Blogs For Victory

In this case, on the war:

You will hear from my opponent’s campaign in every speech, every interview, every press release that I’m running for President Bush’s third term. You will hear every policy of the President described as the Bush-McCain policy. Why does Senator Obama believe it’s so important to repeat that idea over and over again? Because he knows it’s very difficult to get Americans to believe something they know is false. So he tries to drum it into your minds by constantly repeating it rather than debate honestly the very different directions he and I would take the country. But the American people didn’t get to know me yesterday, as they are just getting to know Senator Obama. They know I have a long record of bipartisan problem solving. They’ve seen me put our country before any President — before any party — before any special interest — before my own interest. They might think me an imperfect servant of our country, which I surely am. But I am her servant first, last and always.

I have worked with the President to keep our nation safe. But he and I have not seen eye to eye on many issues. We’ve disagreed over the conduct of the war in Iraq and the treatment of detainees; over out of control government spending and budget gimmicks; over energy policy and climate change; over defense spending that favored defense contractors over the public good.

I disagreed strongly with the Bush administration’s mismanagement of the war in Iraq. I called for the change in strategy that is now, at last, succeeding where the previous strategy had failed miserably. I was criticized for doing so by Republicans. I was criticized by Democrats. I was criticized by the press. But I don’t answer to them. I answer to you. And I would be ashamed to admit I knew what had to be done in Iraq to spare us from a defeat that would endanger us for years, but I kept quiet because it was too politically hard for me to do. No ambition is more important to me than the security of the country I have defended all my adult life.

Senator Obama opposed the new strategy, and, after promising not to, voted to deny funds to the soldiers who have done a brilliant and brave job of carrying it out. Yet in the last year we have seen the success of that plan as violence has fallen to a four year low; Sunni insurgents have joined us in the fight against al Qaeda; the Iraqi Army has taken the lead in places once lost to Sunni and Shia extremists; and the Iraqi Government has begun to make progress toward political reconciliation.

None of this progress would have happened had we not changed course over a year ago. And all of this progress would be lost if Senator Obama had his way and began to withdraw our forces from Iraq without concern for conditions on the ground and the advice of commanders in the field. Americans ought to be concerned about the judgment of a presidential candidate who says he’s ready to talk, in person and without conditions, with tyrants from Havana to Pyongyang, but hasn’t traveled to Iraq to meet with General Petraeus, and see for himself the progress he threatens to reverse.

I know Americans are tired of this war. I don’t oppose a reckless withdrawal from Iraq because I’m indifferent to the suffering war inflicts on too many American families. I hate war. And I know very personally how terrible its costs are. But I know, too, that the course Senator Obama advocates could draw us into a wider war with even greater sacrifices; put peace further out of reach, and Americans back in harm’s way.

The argument made here by Senator McCain is unanswerable – so, expect the Democrats to not answer it and seek, instead, to change the subject as swiftly as possible. But McCain – and we who support him – must not let the subject be changed. This is the vital issue of our times, and it is also the prime reason to oppose Obama: he’s not fit to be President because he has no understanding of war, military policy, foreign policy or America’s place in the world. Obama’s views seem straight out of sophomore’s notebook from a government class…the sort of pie-in-the-sky talk we get from ivory-tower academics who don’t allow reality to interfere with grand theory.

The world is a hard place, at times, and Obama is a babe in the woods – it might be that he’d be a quick study and swiftly learn to discard what he thinks he knows, but we can’t gamble America – and the lives of Americans – on a hope that Obama will change fast enough from fool to sage. McCain, on the other hand, knows from hard experience (some of it excruciatingly personal) just how rough the world can be, and how cruel our enemies are – especially when they think they have us down. In the choice this November, nothing is more stark than this difference between Obama and McCain.

As McCain points out, Obama and his Democrats will use the Big Lie to try and win – not by out arguing McCain, but by making people feel worse about McCain than they do about Obama and his Democrats. This is the tried and true Democratic tactic – they’ve used it with success in the past, and they hope to do so in 2008. Winning is the only thing Democrats care about – and Obama is a blindingly ambitious man who has proven himself capable of getting right down into the political swamp in order to win. Counter-acting this Big Lie campaign will be difficult – especially as the MSM will largely serve as Obama’s megaphone for the next 6 months, but counter it we must. America is too valuable to the whole world – not just to Americans – for it to be placed at risk to gratify the ambition and greed of leftwingers slavering at the prospect of having the levers of power in their hands.