Apparently it was "tough-minded foreign policy theme week" on the Republican presidential trail this week. First came John McCain's op-ed in the Satuday Washington Post, "The War You're Not Reading About," calling for "bipartisan support for giving the new strategy time to succeed" in Iraq. Next came Fred Thompson's widely-linked and praised first blog post at RedState, "The Pirates of Tehran," in which Thompson presented a tough-minded realists view of the latest Iranian hostage crisis. And, tonight, in a speech at the George Bush Presidential Library Center in College Station, Texas, Mitt Romney tears into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for her visit with the terrorist-supporting dictator of Damascus, Syria's Bashar Assad. The Hill reports on Romney's speech based on an advance copy.
Wait. The war's unpopular, right? So why are these guys - and every other Republican candidate - hugging the war and calling for even tougher action? My guess is this: While polls show a general dislike for the war in Iraq, there are two kinds of people unhappy with the war. Some don't want America to fight at all - but for the rest, Republicans mostly, the war is only unpopular because America hasn't been fighting to win.
The Republican candidates know that most Republicans aren't opposed to war against Islamist terror, they are only opposed to half-measures that lead toward defeat in that war or at least don't lead toward victory.
John McCain has said, often, he'd rather lose his campaign than have America lose a war. He's staked his presidential hopes on American success in Iraq. It's clear to me that pretty much everyone else in the GOP field feels the same way. For that, you have to honor all of them as men of character who put America's future ahead of their own ambition.
Comment Preview