US Election 2004

Now that the election has past, President Bush has demonstrated a willingness to re-engage the war with the action in Fallujah. 

With the resumption of effective and aggressive action against the terrorists, the words of Capt Scott D. McDonald should be revisited.  On the eve of the invasion of Iraq, he spoke with his marines about the meaning of their actions.

In his conclusion, Capt McDonald effectively explained why it is proper for America to invade our enemies:

Ensconced as we are within boarders that protect us from the rampant collectivism that embraces the rest of the world, why then do we engage in expeditionary campaigns? What drives a nation of free men to take up arms and carry war to foreign shores?

Contrary to the rhetoric of contemporary sophists, we are not the defenders of international liberties. We empowered our government to protect our rights, not to spend our treasure on protecting the misbegotten notions of others. There comes a time, however, when in order to defend our republic—and by extension our rights—we must carry the fight to the enemy.

Those who despise our ideals, who scoff at our liberty, lurk in far off places. Their lairs serve not only as planning cells, but launching pads for the use of force against our citizens. Their targets, however, are not the innocents who perish in such attacks, but the very principles on which our republic was founded.
Having displayed intention and means to bring death to our shores, it becomes not only the right of our government to take action against such criminals, but an obligation based on the sacred trust we have placed in our government to defend our rights.

We, the men who volunteered to defend our constitution and the way of life that it enables, march to the sound of the guns, not because we are bloodthirsty, nor because we love death. We come willing, ready, and committed to defending those freedoms, without which our lives would be unlivable. We are men who have tasted freedom and refuse to live without it. We are men who fight to be free.

We retain that sacred charge of the American Revolutionaries and carry it into a new era, an era where we are under threat from people who oppose all that we know to be right. With integrity of purpose and moral conviction, we will defeat the enemies of our Republic and return to bask in the glow of the temple to the triumph of man, which we call the United States of America. [S. McDonald, Why a Free Man Fights, Initium, 5/26/2003]

This is a lesson the Democrats must learn if they are going to avoid the marginalization caused by their New Left leadership.

Check out a wonderful photograph by Lee Sanstead of the USMC War Memorial with the Capitol, Washington Monument, and Lincoln Memorial in the background.  If you love this image, go to the Monument Light Photography website and buy a quality print.

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