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Democrats on the Ropes
Not unlike their counterparts in Anbar — and now Baghdad — the Dems are staggering around the ring. Joe Louis has just hit them square on the chin. They are flat footed, dizzy; their eyes move in and out of focus. As the fog of war clears, the fog of politics emerges, and at precisely the wrong time. And so they squint, trying to see their adversary, searching for some piece of flesh to swing at. A flailing jab. A wild punch into to the air. Everywhere: impotence. Their inside dialog: Breathe. This guy wasn’t supposed to be able to do this. Push up your knees. I’m OK. Settle down. I’m the champion, right? I need to sit down. Put up your hands; protect. There he is. No. Over there.”
There is a moment in every prize fight — sometimes a couple of moments — when the fighters decide whether the fight is going to be decided then, in dramatic form, or whether it is going to ”go the distance.” 12 rounds or 3? It can be decided by either the victor or the loser. The will can give; a fighter can stay on the canvas. If not, the better man — the Champion – can take matters into his own hands, resolving the battle in a flourish of decisive force.
Pelosi and Reid, Schumer and Durbin. Hagel. They should never have got into the ring. It was a losing cause from the beginning. How could it not be? Wrap up your personal political fortunes in the prospect of an American military defeat? If you win such a fight, do you really win?
And yet, like a punch drunk Tyson, they continue the pre-match trashtalking, as though a fair fight continues. Even as they stagger. Even as the referree searches their pupils for life.
It is time for the knockout punch in Iraq. Petraeus and his troops are taking care of that.
But it is also the time for this fight’s Champion to put these outmatched contenders at home on the mat for good, down for the count.
THE HOUND
Jeff
September 14th, 2007 at 10:43 am
This is exactly right: the Dems offer no vision for victory–no forward-looking vision at all. Petraeus was clear-eyed and laser-focused in the hearings. The bloviating congressman who oppose the war made no more sense than a swollen-eyed, fuzzy-headed Tyson.
And that’s being genersous.