American Elephants

In unusually strong language from perhaps America’s most respected editorial page, the Wall Street Journal has said it can no longer give Nancy Pelosi and Democrats the benefit of the doubt that their political maneuvers are not, “consciously intended to cause a U.S. policy failure in Iraq.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, famous for donning a head scarf earlier this year to commune for peace with the Syrians, has now concluded that this is the perfect moment to pass a Congressional resolution condemning Turkey for the Armenian genocide of 1915. Problem is, Turkey in 2007 has it within its power to damage the growing success of the U.S. effort in Iraq. We would like to assume this is not Speaker Pelosi’s goal.

To be clear: We write that we would like to assume, rather than that we do assume, because we are no longer able to discern whether the Speaker’s foreign-policy intrusions are merely misguided or are consciously intended to cause a U.S. policy failure in Iraq. [emphasis added]

This is an unuusally powerful condemnation coming from a paper so well respected that its Op-Ed pages regularly play host to world leaders and heads of state, but it is in response to a political maneuver that is unusually treacherous even by Democrat standards.

As we explained the other day, there is no valid reason to pass this resolution at this time. The event in question took place 91 years ago, and has already been condemned by Congress twice.

The only rational explanation remaining then, and quite frankly the obvious explanation, is that Democrats are trying to undermine their own country in order to end the war without having to be held accountable for ending the war.

The maneuver has been condemned by eight former Secretaries of State, including Democrats Madeline Albright and Warren Christopher, by current and former Secreteries of Defense,  and even by Demcorats such as Jane Harman who wrote just as much in an Op Ed in the Los Angeles Times.

Last time we looked, treason meant intentionally attempting to harm your country. And how can anyone argue that intentionally trashing our relationship with an ally for bogus, trumped up reasons is anything but that?

The fact remains that if Democrats want to end the war, they have it within their constituional powers to do so. Having won control of the House, Democrats control the purse strings. If they want us out of Iraq, all they need do is stop funding the war.

The reason Democrats refuse to do so is because they know that while they desperately try to paint the war they themselves approved as , “Bush’s war,” that if they cut funding out from under the president and the troops, then the aftermath really will be, “the Democrat aftermath.” If we leave and things get worse, as everyone predicts they will, Democrats will own that regional chaos lock, stock and barrell.

But no one, absolutely no one, should tolerate Democrats thinly veiled attempt to trash our relationship with Turkey in their attempt to undermine their own country out of war. Since when is intentionally undermining your country an acceptable means to any end? As the Wall Street Journal concludes:

If Nancy Pelosi and Tom Lantos want to take down U.S. policy in Iraq to tag George Bush with the failure, they should have the courage to walk through the front door to do it.

Indeed! Nor should the Democrats like Nancy Pelosi, and co-sponsor in the Senate Hillary Clinton, be let off the hook for their treacherous politics.