*sigh*
DTWB--
The fact that America wasn't "subject to the same liberal sympathy for the enemy" speaks more to the motives and methods of the President and his administration then to the mood of the country. WWII is the model for a "just war", one where the morals and ethics allegedly practiced by America are enforced. Although I don't believe the President to in Iraq for the same reasons as Vietnam, the lack of a clear objective is telling.
If Iraq decides they don't want democracy--which wouldn't be surprising given that no Muslim-majority nation embraces democracy--then this will have been a failure of sorts. A failure in the sense that the troops that died are enforcing a political agenda--not a bad thing since all wars enforce political agendas. But the President should've received more realistic advice on the chances of converting Iraq into a neo-democracy. And that's why this whole thing, for me, gets so much of my attention.
If freeing the Iraqi people becomes the impetus for the war, then several points must be made: the entrance/exit strategy of the military has been poorly planned. The administration greatly underestimated the Iraqi people's desire to be free. The Koran is a political text, with explicit, and frankly anti-democratic sentiments that make the implementation of Western-style "freedoms" very difficult. So the primary objectives of the occupation have been blunted by the teachings of their holy book and their holy men.
Your vitrolic call for unity is silly. America was built on terrorism and free speech, and to try to control the latter smacks of facsism. Voltaire's assertion that "I may disagree with what you say, but defend to the death your right to say it" is essential to the Constitution: for all your thinly veiled hatemongering regarding homosexuals, I do not agree with one word you say, but would never insist or suggest that you be silenced. Free speech with the fewest number of restrictions is the only way to insure the health of our democratic enterprise.
Additionally, one could take the sentiments of "never speak out against the President" to preserve a host of evils that have plagued our country: slavery, women's rights, immigrants rights, the inherent wrong of Vietnam, and so on. If people can't use their freedoms to speak out against what they believe to be injustices of the day, then you are calling for a fascist state where control is more important than freedom. But that wouldn't be America.
