Conservativa

Everyone’s linking to this, and I am too. Please watch this video, “Dear Mr. Obama” and stay for the whole thing. Two minutes, well worth it.

General David Petraeus will be testifying today about progress on the Iraqi front. Check out this AP news article. A couple of excerpts:

The four-star general in charge of Iraq wants more time in a war that is now in its sixth year. Democrats say he’s got until the November elections. …. Democrats also acknowledge that they are more or less helpless in trying to force President Bush’s hand on the war. While anti-war legislation has been able to pass the House, it repeatedly sinks in the Senate, where Democrats lack the 60 votes needed to overcome procedural hurdles.

The Defeat-o-crats are aiming for that veto-proof majority this fall. They really think the American public is so dissatisfied about the war that we just want to bail out, no matter what the larger consequences might be. They really think that the American military (that would be the bunch of people who defeated the 3rd reich and imperial japan) somehow is unable to win in Iraq, so we should just crawl home. Or maybe the Democrats don’t think that but their big-money far-far-left donors do, and they will work to please those donors. Doesn’t matter. It’s a disgrace.

Here are a few more words on this, with something positive you can do, from GateWay Pundit.

Have to highlight this story, noted in Michelle Malkin’s blog. Here’s the quotation, from a little boy, Hunter:

‘Added Hunter, “For my report, I asked my dad if he likes being a soldier. He said he likes it because he gets to help people. He’s very proud and that’s one of the main things he joined the Army for.”‘

Here’s the link to the story.

It is the job of every military to defend its country by force, which may mean killing a lot of people, which every soldier knows. But he also knows how humane our military is, in general. (If you doubt this, pick up any history book and start reading anywhere).

See also, this picture. Shows the cruelty of war but the kindness of many American military people.

Michael Yon is a first class freelance photojournalist. Please read his new dispatch from Iraq: Resistance is Futile: You Will be (mis)Informed. Terrific writing, fine photographs. Learn what it’s like in Iraq, and what it’s like to try to report from Iraq.

Recently I have caught up with a friend serving in Iraq. He gave me permission to talk about the gist of what was in an email he sent, but did not want any identifying information given. The gist was this - where he is, in a hot spot in Iraq, the locals are getting along well with the Americans, and slowly beginning to get along with each other. They are seeing that Al Qaeda is the enemy of all of them. Wish I could quote a lot more of what he said, but I respect his wish to not do so.

He did say plainly that a real fear that he and his friends have is that Congress will pull the rug out from under them, just now when progress is truly beginning to happen. For example, see an AP story that is quoted here.

That ain’t right, people. Anyone who goes and puts his life on the line in the military should not have to worry that some shortsighted individual on Capitol Hill is going to undercut his work.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, who is also a colonel in the Air Force Reserve JAG, in Iraq, was interviewed by W. Thomas Smith for National Review. Graham is talking about detainees there and how we are working with some of them. This is amazing:

“SEN. GRAHAM: We put the detainee in school, teach them to read and write, then bring in moderate clerics who will actually sit down with the detainees and go over the Koran with them: Reading passages that the insurgents use on the streets. The clerics will say, ‘Here’s what they [the terrorists] say it says. Here’s what it actually says. Read it for yourself.’”

This is interesting and creative. Read the whole interview with Lindsey Graham.