Team Of Rivals

I have been reading "Team of Rivals" by Doris Goodwin Kearns.  It is a fascinating biography of Lincoln and his four leading cabinet ministers during the war, Seward, Stanton, Bates, and Chase.  It delves into the politics in the North during the Civil War.  I was struck by how much the politics that went on then could be compared with what is going on today with regards to the War on Terror.

Late in the book, during a depiction of the 1864 election cycle, can be found the following depiction of the Democratic Convention.  "'It was noticeable that peace men and measures and sentiments were applauded to the echo, while patriotic utterances, what few there were, received no response from the crowd.'  The playing of 'Dixie' was cheered, while Union tunes were met with virtual silence."

How like today!  The Dems still decry the country.  They view our own nation as a threat to the world, when we are the only ones who can seem to maintain a semblance of civilization in the midst of the chaotic machismo of Muslim fanaticism.  If the Democrats had had their way during the Civil War, we would be a divided, probably fractured country.  Slavery, or some form of it would likely still exist in the United States.  The "peace-at-any-price" Democrats think the same way today.  They do not seem to see the logical conclusion of their policy of appeasement, a policy which has led historically to the perpetuation of evil (Chamberlain / Hitler - just one example).

I have had Democrats ask me, what makes me so sure I am right.  Well, regimes that murder 50,000 of their own people with poison gas, regimes that kill 300,000 more (including children) in prison camps, regimes that support terror abroad, and develop weapons of mass destruction for use by terrorists - and don't tell me that you deny that the Iraqis didn't truck all those documents and paraphernalia into Syria just before the invasion (as has been admitted to by some high ranking people of the old regime in Iraq) - such regimes must be toppled and supplanted if we are not all to suffer evil consequences as a result.

What evil consequences?  If the abominations listed above were not enough, the use of nation states as harbors for terrorists allows terrorism to flourish and ultimately invade peaceful nations all over the world.  I am frankly bemused by leftist who espouse liberalism and cannot see that NOT stopping terrorist states now such as Iran, Syria and North Korea will only result in the ultimate destruction of liberal principles the world over.  Look at what is happening in France as a mere harbinger of what is to come.  True liberals cannot be so blind as to see that tolerance when applied to the evils of Muslim extremism is no virtue at all.