Hugh Hewitt on Iraq Independence and the American Left

Hugh Hewitt:

Every day of freedom the Iraqis enjoy is a day that MoveOn.org and the rest of the gang wanted to deny the Iraqi people. They helped President Obama win an election of course, but they are losing the battle with history every single day, and days like today must drive that home and drive them into a deserved gloom over their own failed plans to see America humbled.

What I appreciate is how the networks sent their big guns: Charles Gibson, Brian Williams, Couric, Blitzer, to Dallas to interview President Bush on Iraq Independence Day. It was a classy move to acknowledge the historic significance of the moment; to acknowledge that - though Iraq still is not in the clear - the ecstatic celebrations of June 30, 2009 would not have happened without President Bush' vision and courage, at the tail end of 2006, in going against the advice of virtually the entire foreign policy establishment.*

Peter Wehner concludes a must read:

[T]hose who wrote off the war as unwinnable and a miserable failure, who made confident, sweeping arguments that have been overturned by events, and who had grown so weary of the conflict that they were willing to consign Iraqis to mass slaughters and America to a historically consequential defeat -- they were thankfully, blessedly wrong. And the Land between the Rivers, which has known too much tyranny and too many tears, may yet bind up its wounds.

Wehner examines three arguments against the Iraq invasion:

1. "the effort to promote liberty in the Arab world was a fool's errand" because "the cultural soil was too hard and forbidding."(Wehner quote)
2. "Iran was the real winner in the war in Iraq."(Powerline quote)
3. "global jihadists in general, and al Qaeda in particular, were massively aided by the Iraq war"(Powerline quote)

More on President Bush, from Jay Nordlinger:

Reminds me of something a well-known politician said about George W. Bush (off the record, I’m afraid): “Whatever his other accomplishments, at least he kept two of the sorriest sons-of-[guns] who ever lived from being president.”

*Just kidding. The networks sent exactly zero guns to Dallas on an Iraq Independence Day in which Iraqis danced deliriously in the streets. Networks didn't even send a pop gun to Dallas. Network stories, rather than emphasizing Iraqis who were delirious with delight at their freedom and self-rule, instead emphasized how Iraqis were celebrating being out from under the thumb of those bad, bad Americans. Oppression was implied.