The Terror Candidate?

Few things seem to rile the left more than the notion that the terrorists want John Kerry to win.

Who can blame 'em? As a Republican, I get incensed when some chuzzlewit drags out the well-worn, long-pummeled warhorses about GOP connections to the Nazis or the Klan or whomever. It gets old.

The problem, though, is that those strawmen are easily lit on fire and kicked off the stage. On the other hand, many terrorists do seem to think Kerry's their man.

A terrorist-endorsing cleric says:

"If the U.S. Army suffered numerous humiliating losses, [Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John] Kerry would emerge as the superman of the American people," said Mohammad Amin Bashar, a leader of the Muslim Scholars Association, a hard-line clerical group that vocally supports the resistance.

More:

Resistance leader Abu Jalal boasted that the mounting violence had already hurt Mr. Bush's chances.
"American elections and Iraq are linked tightly together," he told a Fallujah-based Iraqi reporter. "We've got to work to change the election, and we've done so. With our strikes, we've dragged Bush into the mud."

And more:

Abu Jalal, answering questions submitted to him through the Iraqi journalist, devised a simple formula for how his group's attacks on American soldiers draw votes from Mr. Bush.
"They say there are 1,100 dead soldiers. That means 1,100 families hold grudges against Bush and hate him. There are 6,000 families whose sons were injured who hate Bush and will not re-elect him."

Of course it's not unanimous; the article notes a few terror supporters who believe Bush would be their best bet.

My biggest worry? I think that for all their contempt for American society, the terrorists overestimate us:

"The nation of infidels is one, and Bush and Kerry are two faces of the same coin," said Abu Obeida, nom de guerre of a leader of Fallujah's al-Noor Jihadi regiment. "What is taken by force will be returned only by force, and we don't care what the results of the elections are."

We're one?

Well, we could be. Republicans certainly stood behind FDR, Truman, JFK and LBJ when they led the nation to and through war. I have little doubt that had Algore won the presidency (shudder), you'd see a very loyal opposition.

But as long as the Democrats' intellectual lynchpin is Michael Moore, the nation of infidels is not one. We have two Americas, all right - one that's realistic about the situation we face, and one that will unleash a storm of aggressive rhetoric while turning inward and hoping it all goes away. Just like that America did in the 1970s.

Posted by Mitch at October 27, 2004 09:27 AM | TrackBack