Media Are Gonna Barack Around The Clock

by Mark Steyn - January 21st, 2007 - Chicago Sun-Times

Did you see that poll about Iraq suggesting that . . . What's that? Barack Obama? Oh, sorry. According to the new rules . . . . .

[snip]

That poll about Iraq I mentioned right at the beginning was very interesting. It came out last week and it posed various questions about whether folks thought the "surge" was a good idea or not. Including the following:

"Do you personally want the Iraq plan President Bush announced last week to succeed?"

And here's how the American people answered: 63 percent said yes, 22 percent said no, 15 percent said they didn't know.

Let me see if I understand that. For four years, regardless of this or that position on the merits of the war, almost everybody has claimed to "support our troops.'' Some of us have always thought that "supporting the troops" while not supporting them in their mission is not entirely credible. But here we have 37 percent of the American people actually urging defeat on them. They "support our troops" by wanting them to lose. This isn't a question about whether you think the plan will work, but whether you want it to work. And nearly 40 percent of respondents either don't know or are actively rooting for failure. Which is to say: more dead American troops and more dead Iraqi civilians. Asked whether they want the surge to succeed, 34 percent of Democrats answered "No" . . . . .

Every now and again the articulate and intelligent Mark Steyn gets so subtle that you have to really concentrate to follow his argument. This column takes on two subjects and tries to juxtapose them so they make an argument that is not that easy to make. The point?

Per Steyn, ". . . increasing numbers of the American people reject the post-9/11 paradigm, and there will be a lot of votes for the quiet-life option in 2008."

Steyn argues the Barack Obama phenomenon and the fact that 34 per cent of democrats actually want the surge to fail adds up to a rejection of reality if it presents tough times and tough options. The quiet-life is what many people want. When 34 per cent of democrats want America to lose he may not be far off.

After these poll numbers I want to say to my friends who say calling democrats "appeasers" is unjust, I am actually being kind. "Traitors" would be more accurate.