Trochilus on June 23, 2008 at 8:07 PM

Many people come out of history classes in college after studying every example of when our government abused its power, or even just used its power to advantage itself. And there were a few times when we weren’t right.

But all of them put together pale in comparison to the way the Democratic Congress abandoned South Vietnam in the wake of the Vietnam War and Watergate. Having pledged that we would stand beside them and support them with funds and air power against the invading North Vietnamese, we just abandoned them.

This was entirely the fault of the Democratic Congress. Worse, the people who abandoned their allies to death and torture patted themselves on the back for it.

To this day, the Democratic Party wants to surrender to our enemies and stab our allies in the back. As bad as the Republican party is sometimes, at least they don’t do that.

As ever, not an unmixed bag, but overall we are very much better off for having had GWB at the helm in these interesting times.

Even the native insurgents, mostly Ba’athist dead-enders who hated Americans, switched after enduring their alliance with AQI long enough to see the real threat to their homeland.

AQI==scum.

But don’t tell Obama. He still thinks it’s mid-2006.

It reminded me, by contrast, with that dark feeling I had April of ‘75 when we finally left Viet-Nam permanently. Like most everyone, I was happy the war was over, but I kept thinking back about the Vietnamese people, especially those I personally knew, who we left behind to fend for themselves against the communists — Chin, the wonderful lady who cleaned our hooch every day on Long Binh; Mia, the smart young girl who really ran the supply unit office; all the guys who came in to work in the motor pool, and learned a trade, or just made a few bucks . . . whatever. They no doubt suffered mightily when the rampaging communists came to town, and they were singled out as collaborationists.

Had we listened to the Democrats and been forced into retreat from Iraq, who can doubt what many of the consequences would have been? No doubt al-Qaeda in Iraq would have immediately declared victory over the infidels. In fact, our defeat would have been a tremendous boost to the prestige of that terror organization world wide, and likely would have permanently put them on the map. Having abandoned and left behind a fragile government, how long would it have been before thousands of recruits would have poured into the country, toppled that government, and thus established an al-Qaeda national base. It would have been one with huge oil reserves for them to exploit, the revenues of which would have been used to underwrite their terror activities throughout the region and the world.

American influence would have been dealt such a severe and humiliating setback that we would have been essentially impotent to deal seriously with terrorism for many, many years to come.

. . . .

And Chuck Schick — Thank you for telling us about your friend Mark. Please share with his family the enormous admiration we all feel for his great courage, and, above all, the true sense of gratitude we have for his sacrifice, and for the sacrifice of his family, on our behalf. You are a class guy for remembering to honor him, and we will hold his memory dear.

Oooops! My bad! What was I thinkin’? hehe :-)

Let’s hope the libs can learn from the Iraqis’ mistake and end their alliance with a.Q. before they too learn the hard way.

Tony737 on June 23, 2008 at 2:51 PM

One problem with your statement Tony, you have “libs” and “learn” in the same sentence.

Sorry to hear that, Chuck. Your friend Mark fought ‘em there so we wouldn’t have to fight ‘em here. God rest his soul.

Tony737 on June 23, 2008 at 2:54 PM

Much appreciated Tony. I think you’re right.

Per Hot Air, Iraq’s Anbar province will be turned over to the Iraqi security forces in the next ten days. This means 10 of the 18 Iraqi provinces are in control of the government. If The Surge continues to fail at this rate, Obamessiah will have no on…

The reason there is success in Iraq at all is specifically because of the Courage, Determination, and Resolve of the American Fighting Man and Woman, and the patriotic American civil servants who gave their time, efforts and lives to perpetuate a free and stable Iraq.

The midwives of Iraqi Democracy? The United States government and, especially, the young Men and Women of the Armed Forces.

Is this a great country or what?

Subsunk

I respect those who say it’s not worth it; but those who argue that point have to consider the consequences of leaving the country just as much as we who say we need to stay must take into account those costs.

I’m sceptical (who isn’t?) that the Sunni/US alliance will hold. AK-47 marriages, like shotgun agreements, seldom do.

We’ll see.

McCain had better push and promote this and similar news every time he speaks, because obviously the media won’t.

This is not a ‘kitchen table’ issue but a symbolic one, and sometime symbolic issues are crucial in national elections.

JFK won on symbolic rather than ‘kitchen table’ issues, and so did Clinton ( it WASN’T the economy, stupid )

The election will be mostly about Obamassiah, but exposing BHO as Totally Frakking Wrong on this issue is absoutely necessary

I wonder if this will be covered on any news channels. I mean, more than a brief mention before we are told of the casualty count and how we’ve been in Iraq longer then we were in WWII.

Sorry to hear that, Chuck. Your friend Mark fought ‘em there so we wouldn’t have to fight ‘em here. God rest his soul.

Let’s hope the libs can learn from the Iraqis’ mistake and end their alliance with a.Q. before they too learn the hard way.

Oops, I forgot. Only legitimate journalists retract incorrect statements and factual errors. Loud mouthed opinionated bigots like KO just go on to the next topic du jour.

I hope he’s somewhere smiling at this news. RIP amigo