North Star Writers Group

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's recently stated that the conflict in Iraq "is lost." If he honestly believes this, then it begs a simple question: Who won? Who defeated America? After all, if someone loses a contest, someone else usually wins it, do they not? Therefore, there must be a winner, at least in Harry's mind. I think there would be two entities that would stand to "win" if Reid and his fellow retreating liberals got their way: Al Qaeda and Iran.

Were we to withdraw from Iraq, Al Qaeda would waste no time setting up shop in whatever portions of the country they could control. They would reconstitute the bases of operation they once had in Afghanistan, and without a local fight to occupy their time and resources, return their full attention to attacking the United States domestically. The progress made in both Iraq and Afghanistan would be quickly reversed, and the bloodshed in both countries made a complete waste.

Iran would certainly swallow up the Shiite parts of Iraq with which they are more closely allied. Given that Iran is already defying international law in creating nuclear bomb materials, run by one of the most oppressive regimes on Earth, and has been the top abettor of terrorism for the last quarter century, increasing their power, influence, and hegemony cannot possibly be a desirable or acceptable outcome. That punk Ahmadinejad was a member of the mob that took American citizens hostage in 1979, and rather than giving him a long-overdue, much-deserved punishment for that, we would instead hand him a substantial addition to his empire on a silver platter.

Worst of all, America's word would be good for nothing anymore. The entire world would get the message, loud and clear, that America cannot be trusted to finish anything it starts. We would have lived down to Osama Bin Laden's trash talk in the wake of President Clinton's retreat from Somalia in the early 1990s, which motivated him to perpetrate the monstrously evil 9/11 attacks. We would show that America is all talk and no action, a paper tiger, an emperor having no clothes. Theodore Roosevelt's "speak softly and carry a big stick" would finally be reversed to "speak often and carry no stick at all."

Perhaps even this could be feasible, were we willing to play a very staunch, politically incorrect defense. For example, seal the borders, profile Muslim airline passengers and so on. It would still be true that we'd have to be right every time and the terrorists only once, but maybe all the flies could be squished if the swatter were big enough and swung often enough. But obviously, we're nowhere close to stomaching that sort of thing. And that makes retreat in Iraq all the more unconscionable - you can't give up on offense when you're already unwilling to play defense. It's asking for defeat, which in this case would be measured by a body count.

So what is inspiring Reid's seemingly incomprehensible cheerleading for losing? Why would he and his fellow liberals appear to eagerly anticipate a result bad for America and good for her two biggest enemies?

There are only two possibilities. One is that they just plain don't understand the stakes, or are so blinded by partisan rage that they can't see them and probably don't care. The other is that he knows full well what he's doing and what the result would be. Either way, his and Speaker Pelosi's behavior is so contemptuous that neither has any business being a "leader" of anything. Wasting everyone's time passing a bill they know full well will be immediately vetoed displays an appalling unseriousness not befitting the offices they hold and the solemn duties that come with them. The same holds for trying to orchestrate an outcome in Iraq and then running away from responsibility for the direct and inevitable consequences of it. And to top it off, there is the flagrantly unconstitutional attempt to usurp the president's rightful role and powers of Commander in Chief.

This is not occurring in a vacuum. These actions will have real-world consequences that affect us all. We cannot afford to repeat the mistakes of the 1990s, taking terrorism too lightly (if at all) until it's too late. Whether they are well-meaning but badly mistaken, or consumed by childish partisanship and selfish power grabs, or even legitimately treasonous, Reid and Pelosi are putting our lives at stake. Saying "oops, my bad" doesn't bring back dead victims from the grave.

NASA's motto of 40 years ago applies equally well to the War on Terror: "Failure is not an option." But sadly, for Reid and Pelosi and the liberal part of America that they represent, failure isn't just an option but an imperative. Should they be successful in their effort, we shall all pay the price for it.

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