Right Wing Nut House

Perhaps the Democrats should think very seriously about substituting the ostrich for the donkey as a mascot for their party.

It certainly would make more sense after House Armed Service Committee members decided to ban the use of the phrase “War on Terror:”

The House Armed Services Committee is banishing the global war on terror from the 2008 defense budget.

This is not because the war has been won, lost or even called off, but because the committee’s Democratic leadership doesn’t like the phrase.

A memo for the committee staff, circulated March 27, says the 2008 bill and its accompanying explanatory report that will set defense policy should be specific about military operations and “avoid using colloquialisms.”

The “global war on terror,” a phrase first used by President Bush shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S., should not be used, according to the memo. Also banned is the phrase the “long war,” which military officials began using last year as a way of acknowledging that military operations against terrorist states and organizations would not be wrapped up in a few years.

Committee staff members are told in the memo to use specific references to specific operations instead of the Bush administration’s catch phrases. The memo, written by Staff Director Erin Conaton, provides examples of acceptable phrases, such as “the war in Iraq,” the “war in Afghanistan, “operations in the Horn of Africa” or “ongoing military operations throughout the world.”

“There was no political intent in doing this,” said a Democratic aide who asked not to be identified. “We were just trying to avoid catch phrases.”

The problem isn’t that the “War on Terror” doesn’t describe the nature of our conflict with radical Islamism. We’ve heard it repeated ad nauseam that terror is a tactic, not an ideology. And this is true to a large extent.

But the problem with this change in nomenclature is that the “War on Terror” was a phrase that made it absolutely clear that the conflict was both global in nature and that all of the “operations” the Democrats are now going to list separately had an interconnectedness to them, that they were part of a united effort against a common enemy. And since both political correctness and strategic necessity disallowed the obvious alternative to “War on Terror” - that being, a “War Against Radical Islam” - supporters of the war found themselves hamstrung in what else to call the conflict.

Some military people began to refer to the war as “The Long War” which was accurate as far as it goes but much less descriptive. Now apparently, the Democrats have simply abandoned the idea of a general war at all and will pigeonhole each operation as separate and unrelated to any other operation underway around the world.

This is the culmination of nearly 6 long years of work by Democrats to banish 9/11 as a seminal date in history; that America was a different place after the terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 Americans than it was before.

And the reason the Democrats have been so anxious to change the dynamic regarding the “War on Terror” is shockingly political; they see a huge advantage accrue to the Republicans as a result of the attacks on this country and have been seeking for 6 years to destroy that advantage. Despite a transparent attempt to change the narrative of 9/11 to reflect badly on the President, to this day the President’s performance on 9/11 and the days following is seen as the highlight of his presidency by the majority of Americans. Unable to undermine history by substituting their own cockeyed narrative of the events on that day and immediately after, the Democrats are doing the next best thing; they are trying to remove the impact of 9/11 on our military and foreign policy and the subsequent decisions made by the President to fight Islamic radicalism all over the world.

And lest anyone think that this isn’t almost entirely about politics, House staffers makes it plain as day:

Committee aides, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said dropping or reducing references to the global war on terror could have many purposes, including an effort to be more precise about military operations, but also has a political element involving a disagreement over whether the war in Iraq is part of the effort to combat terrorism or is actually a distraction from fighting terrorists.

House Democratic leaders who have been pushing for an Iraq withdrawal timetable have talked about the need to get combat troops out of Iraq so they can be deployed against terrorists in other parts of the world, while Republicans have said that Iraq is part of the front line in the war on terror. Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., the armed services committee chairman, has been among those who have complained that having the military tied up with Iraq operations has reduced its capacity to respond to more pressing problems, like tracking down al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.

At the moment, the only other place to deploy troops is Afghanistan - a hypocritical idea since the Europeans aren’t pulling their weight as it is and such a move would give the lie to the Democrats oft repeated criticism that Bush is all too willing to go it alone when it comes to the conflict formerly known as The War on Terror.

The Washington Times hits the nail on the head:

This is yet another sign that the Democrats are going hard-left on national-security issues generally and not just on Iraq — in this instance, trying to airbrush away the very war on terrorism from our most basic defense legislation.

This is also hypocrisy, simple and rank — the sort that causes us to question motives. There is no other conclusion given that the phrase “war on terror” still has its uses for some Democratic lawmakers. One of them is Rep. Ike Skelton of Missouri, who chairs the House Armed Services Committee and is ultimately responsible for these directives. “Today, we are in the midst of a long struggle against the evil of terrorism,” reads his press release commemorating the fifth anniversary of the September 11, 2001. Iraq is “separate and distinct from the war on terrorism,” which, according to the Ike Skelton responsible for the Sept. 3, 2006, release, still retains merit. Of course, this document is intended for public consumption. It is only secondarily a means of cudgeling Mr. Bush.

Which is it, Mr. Skelton? A catch-phrase or a long struggle? We suppose it depends on whom you’re talking to.

Perhaps we shouldn’t be so taken aback. Many Democrats have been uncomfortable with “war on terrorism” for its alleged bellicosity, its lack of “nuance” and its clarity on whom the bad guys are. Above all, they dislike its close association with the presidency of George W. Bush.

No doubt that “close association” with Bush is one the major reasons for the change. From a party that has portrayed this president as more dangerous than terrorists; a Hitler, a stupid ox (while at the same time attributing Machiavellian achievements to him), and the greatest threat to civil liberties and liberal democracy in American history, removing part of his legacy would seem to be the least they can do to stick it to him.

I suspect that this directive will be honored in the breach and many Democrats of the Blue Dog stripe will continue to use the term “War on Terror” to describe the long, twilight struggle against radical Islam. And since global operations against terrorism will continue regardless of what Democrats call it (at least until a liberal democrat is elected President), it might be fun to watch Democrats twist themselves into knots trying to describe an operation that targets the financial reserves of the Philippine terrorist organization Abu Sayyaf Group while using Special Forces to interdict bombs and bomb making materials from the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) whose links to the Indonesian group Jemaah Islamiah are well established. In the meantime, American FBI and CIA scour the back alleys and slums of Asian cities looking to break the links that bind all those groups together.

Yeah…but don’t call it a “Global War on Terror.”