Democrats and the Media Undermine Our Troops

The following is one of my upcoming columns for The Queens Village Eagle newsletter, in anticipation of the president's State of the Union address, where he will challenge his congressional critics to come up with their own plan for victory in Iraq.
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The country is split over President Bush’s new strategy to send more troops into Iraq. Political squabbling in Congress and media vitriol directed at our Commander-in-Chief are largely to blame for our failures in Iraq and they are undermining the moral of our troops. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid acting on behalf of the Democratic majority in Congress have been bashing the president’s plan to send 21,500 more troops to stabilize Baghdad and change the “rules of engagement,” without offering a solution of their own, except for early withdrawal and defeat. Pelosi said: “President Bush has dug a hole so deep he can’t even see the light. It’s a tragedy. It’s a stark blunder.”

The consequences of the political back biting on Capitol Hill are demoralizing our troops as Marine Corporal Philip Levine of the Bronx has expressed: “It’s bad for morale for politicians to be fighting at home. The troops want to know they have the support of the government and the American people. The last thing you want when you’re over there is to read about politicians fighting over what to do with us.”

The Bush plan is a street level offensive that divides Baghdad into districts and secures and holds the city block by block until the terrorist insurgents are defeated and never return. It’s a proven model endorsed by Rudy Giuliani who used the seize and hold street crime strategy and added additional police in order to reduce violent crime in New York City by 68% from a high of over 2000 homicides a year to a few hundred.

The war in Iraq will be won or lost here at home. It’s a war of ideas and propaganda that’s being played out on the pages of the media, on Capitol Hill and in our classrooms. In order to win, we must speak up loud enough to drown out the vitriol and pessimism coming from these quarters. We must condemn the depraved media, the radical professors, and politicians who are backstabbing our troops fighting overseas for our liberty. For the sake of victory in Iraq we must speak out here in America to defend President Bush and the Congressional Republicans who support the president’s plan, in order show the troops that they have the full support of the government and the American people.