...After all, we are wealthy and have much to live for; our enemies are poorer and have little to lose. Thus Israel ponders trading 300 incarcerated terrorists for the life of one Israeli businessman. The world accepts that none of the former will be abjectly murdered in custody, while the latter of course could and probably will be. American prisoners are raped and shot with impunity; their Iraqi Baathist counterparts cannot be so much as frightened. We cannot and should not change our values; nor can we do much about the fact that we use technology and education to protect our soldiers while our enemies use fundamentalism and ignorance to expend theirs...

Nevertheless, the present public perceptions and political realities will likely persist, since recent popular ideologies like multiculturalism and utopianism have become embedded in the postwar Democratic party. Both notions tend to characterize the American military not as a force for good, but as an extension of American pathology that legitimizes if not promotes an oppressive globalism, racism, sexism, colonialism, and economic oppression.

If one finds that stereotype unfair, remember the pathetic scene of a Gen. Clark during the recent Democratic debate, who castigated the president of the United States at a time of war while deferring to the wisdom of Al Sharpton. Take out a mass murderer, free 26 million, and you will earn charges of incompetence if not treason; slander a DA, fabricate a crime, and fan the flames of riot and racial hatred, and you will win respect from a Democratic frontrunner. For Republicans who must resort to war, the primary challenge will not be the fighting itself, but rather the perception that the United States was inherently wrong to have fought in the first place.