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Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: Sully- who wrote (57300)4/5/2007 9:05:30 AM
From: Sully-  Respond to of 90947
 
Denying The War

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Editorial
Posted Wednesday, April 04, 2007 4:20 PM PT

War On Terror: In a sly semantic move, a Democrat House Committee secretly ordered the removal of all references to the "Global War On Terror," nonchalantly claiming it wasn't political. Who are they fooling?

The Military Times reported that Erin Conaton, a staffer on Missouri Rep. Ike Skelton's House Armed Services Committee, banished the term "Global War On Terror" from the 2008 defense bill, in a Mar. 27 memo to Democrats.

A minor move? It really isn't .

In doing this, she undercut the war by atomizing it into "the war in Afghanistan," "the war in Iraq," "the action in the Horn of Africa." It was a highly political move to legitimize the idea that there's no longer a common mission in this war. It reflects the Democrats' real agenda of de-funding the war by branding it "meaningless," an ominous echo of the Vietnam era.

This time it arises from three junk myths, outlined by Vice President Dick Cheney Monday in a Birmingham, Ala., speech:

• That the war on Iraq has nothing to do with 9/11.

• That it's possible to support troops without supporting victory.

• That cutting and running from Iraq will put the U.S. in a better position to fight terrorists elsewhere.

Is it coincidence that one of the loudest proponents of these myths is Conaton's boss, Democrat Skelton?

"GOP objections to our efforts to clarify legislative language represent the typical Republican leadership attempt to tie together the misadventure in Iraq and the overall war against terrorists," Skelton said. "The Iraq War is separate and distinct from the war against terrorists, who have their genesis in Afghanistan and who attacked us on 9/11, and the American people understand this."

So to heck with Conaton's claim about being "above politics."

Democrats do not want to look our global enemy in the eye. Cold-blooded terrorists struck our nation first for no reason other than to see us dead.

As Manhattan burned, New York's Union Square almost at once became a leftist camp-out of banners and candles that twisted the valid rage of 9/11 into a blame-America-first therapy session.

Myths swirled that Israel knew of the plot and tipped off the Jews in the towers beforehand. That morphed into Michael Moore's preposterous tales of President Bush's 9/11 incompetence, and moved on to far more extreme "Loose Change" fantasies about Bush organizing 9/11 himself, a theory now favored by Rosie O'Donnell.

The dangerous thing is that as memories of 9/11 fade, about a third of Americans, according to a poll, are starting to believe the myths.

The Democrats' refusal to call the global war on terror by its name is part and parcel of this. By refusing to see the enemy, or Iraq's central role in terrorism, it's far easier to break the war up into parts and recast each front as a quarrel President Bush picked. It can all be solved by ad hoc efforts like Nancy Pelosi's Syrian "diplomacy."

But semantic shifts will not negate the fact that this real war won't be won by denying the identity of the very enemy we fight. Closing our own eyes won't blur the global terrorists' vision.

ibdeditorials.com



To: Sully- who wrote (57300)4/5/2007 9:26:17 AM
From: Bill  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 90947
 
It's a constant bombardment of bias.



To: Sully- who wrote (57300)4/20/2007 2:57:00 PM
From: Sully-  Read Replies (1) | Respond to of 90947
 
A word from the Swift Boat Vets et al.

Power Line

Michael Barone takes note of John Hinderaker's post "Ineffective, even for a liberal" responding to Eric Boehlert. In his response John recaps the contribution of the Swift Boat Vets to the 2004 campaign. Barone comments:
    John Hinderaker at Powerline skewers the claim, often made
in mainstream media and the left blogosphere, that the
charges made by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth against
John Kerry have been "discredited." To the contrary. There
can be disagreement about their characterization of
Kerry's service, and some factual dispute about the way in
which he earned at least one of his decorations, but
nothing has been proved false. On the contrary, it was
Kerry who had to abandon the claim, "seared, seared in my
memory"
as he said on the Senate floor, that he was in
Cambodia at Christmastime 1968.

Barone is the peerless commentator on the American political scene. It doesn't get much better than that.

The indefatigable leader of the Swift Boat Vets was John O'Neill. In February 2004, O'Neill was lying in a hospital bed after contributing a kidney for transplantion to his wife. He answered the call of his former commanding officer Roy Hoffman to serve our country one more time by leading the veterans' effort opposing John Kerry. It was the most dramatic story of the 2004 election campaign, now smothered in a welter of lies foisted on the public by the likes of Eric Boehlert. Bruce Kesler is a Vietnam vet who himself commented on John's post at Democracy Project. John O'Neill wrote Bruce "RE: Your blog and the Powerline blog's summary: Thanks--always be grateful for both of you."

Paul Galanti is the highly decorated naval aviator who served in Vietnam and was captured by the North Vietnamese in 1967. He was held and tortured for six years until his release was secured by President Nixon in 1973. In the most powerful of the Swift Boat Vet ads, Galanti testified to having had John Kerry's standard charges of American war crimes played to him by his Communist captors. In the ad "Sellout," Galanti commented:

<<< Bruce: Your article about Kerry and the Swiftees was outstanding. Your blog, amplifying comments and whoever compiled all those SwiftVet ads concisely nailed the reason Kerry lost the 2004 election. All of us involved felt immensely satisfied that his phony bravado and traitorous acts were exposed despite the "below the fold" treatment they were accorded in most media quarters.

Of at least equal importance, though, was John O'Neill's Unfit for Command and the internet blogsters - YOU - who spread the word far and wide. So thanks for the reminder and thanks for helping spread the word - big time - during the 2004 campaign.

Take care,
Paul
Paul E. Galanti
Commander, USN (Ret)
Richmond, VA
nampows.org >>>

Val McMurdie also served in Vietnam and wrote to comment:

<<< I've read your blog post and realize your arguments are cogent for the general public to read. I was the Operations Officer and Division Operations Officer for Operation Market Time and directed Swift Boat operations, intercepts, etc. in South Vietnam beginning in November 1969.

For those veterans who served in South Vietnam, numbering approximately 1.5 million, and for at least the nine million veterans who are eligible to vote, Kerry had two instantaneous problems after the Swift Boat Veterans ad came out:

1) all of use knew it is virtually impossible to be awarded three Purple Hearts without ever spending a day in the hospital;

2) his accusations that war crimes were commonly committed by service men, or sailors, which none of us had ever heard of, let alone seen.

The phony Purple Hearts killed Kerry as an honest or honorable man to probably 90 percent of veterans. Phony Purple Hearts put him among the most unethical people in the county.

As an officer, and medical officer for the North coast, since the Swift Boats had no MD, I can tell you that it would have been easy for me to ask the "Doc" corpsman to write me up for a Purple Heart for every scratch I received on any one of dozens of operations. I could have had five Purple Hearts had I wished to dishonor myself and wounded and dead sailors. I have none. I rate John Kerry among criminals, and despicable, on this point alone.

It is difficult for civilians to understand the responsibility and authority of junior naval officers serving in Operation Market Time. Any junior officer, Ensign or jg could have obtained several Purple Hearts had he wished to by simply asking the corpsman to write up any scratch in his medical record. It would have been that easy.

Without having been there, you may not realize these real world realities. >>>

Thanks to all for their comments.

powerlineblog.com

usnews.com

powerlineblog.com

taemag.com

democracy-project.com

democracy-project.com

newsmax.com

foxnews.com