Democrat Harry Reid: "This War is Lost"

"We can't win."  "We've already lost." 

This is how losers talk.

Democratic Senate majority leader Harry Reid is the baseball "fan" who declares his team defeated when it's still a tie in at the bottom of the 7th inning.

Harry Reid is the surgeon who declares his patient dead when the man is still on the operating table with a beating heart.

Harry Reid is the sales rep who gives up after the sixth customer says no.

Harry Reid is the head of the cheerleading squad who rallies the fans to boo their own coach.

Harry Reid is the lawyer who realizes his client is unpopular and the trial will be difficult, and promptly withdraws from the case.

Harry Reid is the man who hears of deep evil being done to innocent people in a faraway land -- a place like Darfur or the Phililpines or Iraq -- and immediately returns his attention to the more pressing problem of his hangnail.

Harry Reid is the military officer who stares into the faces of vicious enemies who hate freedom and life itself . . . and concedes the battlefield.

Harry Reid is living up to the defeatist parodies of himself -- except that it isn't just himself and his party he is giving up on this time.  It is his country.

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Let us recall how true leaders speak and act, even in difficult times. 

You no doubt remember the words of Winston Churchill during World War II on the subject of never giving up. 

Here is an excerpt from that speech given on October 29, 1941 by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, while visiting Harrow School.  Although some of the names have changed, the story is the same:

You cannot tell from appearances how things will go. Sometimes imagination makes things out far worse than they are; yet without imagination not much can be done. Those people who are imaginative see many more dangers than perhaps exist; certainly many more than will happen; but then they must also pray to be given that extra courage to carry this far-reaching imagination.

But for everyone, surely, what we have gone through in this period--I am addressing myself to the School -- surely from this period of ten months, this is the lesson:

Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never--in nothing, great or small, large or petty--never give in, except to convictions of honor and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.

We stood all alone a year ago, and to many countries it seemed that our account was closed, we were finished. All this tradition of ours, our songs, our School history, this part of the history of this country, were gone and finished and liquidated.

Very different is the mood today. Britain, other nations thought, had drawn a sponge across her slate. But instead our country stood in the gap. There was no flinching and no thought of giving in; and by what seemed almost a miracle to those outside these Islands, though we ourselves never doubted it, we now find ourselves in a position where I say that we can be sure that we have only to persevere to conquer.

You sang here a verse of a School Song: you sang that extra verse written in my honor, which I was very greatly complimented by and which you have repeated today. But there is one word in it I want to alter - I wanted to do so last year, but I did not venture to. It is the line: "Not less we praise in darker days."

I have obtained the Head Master's permission to alter darker to sterner. "Not less we praise in sterner days."

Do not let us speak of darker days: let us speak rather of sterner days. These are not dark days; these are great days--the greatest days our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race.

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We are not losing in Iraq, Senator Reid, despite your efforts to deprive Iraq and America's troops of victory when it is almost within their grasp.

We are winning in Iraq.

This is how winning feels, in the early stages.  It feels like scorching heat, freezing cold, sweat, pain, agony, injury, and loss of life.  That is always how it feels in wartime before victory comes.

Did you think it would be easy?

Did you think it would be easy when you voted to authorize the Iraq war? 

Did you imagine that America would win a war against vicious, determined foes without any real loss of life, without enough funding to put a dent in the budget, and without any real inconvenience to anyone?

Sometimes winning a war is easy. 

More often, it is not. 

A wise leader, and a wise nation, are prepared for either possibility, and do not flinch from their duty when it is hard.

The blood of every American soldier who ever died on the battlefield cries out that winning a war is not always easy.

The blood of every victim of Islamic terror cries out too.  Can't you hear it, Senator Reid? 

Can't you hear hundreds of thousands of victims of Islamic terror around the world -- including thousands of Americans -- crying out?

In Iraq, we are fighting terrorists who are evil enough to booby-trap children's toys with shrapnel and saw off men's heads to place them in fruit boxes around town.

And you, Senator Reid, would let them win.

In fact, you want to make sure they win -- by abandoning the battlefield.

What spineless sea of jellyfish did you float in with, that you lack the backbone to see this difficult, necessary, sacred duty through to victory?

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Update:  Messages from the troops to Harry Reid in the wake of his shameful comments are here and here.  Kim Preistap at Wizbang points out that Reid's declaration of defeat is both predictable and premature -- since the surge has barely begun.

The New York Times, the Paper of Record for Losing the War, covers Reid's Defeat-o-crat talk here.

From Scrappleface:  Reid Supports the Troops Who Lost the War

From John Hawkins:  Harry Reid: Al Qaeda Wins! Al Qaeda Wins! Al Qaeda Wins!

Comments

[DemocracyRules]

WELL SAID GINA! Another quote from Churchill is relevant: "If you are going through hell, keep going."

[NOX]

Okay... a question really needs to be asked here:

What does "winning" actually mean?

If it means a stable, US-friendly democracy, with limited influence from Islamic fundamentalists, free-flowing oil to Exxon and co., the removal of a safe-haven for terrorists, and a sound, freedom-loving template for other Middle-Eastern countries to follow, then to use your baseball analogy: Harry Reid is the fan who has jumped back on the 7 train at the top of the 7th with the Mets trailing 13-0, the bases load, no outs and a rookie pitcher on the mound who has yet to throw a strike.

"Winning" isn't about words, it isn't about posture, it isn't about headlines, it isn't about "sending messages", it is about achieving what you set out to do.

Unfortunately, because of the wildly unrealistic expectations of Cheney, Rumsfeld, et al at the outset of this ill-conceived and woefully poorly executed war, it was apparent the US "lost" sometime in mid-June, 2003. The vast majority of Iraqi people didn't want the invasion or the occupation. Hatred of Saddam did not mean love of war or invasion or the US's oil-hungry foreign policy.

I will leave you with a quote from General McPeak, US joint chief of staff during the first Gulf War: "This is a dark chapter in our history. Whatever else happens, our country’s international standing has been frittered away by people who don’t have the foggiest understanding of how the hell the world works.