Karl Rove has the Democrats up in arms over his comments today, as the White House apparently has decided to go on offense. In the wake of the truly boneheaded remarks by the Honorable Senator Richard Durbin, who compared Americans at Guantanamo to to Nazi concentration camp guards and Soviet gulag guards, Rove pointed out the what is inescapably implied by all this Democratic solicitude toward captured enemy combatants.
At a Manhattan fundraiser Wednesday night, the flamboyant architect of Bush's two presidential campaigns and now White House deputy chief of staff told members of the Conservative Party of New York State: "Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 in the attacks and prepared for war. Liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers."
John Kerry responded from the floor of the Senate, one of many Democrats demanding that Rove apologize for his remarks and step down from his White House post.
For Karl Rove to equate Democratic policy on terror to "indictments" and "therapy" is an outrageous attempt to divide the nation at just the moment we must be unified.
I seem to have missed that part where the Democrats joined with Republicans to present a united front in the prosecution of this war. Must have been right when I blinked. My bad. But let's leave aside Democratic yearnings for unity for the moment. Their outrage over the fact that their preferred response to the terrorists has been recognized -- "preparing indictments and offering therapy" -- is unconvincing. Just how farfetched is it to suggest Democrats would prefer to rely on indictments and therapy in the fight against terror? Here's John Kerry on January 29, 2004 during a Democratic Primary debate.
The war on terror is less -- it is occasionally military, and it will be, and it will continue to be for a long time. And we will need the best-trained and the most well-equipped and the most capable military, such as we have today.
But it's primarily an intelligence and law enforcement operation that requires cooperation around the world...
Sort of reminds me of the old saying, "Throw a rock into a pack of dogs, the one that yelps the loudest is usually the one that got hit." Here is a yelping sampler.
"Our entire country came together after the 9/11 terrorist attacks," Pelosi said Thursday. "His shameful comments trying to revise history insult the victims of 9/11 and all of us who support them."
That's Pelosi for you, trying to equate support for the victims of 9/11 with a willingness to be strong on national defense by taking the fight to the terrorists.
Dean, now the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said Rove was trying to distract attention from the failure to capture terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden.
"Given the miserable failures of Bush's foreign policy, it's no wonder Rove would launch this desperate attempt to deflect from the real issues and distort what Democrats say than admit what Republicans have done," Dean said.
How absurd. Harry Reid called Bush "a liar and a loser", Dick Durbin said the Americans at Guantanamo Bay behaved like Nazis, and they're looking for apologies? Here's what they get.
Q So will the President ask Karl Rove to apologize?
MR. McCLELLAN: Of course not, Jessica.
The Republican National Committee went on to back up Rove's comments for him by providing a list of quotes by prominent liberals that challenged the need for war after the 2001 attacks.
Soros called for "police work."
In a 2002 interview, Moore said: "To bomb Afghanistan, I mean, I've never understood this." Similarly, Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, said: "Afghanistan may be an incubator of terrorism, but it doesn't follow that we bomb Afghanistan."
Moveon.org urged "moderation and restraint" in responding to the attacks, the RNC said. The group also urged that "wherever possible, international judicial institutions and international human rights law" be used against terrorists rather than war.
I wonder how they keep it straight. Arguing that they would be stronger on national defense, but against actually taking the war to the terrorists. Supporting our troops, while calling them Nazis. I'm betting the White House is going to keep calling them on it.
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