Lacking Credibility, but Rich in Absurdity

The New York Times reports: With New Clout, Antiwar Groups Push Democrats

I say - What new clout? Isn't it the same old clout?

The New York Times itself helps to give this clout to the antiwar movement by giving space to authors, such as Dick Cavett, who would say the following:

"Personally, I don’t give a damn what happens to Iraq"

It is no surprise that the New York Times would report this apparent 'newfound clout' of antiwar groups as news, as if this has been a recent phenomenon. After all, the Times must pander to its readers. Readers who believe this [I fixed his spelling errors]:

And here I go out on a long limb as I’m about to question the one war that never gets questioned — especially not in the school textbooks that we were all weaned on.

The Revolutionary War a noble cause? A necessary and justified war? Hardly. Every bit a war fought for the economic benefit of a select few of the colonies and business people. Very much a war that allowed the colonies to continue their practice of slavery and slave trading (unlike England or its continued colony Canada). Very much a war that was opposed by prominent, albeit outmaneuvered, politicians such as Joseph Galloway and John Dickerson of Pennsylvania as hasty and likely avoidable through political and non-violent negotiations with England (Google the Galloway Compromise which proposed a very feasible political solution to the issues raised by the colonies — sadly it lost in the the Continental Congress by one vote — and interestingly it is almost never referred to in U.S. History textbooks…) . Many of that day referred to the Declaration of Independence as in reality a Declaration of War that purposefully sought to so antagonize the King that any chance of a non-violent resolution would be lost.

Note that this country’s love affair with war, our country’s easy turn to violence began with the revolutionary war and which our neighbor, Canada avoided and yet still gained her freedom through peaceful means albeit 100 years or so later. Were all of the lives lost in the revolutionary war worth the quicker path to ‘freedom?’ Did the slaves of the U.S. colonies benefit from our violent revolution (and would have the Civil War even occurred had we remained a British colony for awhile longer?)

Our willingness to step into war, our ongoing attempts to see it as a noble cause and as a good solution to the problems we face, started at the beginning of our country, founded in a revolutionary war of choice. It is a bias in favor of war that we continue to repeat to this day often with tragic consequences.

The reader suffers from such a level of self-hatred, delusional Bush Derangement Syndrome, and has bought into the leftist antiwar hysteria with such vigor that even our Revolutionary war has been construed as folly And let us also turn to this babbling buffoonery by another NYT reader identifying himself as Gareth Harris:

A PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES:

Whenever members of the United States Armed Forces shall be placed in harm’s way by the President to engage in combat or other threats of life and limb, it shall be required of the President, Vice President and all members of the cabinet that they shall immediately be deployed and placed with and accompany the troop son the ground in the most perilous mission positions.

If the Congress has declared war or supported the combat in any formal way,those members declared or voting in support in favor shall likewise be assigned and deployed immediately to accompany the troops in combat duties on the ground in the most perilous mission positions.

Whenever either of the two proceeding paragraphs must be invoked, as in past wars, total mobilization of the entire society shall be immediate, with appropriate rationing of every service, good, and luxury to everyone on an equal basis, troops first.

All troops shall be housed as they deserve in the finest hotels and homes –furthermore all corporate profits, all income of the President, Vice President,cabinet and members of Congress shall be immediately and continuously confiscated to pay for any such endeavor and both it short and long term expenses as long as they continue.

In response to American 'unilateralism,' the U.S. often has little choice in the matter, being the only military capable of exercising such action. Max Boot writes Going it alone because we have to:

“According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies, defense budgets among NATO members, excluding the U.S., have fallen from 2.49% of gross domestic product in 1993 to 1.8% of GDP in 2005. Britain is actually above the norm, spending 2.3% of GDP, or $52 billion, on defense. Canada, with a defense budget of $13 billion, is below the norm, at 1.1%.

“But all those expenditures fade into insignificance by comparison with the U.S., which spends $495 billion a year, or 4% of the world’s largest GDP, on its armed forces. That’s more than the rest of NATO combined, even though the other countries have, in aggregate, greater demographic and economic resources.

“Unless the other NATO members are willing to step up their spending — and what are the odds of that? — there is scant chance that their gripes about American unilateralism will ever be rectified. We act alone, or almost alone, not out of choice but out of necessity.”

The predominantly liberal media, which was quick to highlight the chaos in Anbar province a year ago, has slowly come to admit that Anbar is now fast become one of the safest regions in the country.

These same liberals who decry war in all its forms, also deny the presence of al Qaeda in Iraq, despite evidence presented by George Tenet himself.

So who can you trust? The increasingly fanatical, fringe elements of the liberal antiwar movement, who are determined to end any and all wars at all costs? People convinced that the United States is the biggest part of the problem, not the solution? An entrenched, institutionalized media, which has failed for four years to accurately portray the realities of the war, especially the successes?

Would you trust these people with your life, your future, and that of your family?

I would rather side with the more nuanced truth of the matter, recently expressed by Victor Davis Hanson.

...while the West continues lopping off radicalized “monster-heads,” it is imperative to at least acknowledge the malady — radical Islam — in order to ultimately prevail. Victory can only come when the violent ideologies of radical Islam have been cauterized.

While Hanson points out the true source of the instability we are experiencing within nations that harbor and breed terror, Hanson would never mistake his assertion as a reason to halt military operations to be supplemented by strictly humanitarian efforts.