Krauthammer on Iraq and the Democrats
By Marc Schulman on Iraq
From his column ("Free to Dance") in the [$] Wall Street Journal:
The liberal cliche of the time was that Third World people care more about food than about freedom. This kind of contempt for the political and spiritual dignity of people who live in different circumstances never goes away. It simply gets applied serially to different sets of patronized foreigners . . .
On Jan. 30 millions of Iraqis said otherwise. They really do care about the right to speak freely and to vote secretly, the ordinary elements of democratic citizenship.
Why weren't Iraqis dancing in the streets on the day Saddam Hussein fell, critics have asked sneeringly. Some Iraqis, the young and more reckless, did dance. Others, I suspect, were too scared, waiting to see how things turned out. Would the United States leave them hanging as in 1991? Would it leave behind a "moderate" Baathist thug in its place?
Nearly 22 months later, Iraqis seemed convinced that there would indeed be a new day. And that is when the dancing started -- voters dancing and singing and celebrating, thrusting into the air their ink-stained fingers, symbol of their initiation into democracy. It was an undeniable, if delayed, feeling of liberation . . .
As if to make a point even more definitively, it was not the suicide bombers but the voters they killed at the polls who were buried as martyrs. The remains of one suicide bomber were spat upon. Another suicide bomber, reported Iraq's interior minister, was a child with Down syndrome. These are the people whom Michael Moore, avatar of the Democratic left, calls the "Minutemen." These are the people who Ted Kennedy, spokesman for the Democratic left, says are in a battle with the United States for "the hearts and minds of the people."
[...] Leading Democrats are discomfited by this demonstration of Iraqi support for the Bush Doctrine. John Kerry urges that we not "overhype this election." At the very moment when the first seed of democracy is planted, the Democratic leaders want the United States to turn its attention immediately to withdrawal. Kennedy demands a timetable. Democratic House leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate leader Harry Reid demand a definitive exit strategy.
This might be terrifying to Iraqis who just risked their lives to get democracy underway, and who still remember the Baathist slaughter of tens of thousands 14 years ago when the United States urged them to rise up against their oppressors and then abandoned them. But it will not be terrifying to Iraqis, because they know that this is a different time and a different Bush. He won't listen to the Saudis. He won't listen to the Democrats. If the world knows anything about George W. Bush, it is that he does what he says. Iraq's president called this talk about withdrawal "complete nonsense." Which is why the Iraqis could dance. |
