A poll tax of blood

The Associated Press reported this weekend that terrorists killed several Afghanis Friday simply because they were carrying voter-registration cards.

That, ladies and gentlemen, is why we are over there. And that, too, is why we are here.

“News of the deaths emerged a day after a bomb ripped through a bus carrying female election workers in the eastern city of Jalalabad, killing two of them and wounding 13. A spokesman for the Taliban claimed responsibility,” AP reported.

The terrorists — selfish and maniacal thugs and fools — prove time and again they cannot be dealt with rationally or reasonably. Their end goal isn’t displacement of Western “infidels” or restoration of their perverted beliefs. Their actions are part of a conquest for global domination, and there are no terms under which they will stop senseless killings of their own people.

These fanatics want Americans gone so they can fill the vacuum with their merciless heel, which they promptly would place on the necks of the people of Afghanistan. And until every one of these bullies has been purged, freedom and democracy everywhere remain in harm’s way.

More than 5 million people are registered to vote this fall in Afghanistan, a country that only three years ago was ruled by an oppressive regime of dictators who killed and tortured at will. U.S.-led military action has brought freedom there, though, and Afghanis are seeing the fruits of economic exchange, opportunity for learning and the ability to communicate ideas.

Freedom really has redefined Afghanistan. And as that nation takes this major step toward democracy — in which the people will choose their leaders — terrorist thugs will do everything they can to derail progress. So show mercy to all except those who would keep free people from being free. For them: to the inferno of damnation.

Terrorists seek to stop the elections not because they oppose democracy — although they do — but because elections are a sign of the end of an era, a sign that the nation has moved across a stream and out of the hell in which the Taliban would have Afghanis live. These brutal ways of controlling people cannot exist where freedom thrives.

The people of Afghanistan have tasted the sweet nectar of liberty, and they aren’t likely ever to allow anyone to control their lives again. Democracy is like wildfire, and the United States is pumping a pretty big bellows. We’re not likely to be outpaced in the ammunition department, either.