A reminder that America has done a good thing for itself and for Iraq

Wallace Shawcross, in a Los Angeles Times Op-Ed chews and spits out, with great disdain, the anti-war Left. After pointing out that American actions have finally brought freedom to the Iraqi political stage, and that the Iraqis are embracing and excited by that freedom, Shawcross has this to say:

"That [the Iraqi's ability to operate under a democratic constitution] is thanks to the sacrifice of Casey Sheehan and others. It should be a source of pride in the United States. Thanks to the coalition Iraqis have more confidence in their future than we do. Iraqi refugees are not fleeing abroad in vast numbers, as happened during previous crises. The Iraqi dinar has strengthened, not weakened, against the currencies of other oil-producing nations. The mistakes that have been made in Iraq since its liberation do not alter the fact that the overthrow of Hussein has given Iraqis a chance they never had before and has shaken the ramshackle, corrupt and dictatorial foundations of the Middle East. That, of course, is why there is such bloody resistance. U.S. soldiers are being killed not by romantic nationalist insurgents (as some liberal journalists and marchers like to pretend) but by an unholy grouping of Saddamite gangsters furious at losing power, Syrian and Iranian agents intent on creating mayhem and then theocracy, and Islamo-fascists who want to enslave the world and whose local Pol Pot, Abu Musab Zarqawi, boasts of seeking to murder as many of Iraq's majority Shiite population as he can. Zarqawi has also declared that if he is victorious, he will use Iraq as a base to drag down other regional governments and to mount attacks on the United States. Osama bin Laden has said that 'the Third World War is raging in Iraq. The whole world is watching this war.' All of which makes the antiwar opposition in the U.S. and Europe remarkably shortsighted and self-indulgent. We in the West have a vital stake in delivering on our promises and ensuring that terrorism does not move on to other victims, with even greater bloodlust. The sacrifice of U.S. soldiers, of their coalition allies and of Iraqis is horrifically painful. But if we can stay long enough to enable the Iraqis to lay the firm foundation of civil society, their deaths will not be in vain. We should leave when the elected Iraqi government asks us to do so. It is the promise of freedom that the fascists who murdered the Iraqi teachers last month want to destroy. It is astonishing and discouraging that those who think they were taking the high ground in marching though Washington do not understand this.

Bravo! After spending the day in San Francisco, I really wish I could have had a copy of this article to hand to every ninny I saw parading down the street in an anti-Bush t-shirt, or driving a gas-guzzler bearing a "No War For Oil" bumpersticker. I should add that this anti-war, anti-Bush fever burning the City didn't prevent it from giving a rapturous welcome to the fleet during the City's annual Fleet Week. SF may hate the War, but everyone loves an Angel.