The Politics of the Disinterested

It's beginning to look like America has become incapable of comprehending just what winning a war is all about. The American people seem to have their heads stuck so deep in the sand that they no longer are capable of understanding political realities.

Politics Collide With Iraq Realities
Commanders Seek Longer-Term Focus

By Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, April 8, 2007; Page A01

There are two Iraq wars being waged, according to military officers on the ground and defense experts: the one fought in the streets of Baghdad, and the war as it is perceived in Washington.

Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, who took over as the top U.S. commander in Iraq in February, cited the disparity last week. "The Washington clock is moving more rapidly than the Baghdad clock," he said in a television interview. "So we're obviously trying to speed up the Baghdad clock a bit and to produce some progress on the ground that can, perhaps . . . put a little more time on the Washington clock."

While Washington appears headed toward a political endgame on Iraq, with the White House and Congress sparring over benchmarks and pullout dates, the war on the ground is at an ebb tide. All sides -- including U.S. military strategists and Iraqi sectarian leaders and insurgents, as well as regional players such as Iran, Syria, Saudi Arabia and Turkey -- are waiting to see whether the new U.S. approach to make the Iraqi capital safer will work. Soldiers on the ground tend to see the Washington debate as irrelevant, and the perspective of many politicians in Washington is that the military schedule is simply too slow.

"The time scale to succeed is years," said John J. Hamre, a former deputy defense secretary, while "the time scale for tolerance here is 12 months for Democrats and 18 months for Republicans."

I blame this lunatic obsession with pulling out as fast as possible on two things.

First, the almost constant bombardment of the American public with negative reports coming back from Iraq by the anti-Bush Paleo-media, and the constant drumbeat of defeatism from the Democrat Party leadership as they attempt to regain power at any cost.

Second, the hyperactive, Sesame Street mentality of today's American Citizens. We are so addicted to the high octane video stimulation beaming out to us from our televisions, that we have become bored with the war. Reality has lost its fascination for much of America.

American would much rather get lost in the almost constant bloodshed and sexual content of today's television fare than pay attention to what is occurring in the world around them. They have become dependent upon the 30 second sound bite from the half-hour newscast for insight into what is occurring within their government and events around the world.

We have also become selfish. We are no longer interested in what is going on around us. We have become focused on our own petty existences.

The Left has done a magnificent job of destroying the glue which held our society together for so long. Programs like diversity rather than acculturation, schools which indoctrinate rather than teaching kids to think, and right-speak replacing freedom of speech have all done their job in dumbing down the American people.

May God help us.

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