On that wall

“Because deep down, in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall.”

Does anyone remember this line from the movie, “A Few Good Men”? Jack Nicholson, the wild-eyed Marine colonel is pushed into a witness stand confession by Tom Cruise, the Ivy League-educated son of a famous attorney. This line tells the story of why this presidential election is a neck-and-neck race to the finish.

Jack Nicholson tells Tom Cruise, the young product of privilege that he can’t “handle the truth,” of what it takes to protect America. The crazy colonel is making the argument that the rules of law and civility must be suspended on occasion, but in the end, America is safe because a Marine is “on that wall.”

I spent this past week in the Midwest with the coveted swing staters. Yes, they believe that John Kerry is smarter. They even admit that he would likely make a better president overall. They lost a lot of confidence in George W. when he embarrassed the nation in the first debate on national security. Despite all this, many are still going to vote for President Bush because they believe that the terrorists are more afraid of him than they would be of John Kerry. In short, they believe George W. is “on that wall” for America.

This logic reminds me of another line, only this time from a Billy Joel song: “You may be right, I may be crazy, but it just might be a lunatic you’re looking for.”

The perception is that the terrorists will not attack the United States because George W. Bush will blow them back to Allah in a New York minute. This is a complete delusion.

First, it assumes that terrorists are afraid. Does the word “martyr” ring a bell? It seems to me that someone willing to die for their cause – for their reward in paradise – is not deterred by the fear of death. Compare this attitude to ours. No matter what our beliefs are for the afterlife, I don’t know anyone in this country who wants to accelerate the journey. Yet the “end game” for a terrorist is an e-ticket to paradise. So to think that somehow the terrorists will stay away because Commander George is on that wall is wishful thinking at best; and at worst, dangerous.

It is dangerous because our Commander George is perceived as “Crusader George,” among Arabs. Yes, Iraq, as the president states, is the new front on the war on terror. This is true because he created this front. There is not one single person in this country that believes or can prove that al-Qaida or any of its splinter groups was in Iraq as an ally of Saddam’s prior to the U.S. invasion. Not one. The president, through his twisted optimism wants Americans to believe that it’s a good thing that the terrorists are in Iraq. His twisted optimism is only outdone by his twisted logic. He and his spinmeisters have come up with the conclusion that because terrorists are in Iraq now, they are not in the United States.

What? Iraq is the world’s new jihad factory. It is the Afghanistan and Bosnia of this decade. Our presence in Iraq is used to recruit young jihadists. Now the terrorists don’t even have to travel across oceans and worry about pesky visas in order to kill Americans. Today, these new jihadists are part of the lethal cocktail of terrorists and former Saddam loyalists who are making it nearly impossible to stabilize Iraq, let alone rebuild it into a democratic jewel in the Middle East. Even the interim Iraqi head of state, Mr. Allawi, is starting to criticize Commander George’s gross mismanagement of this war.

The perception is that George W. Bush will protect this nation because he will keep terrorists on the run and will hunt them down in every corner of the Earth. This perception is not rooted in reality.

• According to Bush’s own intelligence apparatus, terrorists’ networks are spreading like the flu virus. And, like the flu vaccine, this president outsourced the first offensive on al-Qaida to mercenary warlords in Afghanistan. Result: Osama is nowhere to be found.

• Then he sent less than one quarter of the number of troops into Iraq that his father sent to oust Saddam from Kuwait. Result: Complete chaos.

• He has left our homeland defenses around our ankles in hopes that his aggressive offensive strategy abroad will keep terrorists away from the homeland.

• He’s got nothing to show for the $150 billion he’s spent in Iraq and now has his hand out again for another $75 billion blank check.

I would like to believe that George W. Bush has been “on that wall” for the past three years. I love this country and, yes, I believe that terrorism is a very real threat to the future of our nation. But the reality is that when it comes to leadership as opposed to rhetoric, this president is best compared to Humpty Dumpty, not a brave U.S. Marine “on that wall.”