.
6. History repeats with unbridled cynicism, Dan K. Thomasson, Boston Herald, Pg. 31, November 16, 2005.
7. What would Dems do?, Boston Herald, Pg. 24, February 1, 2005.
8. Sympathy misplaced for Gitmo terrorists, Deroy Murdock, Boston Herald, Pg. 17, December 10, 2005.
9. The Crying Game, Victor Davis Hanson, The Jewish Press, Pgs. 8 and 91, December 2, 2005.