VILE, UTTERLY VILE

Time to make the blood boil.  One of the finest Americans serving our country today, by common consent, is General David Petraeus, who has done so much to improve our position in Iraq.  He and the United States ambassador will testify before Congress on conditions there next week.  Apparently, Petraeus will receive the same respect that too many Democrats, including the Speaker from San Francisco, reserve for military men:

Congressional Democrats are warning U.S. Iraq commander General David Petraeus, and the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, not to attempt to minimize the seriousness of the situation in Iraq when they testify to Congress next week. VOA's Dan Robinson reports from Capitol Hill.

A few days before General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker appear before House and Senate committees to deliver their latest update on Iraq, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi makes clear what she hopes they will not say.

In a news conference together with the chairmen of the House committees on Armed Services and Foreign Affairs, she refers to the recent fighting in Iraq's southern port city of Basra, saying Petraeus and Crocker should not attempt to put a positive spin on events.

"We have to know the real ground truths of what is happening there, not put a shine on events because of a resolution [of the situation in Basra] that looks less violent when it has in fact been dictated by someone [Iraqi Shiite cleric Moqtada] al-Sadr who can grant or withhold that call for violence or not," said Nancy Pelosi.

Thursday's news conference came in the wake of seemingly critical comments by Ambassador Crocker in a New York Times interview about the Iraqi government's handling of military operations in Basra.

Obviously, Congress deserves the truth.  But there is an ugly suggestion in this story that leading Democrats expect Petraeus to lie, or at least try to evade the truth. 

Where is the evidence of that?

In the past, Petraeus has given a pretty accurate assessment of where we stand.  His work has been excellent.  The press, not given to pro-military outbursts, has at least been reasonably respectful of his efforts.

The tone of the high Dems' remarks reflects the fading of the national-security wing of the Democratic Party.  The Joe Liebermans are gone.  The Henry Jacksons are long deceased.  It doesn't bother a good chunk of the Democratic base that its party leaders insult a commanding general in advance. 

What is remarkable is the failure of the Democrats to learn.  The party's dismissive attitude toward military service is one of the factors that led to its rapid decline in the sixties, seventies and eighties.  Maybe it thinks that a new generation, brainwashed in the universities that grew out of the sixties revolution, won't mind as much as older voters clearly did.  Whether this new generation does mind could determine the future safety of this nation.   

April 4, 2008.