Some Democrats are unpatriotic

So says Orson Scott Card, himself a Democrat.

The Campaign of Hate and Fear

Some choice excerpts:

But then I watch the steady campaign of the national news media to try to win this for the Democrats, and I wonder. Could this insane, self-destructive, extremist-dominated party actually win the presidency? It might--because the media are trying as hard as they can to pound home the message that the Bush presidency is a failure--even though by every rational measure it is not.

You hear about this all the time from the right, that the media is actively working to undermine the administration and bring about a Democrat win in 2004. To hear it from a Democrat only gives it additional weight.

But Iraq is not Vietnam. Nor is the Iraq campaign even the whole war. Of course there's still fighting going on. Our war is against terrorist-sponsoring states, and just because we toppled the governments of two of them doesn't mean that the others aren't still sponsoring terrorism. Also, there is a substantial region in Iraq where Saddam's forces are still finding support for a diehard guerrilla campaign.

In other words, the Iraq campaign isn't over--and President Bush has explicitly said so all along. So the continuation of combat and casualties isn't a "failure" or a "quagmire," it's a "war." And during a war, patriotic Americans don't blame the deaths on our government. We blame them on the enemy that persists in trying to kill our soldiers.

Anyone who persists in comparing Iraq to Vietnam, or calling it a "quagmire" is just parroting a line that is demonstrably false.

It's not just the war, of course. Notice that even though our recent recession began under President Clinton, the media invariably refer to it as if Mr. Bush had caused it; and even though by every measure, the recession is over, they still cover it as if the American economy were in desperate shape.

This brings to mind the famous quote: "It's the economy, stupid!" Actually, it can be shown that presidents have a lot less real control over the economy than most people think they do. Yet that doesn't stop the detractors of the current administration. Though, to be honest, it doesn't stop the detractors of the Clinton administration from blaming him for the recession either.

The goal of our troops in Iraq is not to protect themselves so completely that none of our soldiers die. The goal of our troops is to destroy the enemy, some of whom you do not find except when they emerge to attack our forces and, yes, sometimes inflict casualties.

This is the cold hard truth. I hate to see our men and women in uniform pay the ultimate price. But we must make sure that the price is worth paying. To do less, to cut and run, would be to render their sacrifices meaningless.

And the final paragraph:

And if we elect a government that subverts or weakens or ends our war against terrorism, we can count on this: We will soon face enemies that will make 9/11 look like stubbing our toe, and they will attack us with the confidence and determination that come from knowing that we don't have the will to sustain a war all the way to the end.

I really do need to read more of Mr. Card's books and stories.