House Whip Clyburn: For Demos to win, America must lose

THE FOUNDATION

“National defense is one of the cardinal duties of a statesman.” —John Adams

PATRIOT PERSPECTIVE

OIF: Good news is bad for surrender monkeys

In our democratic republic, we charge our elected representatives with the conduct of vigorous debate about issues both foreign and domestic. In doing so, we expect them to uphold their oaths to protect and defend our Constitution.

However, politicians often posture and pretend in order to line up constituencies that perpetuate their tenure in office, regardless of constitutional constraints.

Such political posturing is a disingenuous breach of trust at best. When this deceit extends to matters of national security, especially when we are at war and continue to face formidable threats from Jihadi terrorists, it is downright traitorous.

The Democrat Party was, in a bygone era, populated by statesmen. Until JFK (that’s J.F. Kennedy not J.F. Kerry), Democrat leaders, understood the projection of force to protect America’s security and vital interests abroad.

Now, this once-proud political party is infested with hypocritical, nescient, duplicitous, reprehensible, half-witted, asinine, obsequious, meretricious, pusillanimous, indolent, imbecilic, pompous, retromingent, ignominious, ungrateful, sycophantic prevaricators (did I leave anything out?), who flippantly exploit Operation Iraqi Freedom as political fodder for their next campaign.

Truth be told, most Democrats know that the fate of the entire Middle East (and, by extension, much of the free world) depends on the establishment of a stable government in Iraq. They know that Fourth Generation Warfare in the Second Nuclear Age leaves us no choice but to confront Jihadistan on the Iraqi front. After all, if not Iraq now, then where and when?

They also know that much of what is reported in the American media reflects not only the propaganda machines of the Left, but also that of our Jihadi adversaries. This is because these cutthroats understand that our mainstream media is friendly terrain for undermining American will.

Unfortunately, petty party politics prevail, with little regard for the inconvenient truth that Leftist defeatism merely emboldens our enemy and further endangers our troops in Iraq.

Now, however, there is a confluence of analysis from the warfront in Iraq that OIF has turned a corner. Clearly, such news will have significant consequences for those Leftists who have staked their political fortunes on America’s failure, surrender and retreat from Iraq.

In the New York Times this week, two noted and vocal critics of OIF, Michael O’Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack, analysts with the Left-leaning Brookings Institution, published an op-ed entitled “A War We Just Might Win.”

Having just returned from a fact-finding tour of Iraq, their op-ed notes, “After the furnace-like heat, the first thing you notice when you land in Baghdad is the morale of our troops. Today, morale is high. The soldiers and Marines… feel now they have the numbers needed to make a real difference.”

On the politics of Iraq, O’Hanlon and Pollack write, “Viewed from Iraq… the political debate in Washington is surreal. The Bush administration has over four years lost essentially all credibility. Yet now the administration’s critics, in part as a result, seem unaware of the significant changes taking place.”

Their analysis continues: “Here is the most important thing Americans need to understand: We are finally getting somewhere in Iraq, at least in military terms. As two analysts who have harshly criticized the Bush administration’s miserable handling of Iraq, we were surprised by the gains we saw and the potential to produce not necessarily ‘victory’ but a sustainable stability that both we and the Iraqis could live with.”

Also this week, retired Army General Jack Keane testified before the House Armed Services Committee, telling them in no uncertain words, “Your actions here in the Congress appear to be in direct conflict with the realities on the ground where the trends are up and progress is being made. We are on the offensive and we have the momentum.”

That news was so distressing to Rep. Nancy Boyda (D-KS) that she walked out of the committee hearings during General Keane’s testimony, lamenting later that there was “only so much [she could tolerate] after so much of the frustration of having to listen to what we listened to.” She continued, “Those kinds of [encouraging] comments will in fact show up in the media and further divide this country instead of saying, ‘Here’s the reality of the problem’.”

Of course, reality in the alternate universe of the Left dictates that down is up, in is out, left is right, black is white, falsehood is truth, pride is humility, red is blue and, particularly in the case of Iraq, good news is bad.

Adding insult to injury, more bad news for Demos: Marine General Jim Jones conducted a congressionally mandated study of Iraq’s security forces and returned with a favorable report.

This report, combined with the continuing decline of American and Iraqi casualties, has Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Leader Harry Reid very concerned that their “defeat and retreat” political folly may backfire.

Asked about the political implications should commanding Gen. David Petraeus report significant progress during his scheduled congressional testimony in September, House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC) replied, “Well, that would be a real big problem for us, no question about that.”

Good news out of Iraq is “a real big problem”? Guess that depends upon whose side you’re on.

Quote of the week

“We’re in a generation-long battle against terrorism, against al-Qa’ida-inspired terrorism, and this is a battle for which we can give no quarter. It’s a battle that’s got to be fought in military, diplomatic, intelligence, security, policing and ideological terms.” —Britain’s new prime minister, Gordon Brown

On cross-examination

“Liberals used to be the ones who argued that sending U.S. troops abroad was a small price to pay to stop genocide; now they argue that genocide is a small price to pay to bring U.S. troops home.” —Jonah Goldberg

The BIG lie

“This war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything.” —Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid

GOVERNMENT & POLITICS

News from the Swamp: Congress rushes to recess

Like little kids with a sugar rush, congressional Democrats are rushing bills through left and further left so they can go home and tell their constituents what a great job they’re doing.

The Homeland Security bill blew through the House, 371-40, and the Senate, 85-8. Seeking to enact the balance of the 9/11 Commission recommendations, the bill funds a massive cargo-screening program, tighter restrictions for international air travel from 27 friendly countries, and $3 billion for border-security measures. Homeland Security grants will also be reapportioned with more money going to high-risk terrorism targets.

House Demos skillfully avoided cutting harmful subsidies from the sweeping $286-billion farm bill, which passed by a largely partisan 231-191. It has drawn a White House veto threat, and not for the large sums that went to preserving grasslands and wildlife habitats. The farm-subsidy program is in need of drastic cuts, but Democrats went trolling for middle-American votes instead of heeding the warnings from economists and international-trade organizations. Democrats are too worried about losing votes next year to begin weaning the agricultural industry off government welfare.

The House also passed its “ethics” bill by a shamefully lopsided 411-8. Thanks to careful construction by Demo leaders, the earmark process will remain in the shadows, and we’re expected to trust that David Obey and Harry Reid will protect us from pork-barrel spending. Republicans in the Senate will attempt to block the legislation there, but they may have some ethics problems of their own.

Ted Stevens under scrutiny

The FBI paid a visit to the Alaska home of Sen. Ted Stevens (RINO-AK) this week in connection to a growing investigation of Veco, an oil-field-services company whose founder, Bill Allen, was convicted in May of this year for bribing Alaska state lawmakers. The media trumped it up to a “raid,” but Stevens knew they were coming and purportedly offered a key.

Allen did extensive work on Stevens’ house in 2000, but Stevens says he paid for it himself. However, with ethics or some version of it being the talk of the day, Stevens could be in for a rough time. His 39-year reputation for being the king of earmarks made Alaska the country’s biggest recipient ($1,000 per resident in 2006) of taxpayer money, and has made Stevens a juicy target. He is already facing calls to step down from the committees on which he serves, including Appropriations, Commerce and Homeland Security. The 83-year-old Stevens is innocent until proven guilty, of course, but his own history won’t be kind to him.

New & notable legislation

Rep. Geoff Davis (R-KY) introduced the “Combating Terrorism Financing Act” (H.R. 3146), which will enhance our ability to stop terrorist financing by closing “loopholes” in current law.

S. 1868, the Higher Education Act Extension Act of 2007, passed by voice vote.

H.R. 3093, the Departments of Commerce and Justice, and Science, and Related Agencies Appropriations, 2008, passed 281-142.

H.R. 3074, the Departments of Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development appropriations for 2008, passed 268-153.

H.R. 2929, a bill to prevent funds for the permanent stationing of forces in Iraq, passed 399-24. That’s the spirit.

Judicial Benchmarks: Supremes not liberal enough

Speaking at an American Constitution Society event last week, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) cried about the ideological direction of the Supreme Court, which he called “dangerously out of balance.” Schumer ascribed a conservative bent to the High Court that we in our humble shop can only dream of and said he has been against Chief Justice John Roberts and associate Justice Samuel Alito since their nominations. He obviously hopes to rally the Democrats’ base, but his comments should also have the same effect on the Republican base.

With John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg likely to retire soon because of age and health, there is a real chance to make the Supreme Court as conservative as Schumer fears. It is doubtful, though, that President Bush could get another nominee such as Alito or Roberts through while the Democrats control the Senate, but another Republican president would certainly have an opportunity to make the Court one of strict construction, as it was intended.

On the immigration front: Mexican influence?

This week, a House Foreign Affairs subcommittee attempted to investigate whether the Mexican government was involved in the prosecution of former U.S. Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean, who were sentenced to prison for shooting drug smuggler Osvaldo Aldrete-Davila in the buttocks. The panel’s attempts were mitigated when Justice Department and Homeland Security officials declined to appear for the hearing. State Department official Charles Shapiro did appear and testified that there was no documentation to indicate that Mexico influenced the Ramos-Compean prosecution.

However, under grilling from Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA), Shapiro admitted that the State Department would not know whether Mexico had contacted other U.S. departments regarding the matter. Shapiro stated he was unaware of previous communication that occurred between U.S. Attorney John Sutton’s office and the Mexican government in other border matters, including the similar case of Texas Sheriff’s Deputy Guillermo Hernandez, in which Mexican officials wrote letters to Sutton’s office requesting prosecution.

The panel plans to hold another hearing and call on Sutton and his staff to testify in the matter. If you have not already done so, please join the nearly 64,000 Patriots who have already signed our petition, Free the Texas Three and Secure Our Borders.

Barack on Iraq

General Petraeus said recently that “al-Qa’ida is carrying out the bulk of the sensational attacks, the suicide car-bomb attacks, suicide-vest attacks, and so forth… and all of the individuals in the intelligence community, General [Stanley] McChrystal, the head of our Joint Special Operations Command, all of us feel that the central front of al-Qa’ida’s terror war is focused on Iraq.”

In other words, Iraq is the front line in the war with Jihadistan.

That notwithstanding, slicker-than-slick Demo presidential contender Barack Obama outflanked his Demo opponents this week. In an attempt to divert attention from his opposition to OIF and a recent debate gaffe in which he said he would meet with Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, Kim Jong-Il, Mahmud Ahmadi-Nejad and the rest of the world’s despots during the first year of his administration, Obama exclaimed Wednesday, “Let me make this clear. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will.”

In other words, rather than flip-flopping on OIF like Hillary Clinton and other Demos, Obama navigates around the “Iraq defeat-retreat” problem by implying he would be so tough on terror that he would launch attacks into Pakistan—the real frontline with terrorists—without its president’s consent.

However, Obama must have been out campaigning while his Senate colleagues were in briefings regarding al-Qa’ida in Pakistan. Most of the “actionable intelligence” about “high-value terrorist targets” along Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan comes from—you guessed it—Pakistan, and special operators are already in the region.

Lieberman stands his ground

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) has taken the fight over Iraq to his once-fellow Democrats, telling The Hill this week, “There is a very strong group within the party that I think doesn’t take the threat of Islamist terrorism seriously enough.” He didn’t mention names, but Reid, Pelosi, Clinton, Obama, Kerry, Kennedy, Biden, Feinstein, Feingold (et al., ad nauseam) leap to mind. Lieberman went on to add that the Democrats are more motivated to act against anything President Bush does than think about the consequences of their actions.

Spying for Spitzer

New York’s Democrat Governor, Eliot Spitzer, is fending off accusations that he spied on rival Republican State Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno for the purpose of smearing him. Spitzer’s inner circle used the State Police to investigate Bruno’s travel expenditures, hoping to catch him using state aircraft for political purposes. “Communication aide” Darren Dopp then fed information to the Albany Times-Union. Spitzer has not acknowledged a personal role in the scandal, but it’s hard to imagine he wasn’t at least complicit. To cover his back, however, Spitzer suspended Dopp and reassigned another aide. Kudos to Democrat Attorney General Andrew Cuomo for pursuing the issue, despite Spitzer’s efforts to “put it behind him.”

NATIONAL SECURITY

On the Homeland Security front: Wiretapping

We are shocked—shocked!—to report that Democrats have canceled yet another national-security hearing without explanation, this time with DNI head Mike McConnell. Director McConnell would have testified about the critical need to update the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), a three-decades-old law characterized by President Bush as “badly out of date.” The President hopes to overhaul FISA to address post-9/11 counterterrorism realities. When reminded by Republicans that “national security can’t be postponed,” Democrites affirmed otherwise, postponing the meeting until after the August recess. Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) offered the most likely rationale: “It appears they are afraid to even risk talking about FISA because the intelligence gap is real and no amount of their rhetoric will make it go away.”

President Bush has urged Congress to restore FISA’s original focus: protecting privacy interests of people inside the United States. He also noted, however, that intelligence agencies must be able to collect on terrorists outside the U.S. Those efforts are currently hampered by court-imposed warrant requirements whenever a call originating in a foreign nation happens to be answered in the U.S. For its part, the Treason Lobby instinctively points the “blame finger” at Bush. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Omicron 5) whined that the Bush administration has refused to “treat Congress as a partner on critical national-security issues,” leading to the current crisis. Unfortunately, however, this remark only begs a larger question: How does one treat as partners in securing the nation those who demonstrate such disdain for national security?

Of Bombs and Bedouins

“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.” So goes the ancient Arab proverb, alluding to precarious alliances often forged for the sake of survival, without regard to long-term consequences. Fast-forward to the Middle East today, and enter the U.S. Our enemy: Iran. Our “friends”: anyone else in the region. This is the implicit logic underpinning billions of dollars of military aid and arms sales the U.S. wants to distribute, in hopes of countering Iran’s push toward regional hegemony. Saudi Arabia alone stands to purchase roughly $20 billion in state-of-the-art weaponry, including sophisticated Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM) technology, which transforms “dumb” (unguided) bombs into “smart” bombs Meanwhile, Egypt will receive $13 billion in aid over a ten-year span, and six other countries—Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates—will sign significant arms deals in the coming years. Supposedly counterbalancing this asymmetric largess to the Arab world is $30 billion in new aid to Israel—$9 billion more than in the previous ten-year period.

Ought we not ask, however, about the extent to which mega-arming the Middle East is in America’s interests? If a few years hence, for example, a formerly “friendly” Arab country were to opt for a national “Bring-Your-JDAM-to-Work Day” against Israel—a move not without precedent, you will note—won’t the proposed arms policy appear foolhardy, in retrospect? On the other hand, if the region implodes as a result of failing to respond to Iran’s quest for regional dominance, wouldn’t such inaction likewise weather an uncharitable post mortem? Moreover, the situation in Iraq must also be assessed in the calculus. Fully half of the 60-to-80 insurgents entering Iraq each month are from Saudi Arabia: what effect, if any, is giving more arms to this country likely to have on the flow of these insurgents? Though no one has a crystal ball, the most reasonable answer derives from asking questions today about what the Law of Unintended Consequences might have in store for tomorrow. On second thought, perhaps an even better rule for U.S. policymakers to consider might be that embraced by physicians: “Primum non nocere—First, do no harm.”

Warfront with Jihadistan: Afghan hostages

Lest we think the Taliban is long gone, they are not to be ignored. Taliban fighters captured 23 Korean Christian missionary workers on 19 July, the largest group of hostages yet taken in Afghanistan since the U.S.-led invasion in 2001. Two already have been murdered by the Islamofascists after previous deadlines passed. Eighteen hostages are women. Spokes-thug Qari Yousef Ahmadi had said that eight captured terrorists, including some held at the United States’ Bagram base, must be released by Wednesday or more hostages will be executed. However, the deadline passed and word is that the 21 hostages remain alive, though two women are sick and may die without help. The South Korean government remains opposed to any military operation aimed at rescuing the hostages, while at the same time requesting that the terrorist-prisoners be released to mollify the terrorist-kidnappers. The U.S. and Afghan governments, however, are standing by our policy of no negotiations with terrorists in hostage situations. (Imagine the hostage count if we actually did negotiate with such thugs.) Even still, according to the Associated Press, Human Rights Watch says that “the Taliban have kidnapped at least 41 Afghan civilians this year and killed at least 23 of them. The rest are missing.”

Profiles of valor: Army National Guard Maj. Southworth

When Army National Guard Maj. Scott H. Southworth, a law-school graduate of the University of Wisconsin, went to Iraq with the National Guard’s 32nd Police Company, his mission was to train police officers in Baghdad. However, there was an unexpected twist to the story.

Southworth’s military mission was a dangerous one, with numerous Iraqi police stations being targeted by insurgents. In spite of such dangers, Southworth’s team made it a point to visit a local orphanage. One orphan, named Ala’a, quickly formed a close relationship with Southworth. Ala’a suffered from cerebral palsy and had been left to fend for himself in Baghdad’s streets. Southworth continued to visit him and the other orphans regularly.

As his tour of duty came to a close, Southworth knew that he could not leave Ala’a behind. Praying for guidance, Southworth explored adoption options, but Iraqi policy forbade foreign adoptions. Iraqi officials eventually agreed to allow Ala’a to travel to the United States for medical care, though his lack of a passport in a time of war made leaving Iraq impossible. Working with U.S. immigration attorneys, Southworth was able to obtain humanitarian parole status for Ala’a. “It’s for situations where there is no other hope, no other chance, and you have to demonstrate extraordinary circumstances,” Southworth said. Ala’a now enjoys a happy life with his foster dad and is making tremendous progress in his battle with cerebral palsy.

Southworth is now working with two other National Guardsmen to bring 24 more disabled orphans from Iraq into loving U.S. homes. Medical professionals have offered to donate their time and resources to the cause. For his commitment to “duty, honor and country,” Southworth was honored with the Army’s Gen. MacArthur Leadership award.

To put it simply, the hate America first brigade does not want this story out. So, I just had too!