William F. Buckley, Jr: What Is The President Going To Do?



William F. Buckley, Jr, one of the more reasonable Libertarian -Republicans and, we cannot fail to note, the "Grandfather" of the modern Conservative movement, has opposed this Second Persian Gulf War and offered sober commentary on the subject. Now, post-November 2006 and as Democratic fundraising skyrockets (and Republican fundraising falls precipetously) before 2008, Buckley reaches a fever-pitch. It cannot be easy; Buckley has been a friend of the Bush family for years. From NROnline (link via drudgie-poo):

"But beyond affirming executive supremacy in matters of war, what is George Bush going to do? It is simply untrue that we are making decisive progress in Iraq. The indicators rise and fall from day to day, week to week, month to month. In South Vietnam there was an organized enemy. There is clearly organization in the strikes by the terrorists against our forces and against the civil government in Iraq, but whereas in Vietnam we had Hanoi as the operative headquarters of the enemy, we have no equivalent of that in Iraq, and that is a matter of paralyzing importance. All those bombings, explosions, assassinations: we are driven to believe that they are, so to speak, spontaneous.

"When the Romans were challenged by Christianity, Rome fell. The generation of Christians moved by their faith overwhelmed the regimented reserves of the Roman state. It was four years ago that Mr. Cheney first observed that there was a real fear that each fallen terrorist leads to the materialization of another terrorist. What can a 'surge,' of the kind we are now relying upon, do to cope with endemic disease? The parallel even comes to mind of the eventual collapse of Prohibition, because there wasn’t any way the government could neutralize the appetite for alcohol, or the resourcefulness of the freeman in acquiring it.

"General Petraeus is a wonderfully commanding figure. But if the enemy is in the nature of a disease, he cannot win against it."

(NROnline)