1. "Our safety does not depend on Iraq."

In what isolationist pipe dream? Globalization has not just been about
trade and technology; it's about ideological front lines that know no
borders. Look what happened when Israel ceded Gaza: Instead of being
heralded by Palestinians as a selfless peace offering, it was lauded
across the globe as a victory for terrorists and turned into an attack
base against Israel.


2. "We should have never gone to Iraq in the first place."

Using this as a pullout reason is like debating the best course of
action during open-heart surgery, then walking out of the operating room
without making sure the heart is beating and stitching the patient up.


3. "We should not include Iran and Syria."

And we need that like a hole in the head. There is a huge difference
between passive neighbor and active instigator. Recently released
Pentagon figures state that 198 Coalition soldiers have been killed and
more than 600 wounded by elaborate Iranian-manufactured explosive
devices smuggled in via the Tigris River and southern marshland. Bashar
Assad might be pushed around a bit, but Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will never
be a friend, ally, or even cordial with the United States, lest his
Islamic street cred be tarnished. Ahmadinejad didn't visit Hugo Chavez,
Daniel Ortega, and Rafael Correa over the weekend to play poker, but to
cement alliances against the United States. And if we're caught sleeping
on Iran we're in big trouble.


4. "We can't force them to be a democratic country."

We didn't exactly force thousands of Iraqis to walk miles down dirt
roads and wait for hours for the chance to cast a ballot. Sheesh, voter
turnout for December 2005 Iraqi elections was about 70 percent, whereas
midterm elections in the U.S. draw on average about 40 percent. They
could teach us how to cherish the right to vote.


5. "Polls say we should pull out."

And military policy should be based on polls? Should it be left to
officials who have all of the pertinent information and intelligence on
the situation at hand, as well as years of experience in the field, or
to someone called during dinnertime by Gallup and posed a five-second
opinion question over the mashed potatoes? Forty-three percent of
Democrats responding in a Zogby poll last May said Iran posed no threat
to the U.S., so that goes to show how much poll respondents know. A 2005
Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life poll found 66 percent saying they
knew "not very much" or "nothing at all" about Islam. Heaven help us if
a poll dictates policy.


6. "The American voters don't want to be in Iraq."

Funny, because they reelected George W. Bush, who initiated the Iraq
invasion and ran on a platform of staying the course, over John Kerry,
the senator who ran on a flip-flop against the war.


7. "The American public is war-weary."

So you just surrender? It's a long, hard slog against militant Islam,
but people seem to still, after all we know, expect a tidy battle
wrapped up with a white flag and a treaty. And we're a long way from
topping the Hundred Years War (now that's cause for war-weariness), so
let's all buck up and get some cojones. War is hell, but sometimes
absolutely necessary.
8. "Bush just doesn't want to be embarrassed by losing."

If he was so concerned about acting with the intent of sparing his
feelings, he would have tried to follow poll sentiment and reverse his
low numbers a long time ago.


9. "An automatic pullout would save lives."
It may spare some U.S. soldiers until the emboldened Islamic radicals,
backed by the same populace that cheered when the Twin Towers were
brought down, proceed with strikes against our foreign installations and
here at home. It would not save Iraqi lives. And as we hawks believe
that an innocent Iraqi life is as important as an American life, we also
know that our presence keeps the country from descending into full-scale
war and bloodshed the likes of which we've never seen.


10. "The war is all about Big Oil profiting."
Oh no, it's the "H" word =97 Halliburton! The left loves the subject of
oil more than J. R. Ewing. It's going on four years now and we haven't
swiped Iraq's oil yet; in fact, Bush's proposal last week advanced
profit-sharing legislation to spread the wealth among Iraqis. Funny, we
didn't take the oil in the first Gulf War in 1991, either.


11. "We're not even wanted there."

Sure, Muqtada al-Sadr doesn't want us there. The Sunnis who love Saddam
(but failed to riot en masse after his hanging as predicted) don't want
us there. But the recent commercial from Kurds thanking America for
democracy, produced by the Kurdistan Development Corporation, doesn't
star Kurds being told to praise the U.S. at gunpoint. They actually feel
that way. Some Iraqi Kurds have named their kids after President Bush in
the wake of Saddam Hussein's toppling. It's not a popularity coup, but
not a seething pit of venom, either.


12. "It's their civil war and we shouldn't interfere."

It's their civil war =97 being fueled and supplied by the same outside
Islamist entities that would like to destroy the West as well. Not quite
the Union vs. the Confederacy.


13. "How come we aren't trying to find bin Laden?"

How do you know that we're not? Despite public opinion to the contrary,
the U.S. government is capable of walking and chewing gum at the same
time. And would those who ask this question support a full-scale U.S.
assault on the heavily fortified tribal regions of Waziristan (Osama's
likely hiding spot), which would then inflame Pakistanis enough to give
the Islamist coalition Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal the weight to overthrow
fairly pro-U.S. Gen. Pervez Musharraf?
It's also not all about Bin Laden. Al Qaeda No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri has
been issuing the calls to arms lately, giving direction to jihadists
around the globe including Iraq and Somalia and reportedly dispatching
al Qaeda to the U.N. buffer zone in Lebanon and neighboring Syria. While
he should face the music for his crimes, Osama is not some fly-by-night
cult leader whose frenzied sect will die with him.


14. "Why are we spending money to rebuild Iraq when we could build
schools here?"

Ever heard of the Marshall Plan?


15. "The war has turned European sentiment against the U.S."

Going back to what kids learn in elementary school, since when is doing
the popular thing more important than doing the right thing? Not to
mention, European nations that have allowed unchecked immigration and
the establishment of unassimilated Muslim communities have been seeing
their appeasing policies backfire with the rise in homegrown
fundamentalist activities and attacks.


16. "The toll has been too high."

The U.S. death toll has passed 3,000 after nearly four years. In the
three-year Korean War, more than 36,000 Americans were killed. While
every loss is tragic and mourned, the toll and sacrifice needs to be
seen in proper perspective. In the movie Munich, the lead character
hunting Black September members has flashbacks throughout taking the
viewer through the grisly details of the massacre of 11 Israeli athletes
at the 1972 Olympics. Like Spielberg's film, we need to constantly
remind ourselves of what Islamic terrorists are capable of and remember
the day they woke up most of America.


17. "We should let the United Nations handle it."

Because they do so well everywhere else?


18. "Would you send your child off to fight in Bush's war?"

This is the U.S., not Uganda, so you'd be hard-pressed to find a child
soldier here. Young though they often may be, they are still adults who
made a conscious decision to join the military and serve when needed,
where needed, and should be respected for their choice. This argument
usually branches into why Bush doesn't "send" his daughters off to war,
when obviously they are adults who are free to make their own choices as
well =97 he can't send them to their rooms without dinner for not flying
off to Baghdad.


19. "Isn't Kim Jong Il a bigger threat than Saddam was? Why haven't we
taken him out?"

And do you know who would be complaining if we did? Everybody who
complained about the U.S. going into Iraq!