Iraq, Afghanistan, and What the Left Ignores

Will the Left judge themselves by the same standard?

“You break it you buy it” is a sign I used to see often when I went into small, family owned stores.  Want to see how heavy that crystal vase is?  Ooops!  That’ll be $39.95 please.  Iraq and Afghanistan are sort of like that vase.  I was never for the United States invading Iraq though I loathed Saddam Hussein.  I was in favor of this country going into Afghanistan, however.  Barack Obama is trying to make good on his promises to remove U.S. troops from Iraq:

The U.S. military is packing up to leave Iraq in what has been deemed the largest movement of manpower and equipment in modern military history — shipping out more than 1.5 million pieces of equipment from tanks to antennas along with a force the size of a small city.

The massive operation already under way a year ahead of the Aug. 31, 2010 deadline to remove all U.S. combat troops from Iraq shows the U.S. military has picked up the pace of a planned exit from Iraq that could cost billions.

The goal is to withdraw tens of thousands of troops and about 60 percent of equipment out of Iraq by the end of next March, Brig. Gen. Heidi Brown, a deputy commander charged with overseeing the withdrawal, told The Associated Press in one of the first detailed accounts of how the U.S. military plans to leave Iraq

The United States has spent hundreds of billions of dollars (or one Obama “stimulus” package) on the operation not to mention the cost in American lives.  Since the drawdown has begun we are again hearing about suicide bombings and the rising civilian death toll in that country.  The dark forces at work in that country are just biding their time until they can unleash their civil war which could kills tens of thousands (or more) people.

Liberals' "universal" rights apply only to themselves.

In Afghanistan (the “good” Liberal war) Obama is under pressure to withdraw troops there even as his newly appointed general says we’ll need at least 30,000 more troops to tamp down the violence and maybe gain control of the country.  Before Americans arrived there mass executions in soccer stadiums, the beheadings of women, and the banning of such things as music and television were common.  Should we leave, the people of Afghanistan will probably find a more repressive life than the people of Iraq would find.

The Left, always the “champion” of gay rights, women’s rights, abortion rights, affirmative action, and organic tofu seems to think their values stop at the water’s edge and thus don’t apply to the poor, uneducated girls and women of Afghanistan.  Well, they may say that these are “universal” values but only if somebody else tries to guarantee them.

Before George W. Bush’s “surge” in Iraq talk was to remove U.S. troops pronto.  Conservatives raised the fact that when a similar thing happened in Vietnam tens of thousands were murdered.  Considering how the U.S. military, which was simply following civilian orders, was treated (Jane Fonda on a Vietcong anti-aircraft gun comes to mind) I can’t honestly believe hippies had the best interests of American soldiers in mind.

When pressed, Liberals will change subjects and just say things like Afghanistan is where nations go to die, we should have never gone into Iraq it’s not our problem, etc.  They ignore the fact that when the Romans, British, and Russians went into Afghanistan is wasn’t to build schools or provide security for free elections and in Iraq we took ownership of that situation when we invaded.  Another phrase comes to mind here:  ”In for a penny, in for a pound.”

Like it or not, withdraw from these countries will cause massive civilian deaths… something the Left loves to discuss when it makes a Republican president looks badly but something to ignore when it becomes an obstacle to “bringing the troops home.”

While we cannot compare the occupation/rebuilding of Iraq and Afghanistan to that of Japan and Germany, the same basic rule applies… you break it you buy it.  One of the things people don’t seem to remember is the Great War became part one because the job with Germany wasn’t finished after the Versailles Treaty was signed (in fact, that treaty was too punitive in nature).

Liberals love to go on and on about the cost of the war.  Well, how much “war” would $787 billion of pork-filled “stimulus” have bought us?  And Liberals wanted even more “stimulus” money!  What about human rights?  How often did the Left get on George H.W. Bush about China after Tiananmen Square?  Where are their arguments now?

I have one word for you: Hypocrisy.

They'll be fine if we leave.

Iraq and Afghanistan should not be holes into which we simply pour our treasure and blood but the principles that make America great: Freedom, Liberty, Individual Rights, Honor, Promises, and Optimism should not be abandoned.  And we shouldn’t forget that Barack Obama, with all of his highfalutin talk of a “withdraw” has never said we would not leave troops in Iraq for the next 10-20 years.

Are we to withdraw, leaving 60,000-some troops there, only to see violence escalate only to have to do it all over again from scratch?

Hypocrisy is what gets me about Liberals.  Saying you are for gay rights, women’s rights, minority rights, freedom, etc… then backing away or only applying them when it is convenient doesn’t cut the mustard with me.  Universal principles are just that… universal.  We’re not talking about being against lying but saying it’s okay to tell somebody their suit looks nice when it doesn’t… it’s a little more complicated than that.

What Obama’s election has done, for a new generation, is expose the lying, hypocritical, selfish Left for being what they really are.

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