The American Spectator

Reader Mail

Assessing Danger

7.6.04 @ 12:01AM

GOOD INTENTIONS, BAD RESULTS
Re: Shawn Macomber's Iraq Agonistes:

Once more Shawn Macomber gets to the root of the issue, this time the Iraq problem. I agree with his article in that we have been really screwing up in our Iraq policy. We did not come to liberate a nation, we came to defeat a tyrant who was a threat. For better or worse, the Iraqi people (like the Japanese and Germans) share the same guilt as their leaders in that respect, therefore like the Axis powers in WWII, they too, should suffer the same type of occupation. Like then, when the evil was Nazism and a God-Emperor (who was nothing but a figurehead to the Japanese fascists), Islam is the evil and should be expunged from the national government. Shawn was right there.

Nowadays, however, we have a situation which is different from 1945. Instead of a press who backs the war, we have a press as hostile to this nation as any armed enemy. Instead of jailing dissidents for subversion (which they are doing with their dissent), as then, we are allowing these factions to influence our policy towards that country and that religion. It's amazing that even with the footage of the torture, murder, etc. of the Iraqi people, the fools in this country still resist the fact that we vanquished an evil dictator, who needed to go. No, until the "people" assert themselves on the right side of the issue, we will have a screwy policy that will become more of an attempt to counter the fools in this country rather than help the nation of Iraq regain its place among the nations of the world as a free and independent people.
-- Pete Chagnon

Macomber has one thing right: the majority of Iraqis want nothing to do with the libertarianism he espouses. We want to leave behind in Iraq democracy and the rule of law. We have not gone through this war to implant a culture-busting hyper-individualism abhorrent not only to genuine Islam but any kind of conservatism. At least Macomber realizes that his libertarianism can win only through the use of force.
-- Gary Martin
Platte City, Missouri

I was varied greatly distressed in reading your article regarding the current situation in Iraq. It seems Mr. Macomber you have fallen into the same mental moronic trap that many liberals had been in for a long time. It's the old story of "If you tell a lie long enough people will believe it."

The liberals of in this country have for many years been trying to expunge from the consciousness of Americans the concepts of religion and God. We need to remember the history of America, its foundations and the people who founded this great nation. They were a religious people, a people who believed in God, and were willing to die for the freedom to express that belief in politics as well as in private. Indeed it was that belief that provided the core values out of which sprang the Constitution of the United States.

The 16 congressional proclamations for prayer and fasting throughout the Revolution [i. e., the acknowledgment of Jesus Christ, the quoting of Romans 14:17, etc.] were not unusual considering the prominent role that many ministers played in the Revolution.

One such example is John Peter Muhlenburg. In a sermon delivered to his Virginia congregation January 21, 1776, he preached from Ecclesiastes 3 which speaks of a season and a time to every purpose under heaven. Arriving at verse 8, there is "a time of war and time of peace," Muhlenburg noted that this surely was not a time of peace; this was the time of war. Concluding with a prayer, and while standing in full view of the congregation, he removed his clerical robes to reveal beneath them the uniform of an officer in the Continental Army! He marched to the back of the church and ordered the drumbeat for recruits. More than 300 men joined him, becoming the Eighth Virginian Brigade. Muhlenburg finished the Revolution as a major general.

The spiritual emphasis manifested so often by the Americans during the Revolution caused one Crown-appointed British governor to complain: "If you ask an American who is his master, he'll tell you he has none. And he has no governor but Jesus Christ."

Letters like this, and sermons like those preached by the Rev. Peter Powers, gave rise to the motto of the American Revolution. Most are unaware that the American Revolution even had a motto, but most wars do [e.g., World War II -- "Remember Pearl Harbor;" the Texas war for independence -- "Remember the Alamo;" etc.]. The motto of the American Revolution was directed against King George III who regularly violated, "the laws of nature and of nature's God."

The motto was very simple and very direct: "no King but King Jesus!"

To conclude that being a dedicated and committed Christian is the same thing as being a radical Islamist is ignorance gone to seed. That is the same type of convoluted logic that would conclude that a cow and a cat are near relatives because they both have four legs and like milk when they are young. Please Mr. Macomber, stop hiding from the obvious truth of the Christian religious element that was so very prominent in the founding of this great nation of "The United States of America."
-- Pastor Gary J. Eberts

READY FOR TORTURE?
Re: George Neumayr's An Equal Opportunity to Die:

"Exposing female GIs to the Zarqawis of the world is an experiment in equality the left won't abandon no matter what that savage does in the coming days."

As a retired Air Force Senior NCO, that happens to be female, I do not think that American Society is ready. I believe that WHEN an American servicewoman is held hostage, it will once again energize the media (worldwide) and up the debate on the United States and President Bush's policies. Those of us that bear the burden (or have borne that burden in the past) ARE well aware, but not "ready" for its impact.

Letter to the Editor

topics:
Taxes, Education, Television, Economics, Religion, Islam, Constitution, Law, Iraq, Iran, Israel, NATO, Conservatism, Libertarianism, Oil