I’ve always secretly wondered if Howard Dean was really an animatronic puppet controlled by Karl Rove, because it seems like every time that man opens his mouth, something incredibly stupid comes out of it. However, his latest idiocy is not only stupid, but horrendously and offensively so.
Howard Dean thinks that we can’t win in Iraq.
Howard Dean is the chairman of the Democratic Party. He’s the official spokesman for the Democratic Party, and he thinks that we can’t defeat terrorists in Iraq. That we should wave the white flag and pull out.
In the spirit of honesty, Republicans get criticized all the time for supposedly impugning the patriotism of Democrats. Well, this time they’re going to be right. What Dean said was unpatriotic, disgusting, and wrong. Any Democrat that doesn’t immediately distance themselves from Dean’s horrendously irresponsible statement has no business in Washington. In a just world, Dean would be immediately fired from his position.
Why is this statement so profoundly irresponsible? How would history judge someone who said at the Battle of the Bulge, one of the bloodiest periods of warfare in American history, who said that the US could never defeat Nazi Germany and should pull out of Europe and let the Europeans fight Hitler? How would history judge someone who said that we should have let Japan have Asia after the bloody battles at Iwo Jima or Guadacanal?
History would judge those people as cowards and fools, and rightly so.
Dean’s comments are deeply irresponsible, 10 days before the people of Iraq are scheduled to vote in a new government, and as US, coalition, and Iraqi forces continue their offensives against the al-Qaeda linked terrorists in Iraq. Does Dean honestly believe that the US is incapable of winning? What message does that send to our troops? What message does that send to our enemy? What message does that send to the people of Iraq.
I am deeply disgusted by Dean’s comments. He would advocate surrendering to al-Qaeda in Iraq. That’s the long and short of it. Pulling out our troops now, when we’re on the offensive in al-Anbar and at a crucial stage in this war is beyond irresponsible. It may not be sedition, but it’s damn close.
Osama bin Laden believed that after Mogadishu Americans were too lazy and self-interested to sacrifice American lives to fight the mujihadeen armies of al-Qaeda. Howard Dean is proving him right. The fact that the Democratic leadership wants nothing less than unilateral surrender to al-Qaeda should sicken anyone who has an interest in a safer world and the values of universal human rights.
We have a moral duty in Iraq to finish what we started, or everything will be in vain. But fools and cowards like Howard Dean would have us leave the Iraqi people to the wolves, forever cementing our reputation as cowards who will always run from a fight. Al-Qaeda will have the greatest victory in their history, they’ll have defeated the Great Satan and justified their tactics of indiscriminate terrorism. Everything we have worked for, our men and women have fought and died for, all of it will have been for naught. A shamed and defeated America would have been brought down not through superior military force, but because a significant fraction of our populace puts petty partisanship above the values of our civilization and human rights.
Thankfully, I still have faith in the American people. We may be fickle, we may tire of warfare easily, but I refuse to believe that the nation that defeated the worst evils of the 20th Century, the nation that defeated the evils of Naziism and communism, the nation that stood as a light of the world for centuries has fallen so far as to surrender to the evil ideology of our time. If this is the voice of the Democratic Party, then the Democratic Party has proven itself to be the party of surrender, useful idiots to our enemies, and a party that belongs nowhere near power. Those Democrats that still believe in America should be calling on Dean to step down immediate – but sadly, while I have faith in America, any faith in the Democratic Party to speak reason has long ago faded.
UPDATE: Captain Ed has more on Dean’s idiocies:
The embarassment of Dean’s military analysis would make clear that the Democrats have no business conducting foreign affairs and national security for the US in this age of Islamofascist terrorism. That’s why the newspapers buried Dean’s comments on their web sites. They had plenty of time to write their own copy, or at least to include the AP story in their print edition. However, the NYT and the Washington Post obviously hope that Dean’s comments get quickly forgotten. (The Los Angeles Times doesn’t bother to mention it at all, despite the longer lead time for their newspaper.)
Protein Wisdom also notes the Democrat’s continued push towards surrender.
Please pray seriously and deeply for Howard Dean and his friends. They are so blinded by their dogma and hatred. According to the Holy Spirit’s message on The Christian Prophet blog, the U.S. has already achieved great spiritual victories in Iraq. Democrats need to begin to see clearly and admit what is good.
Here’s the thing that has always bothered me about your argument. What if we were in a war that we actually could not win and the Administration was determined to press on despite that? I’m not saying that is the case here, and surely believe that not only can we win, but we will, and that Dr. Dean is dead wrong to believe otherwise.
But what if things were different? Would it be sedition to say so? Would it be unpatriotic of, say, a German or Japanese in 1944 to acknowledge that they couldn’t win? Is it the public nature of the comment that makes it treasonous? What if private assertions make no difference?
However, you are right that the Democrats are now the Surrender Party.
Dean is advocating leaving two years from now, hardly out of the mainstream of the current conversation. He was characteristically foolish in saying “we can’t win” since it gives the chickenhawks cover to puff up their chests and dig in their heels in Iraq in the name of American pride. If the GOP gets mileage out of this, as they may, Dean may have set back the overwhelming movement towards withdrawal by months or even years.
But I’m not convinced the GOP will get mileage out of this. For all your wishful thinking about Dean being the “leader of the Democratic Party,” voters are unlikely to see it that way. I don’t see Ken Mehlman as the leader of the Republicans. I see him as an inside-baseball strategist and fundraising guru. Only with the ascendancy of Dean to the DNC Chairmanship have the Republicans begun assigning so much artificial importance to the position. Aside from us political junkies (5% of the population, maybe?), who would even know who the chairman of the Democratic National Committee is?
In that case, I’d say it wouldn’t be improper at all – but neither of those two regimes were democratic either. Their wars were totally unjustified from the beginning.
A government official should always weigh their statements against the needs of the nation as a whole. If saying that a war is “unwinnable” would hurt the morale of the troops, is it right to say so – even if it is true? Would having those troops lay down arms and surrender be better for them than to fight? In the case of Japan and Germany, probably so.
I don’t think what Dean is saying is “treason” or “sedition”, although it comes damn close to the latter. It is deeply irresponsible, factually wrong, and deeply harmful to the morale of our troops, who not only can win in Iraq but are winning in Iraq. That’s the key difference.
If we’re going to do what is tantamount to surrender, then we need to formally surrender. No lies about how we’ll stay “over the horizon” when we know that isn’t the case. Let Howard Dean formally say that we need to sign an armistice with Abu Mus’ab al-Zarqawi, formally transfer control of al-Anbar to al-Qaeda and admit defeat formally. Because that’s precisely what would be doing.
And that’s where I’d draw the delineation. If you’re unwilling to formally surrender to your enemies and lay down arms and admit defeat, then “withdrawal” is often a cover for old-fashioned cowardice.
the will of jesus. or aolhometown
Why wait two years to withdraw if ‘we can’t win?’ That makes no sense, and this is Dean talking here – it makes no sense at all.
First Bush, now Dean. Rove’s multitasking.
Get ye behind me Karl.
So, if Dean thinks we are in a situation like, say, France in 1940, he should advocate doing what France did. Giving up. Admitting defeat.
I’ll by that.
Note to Mark: You’ve made valid and well-thought out points in the past. But really, if you want to be taken seriously, you should dispense with the “chickenhawk” talk. Use of that term implies that you do not support civilian control of the armed forces, and I doubt that’s the case.
Only days before the historical 3rd vote, you have to question Dean’s timing. And lets be serious, in what Murtha is advocateing, staging in another friendly nation outside Iraq is an effective way to conducting operations, then i have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn. The problem with a withdrawl plan is that even in the best conditions the US armed forces couldn’t logistically leave in under 6-8 months. It just couldn’t happen as fast as saying to everyone in Iraq we’ll we gotta go and be out of there in 2-3 days, just isn’t possible. So in essence from a military stand point a 6-8 month withdrawal is tantamount to a immediate withdrawal in the best of conditions. And Dean is advocating halfing our forces, by the immediate return of reserves and national guard units thats some 80000 troops, is just mind blowing. Wasn’t Kerry saying we don’t have enough or has that changed as well ? Which is it ? This all announced before an election, here’s to hoping it isn’t a Koran flushing moment, but I have to agree that it is incredible irresponsible and thats being polite. Mark,I just read Obama’s statements, and the #2 dem in the House and of course Lieberman, backing away from Dean and I don’t think they are far right hacks at all. It does have the look of a split.
To address Winstons concerns about us pressing forward in the face of a losing cause. If we were losing militarily it couldn’t be covered up, not with today’s media. Even when the Russians were in Afganistan, the message of their military debachle came through the troops that returned or didn’t return. The russian people knew it wasn’t going well, even with a completely friendly media. Thats not the case with this war, our military is suprised by the pessimistic coverage by our media and our political elite in Washington. I think the dicodomy is unique to US politics, the US military is again winning the war on the ground and to have a pampered politican sell them out should be fatal to that politico’s political health, somehow it never is. Lets look at the Vietnam analogy that is so loved by Dean,Teddy, et al, after the Tet offensive, militarily we kicked the Viet Cong’s collective tush, that was admited to even by their lead general. So they changed the front to Washington and the home front of USA’s public opinion, with some willing and unwilling accomplises here at home. But the fact remains we were winning militarily and someone forgot to tell the American people. The subsequent pull out and defunding caused untold slaughter for the people remaing as it would cause the Iraqi’s if we pulled out prematurely again. So I think the question should be if we are winning the war why are some in Washington, academe and the media more than willing to undermine it ?