Kamikaze (cont.)

Cavalry Charge attempts to answer our rhetorical question with a motivational speech. Fellas, I'm with you. I stand behind our troops. I pray that the Iraqi people are able to make democracy work. We are united in our resolve to win this war, and now that we're there we should commit serious resources to winning.

However, I disagree with their telling assertion that it is never appropriate to "'reconsider' the cost" to our country. Such a claim defies logic. The justification that was fed to the American people for this war was that it would save American lives. And yet Cavalry Charge now argues that we should sacrifice an infinite number of American lives for this cause? The only way this argument makes any sense is if we differentiate between which American lives are being saved and which are being lost. What the upper-class attorneys who write Cavalry Charge are arguing is that they agree with the sacrifice of an infinite number of young typically lower class American soldiers in order to conduct this experiment in Middle Eastern democracy. I find this appalling.

Cavalry Charge then counters with the question: "What are the costs associated with withdrawal and surrender?" Of course, I have not advocated either. If we lost thousands more of our young men in Iraq, however, and a functioning democratic government seemed nowhere on the horizon in Iraq, I very well might advocate withdrawal. T'OD claims that the cost would be "emboldened terrorists." Emboldened terrorists! Not like the sheepish ones who blew up trains in Madrid. Really, the cost would depend upon the situation in Iraq at the time we withdrew, should it come, and on the international community's willingness to become involved. Let's hope it never comes to that.