Not As Dumb as They Look

Back in 2002 and 2003, we were treated to the sight of anti-war types trotting off to Iraq to be "human shields" to stop the overthrow of Saddam. These doe-eyed fools asked to be placed in orphanages and other such facilities, oblivious to the fact that the orphans actually worked pretty well to keep us from bombing them. The shields were horrified that the Baathists wanted to send them to strategic targets likely to be bombed. The shields didn't like that idea at all.

Fast forward to Iraq of 2007. The enemy slaughters innocents and blows up groups of children and other non-military targets, rejoicing in such victories. The anti-war side deplores this violence yet condemns we who have thus far failed to stop the violence.

Yep, no blame for those who inflict the carnage, but vile hatred of those who try to protect innocents. Austin Bay notes the bizarre logic of this situation that Senator Reid follows. Bay writes:

Saddamists, al-Qaeda and Iran-influenced Shia militias have had enormous information successes, with Reid's rhetorical surrender the latest. One reason for these successes is that they are not penalized by the conventional media and the political left for a campaign of mass murder overwhelmingly directed against Iraqi civilians.

Do you want to help end the terror in Iraq? Condemn the terrorists as the Cho Seung Hui-like psychopaths they are. Deny them the false celebrity they gain when dubbed "insurgents." Denis Keohane, writing for AmericanThinker.com on Nov. 29, 2006, demonstrated why Harry Reid's planet is a truly dangerous place.

"Thanks to the development of mass media inclined to oppose the nation's efforts to obtain military victory," Keohane wrote, "a new path to victory has opened up for America's enemies."

Though the various terrorist groups in Iraq have failed "to gain even minor real tactical victories against coalition (and now Iraqi) forces, all are targeting civilians, with death squads and bombings that intentionally kill civilians in large numbers."

The death toll, Keohane concluded, is "presented as evidence that we are not winning, and cannot win. That makes the reverse true: that if they can merely kill, even civilians, they are winning tactically and even strategically. Merely killing a lot of civilians is not a high bar to attain, and that lesson will be learned and copied, again and again."

Really, you'd think that the anti-war types would be eager to head off to Iraq to act as human shields to protect Iraqi civilians from vicious killers. Sadly, the killers consider orphanages a target-rich environment and are eager to kill such concentrations of innocents. A human shield from the West would be a bonus death.

Which incidentally is why I have never liked the metric that is being applied to the surge.

So the shield recruiting base blames America for the violence--and stays home. They are apparently not nearly as stupid as they look.