Posted by
richstacy on Thursday, February 21, 2008 6:18:50 PM
It astonishes me that the two remaining Democratic candidates for president, like most of their colleagues who have fallen by the wayside, practically stumble over each other trying to claim the distinction of who would be first to declare defeat in Iraq and retreat without honor, leaving Iraqis to fend for themselves against radical Islamists, and mocking the sacrifice of the brave young Americans who have lost their lives there.
Joe Rice is a former Glendale Colorado mayor, now a member of the Colorado Legislature. He has completed two tours of duty in Iraq. Joe has made presentations to my Kiwanis Club in Lakewood twice. During his most recent tour in 2006 he helped establish the Baghdad City Council. Lt. Col. Rice is a Democrat, but his take on Iraq couldn’t be further removed from that of Clinton and Obama. Even in 2006 he said things were going far better there than we have been led to believe.
To be sure there are ethnic differences, but what most Americans don’t realize, Rice told us, is that the great majority of Iraqi families are mixed and intermarried. There is far more understanding between ethnic and religious groups than we have been told. Even back in 2006, he said that most of the country was surprisingly normal and that Iraqis had a sense of optimism about the future. His primary message was that pulling out of Iraq prematurely would be “a tragic mistake.”
Since then, things in Iraq have improved dramatically. To be sure, many of us doubted the wisdom of going to Iraq in the first place. The decision to go may have been flawed and the war may have been mismanaged for years -- but Rumsfeld is gone now. John McCain’s long sought surge has taken place and it has, to the surprise of many, worked remarkably well. Violence is down, not just a little, but way down -- all over Iraq, including in the once uncontrollable Sunni Triangle. Sunni and Shiite are getting along far better than anyone would have imagined just a few months ago. Al Qaeda in Iraq is on the run, in disarray and all but defeated.
The Iraqi government is making real progress; painfully slow progress, but progress nevertheless. Power sharing between Sunni and Shiite factions is slowly beginning to take place. The big stumbling block of figuring out a way to share oil revenues among Sunni, Shia and Kurds is being solved. Schools, power and infrastructure are being restored to better than pre-war levels. Saddam’s murder factories and torture chambers are permanently out of business.
Iraqis have risked everything to come out and vote, have their fingers dyed purple and proudly proclaim that they are for determining their own future. Despite being repeatedly targeted for murder by the insurgency and by al Qaeda in Iraq, Iraqi security forces are becoming stronger by the week. There is increasing support among Sunni sheiks and Shiite militia warlords for peace.
For the first time there is a real opportunity to establish a beacon of hope in the Mid-East: An island of democracy, tolerance, pluralism and hope in a sea of medieval hopelessness and repression. An island where hope and prosperity are possible. A place where women are allowed to be educated and are valued as human beings, not treated as chattels.
Now that our efforts in Iraq are beginning to really pay off, now that victory for the Iraqi people is in sight, now that the sacrifice of our young troops is starting to bear the genuine fruit of freedom: hope -- Is that the time to declare defeat, abandon the Iraqi people to intolerance and Taliban style totalitarianism and come home with our tail between our legs? That is the question I would like to put to Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.