I thinks it's safe to say that the Democrats want the US to lose in Iraq, and they want them to lose badly. To them the United States is the spiritual heir to the Third Reich, and it only deserves to be knocked down, so they can pick it up and work their sick socialist schemes on it. How else do you explain the barrage of anti American war movies? Lions for Lambs, and the shameful Redacted, sounds as if they came from a DNC fundraising letter. Then, of course, there is the surge. Military success in a country that was deemed hopeless? Why that's not news at all. Let's talk about Barry Bonds getting indicted for perjury, but lets not talk about Iraq.
What has happened in Iraq is nothing short of a miracle. Just last year most of the country was embroiled in violence. Shiite militias were fighting Sunnis, Al-Qaida had such a grip on the Sunni triangle that the Marines declared the area lost. There were daily acts of terrorism which took out hundreds of innocent people, most of them Muslims.
But Iraqs turnaround is even more remarkable if you go back into Iraqs history. Iraq was a police state in every sense of the term. There were no civil or political freedom of any kind, the secret police could(and did) take away people on the suspicion of oppossing the regime, never to be seen again. Neighbor didn't trust neighbor, the people were afraid to say anything and were afraid that the slightest sign- a sentence they uttered, a look, or mabye nothing at all- would get them taken away.
We in America don't know what it's like to live with that kind of fear. For all the ravings of the mentally impaired left, no one is punished for criticizing the President. The press, and the nutroots of the Democratic party do it every day. (not only do they criticize him, they call for his impeachment, and joke about his assassination.) It took a long time for the Iraqis to overcome that fear and begin to fight back to reclaim their country from Al-qaida, and the Baathist ilk that wanted them to remain under a police state.
They have overcome that fear to clear Al-Qaida out of the Sunni Triangle, a place declared lost just last year. Yes, our increased presence made a difference but it wouldn't have made much of one if the Iraqis hadn't decided that it was time to reclaim their lives and their country.
Al-Qaida is on the run, no longer welcome in any part of the country. The violcene, and nihlism, they stood for has been rejected by the people. This isn't to say that Iraq has suddenly become utopia. There are still problems. Al- Sadr and his goons could potentially cause trouble again, the Turks are threatening to the north. There are still territorial disputes between Arabs and Kurds, and there is still violence.
But Iraqis are hopeful and we should be as well. Civil society has returned to Iraq, after decades of totalitarianism and violence, and war. We are winning this war, even if most people don't know it. And we will win this war if the Democrats let us.
