A Great Day For The Democrats!

The breathless and enthusiastic anticipation of the Democratic Party was rewarded this last week. The United States suffered her 2000th combat fatality in Iraq. Within moments, the Democratic National Committee released a statement exploiting the occasion. Of course, it was a tasteless and tactless attack on the president.
"Today, our nation marks one of the saddest days of the war in Iraq, the loss of the 2,000th American soldier there. Each soldier lost on the battlefield leaves behind a family forever marked by tragedy, and scarred with grief. Their loss weighs heavily on the heart of every single American. Today, we are united in reflecting on the suffering and sacrifice of the brave men and women in uniform and their families.
"Sadly, in delivering yet another speech about the war in Iraq that lacked a clear plan for victory, President Bush failed to mention the tragic milestone we mark today. This is not the type of leadership that the brave men and women serving in Iraq and their loved ones here at home expect or deserve from the Commander in Chief. Now, even though we have lost 2,000 servicemen and women and spent more than $218 billion over the last two years, just 800 Iraqi troops have been fully trained. The need for a clear plan for victory in Iraq cound (sic) not be more apparent.”
As they demonstrated during the Paul Wellstone Memorial in 2002, for Democrats, there is no occasion so solemn that it cannot be exploited for partisan political advantage.
Every day during these last few weeks, the press reminded us of the approaching “milestone.” I could easily imagine the press as a bunch of hyperactive 11 year olds in the backseat of a car asking: “Are we there yet? Are we there yet?”
The press could just as easily have honored the sacrifice of our war dead by crediting them for their successes, much as we do for our World War I and II dead. It would have been easy. Only hours before the Democrats’ great moment, it was announced that the Iraqi people had voted by a 4-1 margin to establish their nation as the first Arab democracy. Would it not have made a good story to honor the sacrifice by highlighting the progress being made? For example, the terrorist network trying to thwart democracy could only mount 13 ineffectual election-day attacks. During the January parliamentary election, there were nearly 350. Sounds like success to me.
Winning the war against Islamist terrorism will require draining the cesspools where the contagion thrives. The conditions that gave us Osama Bin Laden are the result of 1000 years of history. If we brought Osama Bin Laden’s head out of Afghanistan on the end of a stick, we would be no less threatened by terrorism. The cesspool would just replace him with another. The founding of a democratic Iraq will establish the necessary tipping point that will steer the Arab world away from the path that created Islamist terrorism. Those who see history slipping away from them are desperate to resist. We should steel ourselves to the inevitability of more deaths and keep in front of us the consequences of failure, or even of doing nothing.
Every death is a tragedy. The first death was a loss. The 138th death was a loss. The 1999th death was just as tragic as the 2000th. But numbers such as those were not as valuable to the left as they lacked the landmark value of the 1000th death, which occurred just before last year’s presidential election, or this week’s 2000th death, which occurred Tuesday, and permitted the press to bury the Iraqi referendum story.
If there is anything that makes the 2000th death more tragic than the others, it’s the way that the left has exploited it. The DNC statement is a lie. The Bush Administration has clearly defined its plan for victory – the establishment of a stable, democratic Iraq. Nobody believed this would be bloodless. No remotely responsible person would have us leave the job undone, as that would condemn Iraqis to civil war with the terrorists as the most likely victors. But, that is precisely what the DNC wishes to achieve by using the sacrifice of the 2000th soldier to undermine the cause for which he gave his life.
Disgusting, just disgusting.