This is my most recent article, it’s in the editing stage and it will hopefully appear in a few days on several on-line publications, as always your comments are welcomed.

General Petraeus; grace under fire

by Robert Amoroso,

September 20, 2007,

published in BrooWaha New York

Not since this warrior took the oath “to protect and defend, against all enemies, both foreign and domestic’, have we witnessed a true unfettered American patriot. General Petraeus came to the nation’s capital before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, to testify and to report on the progress the military surge has made in Iraq.

However even before this warrior left the deserts of Iraq, to testify on Capital Hill, the smear merchants on the far left were laying in wait. The ground had already been prepped weeks in advance by the same ‘cut n run” crowd that have continually undermined the efforts in Iraq. Astoundingly Bin Laden himself (in his most recent video), sounded very much like a member of the majority party in congress…a sobering thought indeed.

Of course one would expect the propaganda machines to be in full swing from our sworn enemies abroad, but from our own Congress. Sadly we’ve become a nation of extremes, as witnessed by the deplorable full page ad by MoveOn.org, which ran the day before the General was to testify, in the New York Times.

The headline (in all caps), said it all, “GENERAL PETRAEUS OR GENERAL BETRAY US?” Followed by a subhead “Cooking the Books for the White House”. Of course one may argue that it is our right as a free nation to protest, to engage in meaningful dialog and to express our discontent with the issues of war and peace.

Equally, (as a free people) we have a right to hold those same people and or institutions accountable for their actions. Simply stated, those who besmirch and smear the integrity of anyone simply because of ideology should be held accountable for their actions. General Petraeus deserves our gratitude, more importantly the American people deserve an apology from this radical website.

MoveOn.org has approximately three million subscribers to its website and I would imagine or at least hope that the majority of those subscribers are thoughtful, reasoned and caring individuals. They are (I would imagine) politically active and like General Petraeus, deserve to be better represented. Sadly none of the front running Democratic candidates would condemn the ad, only Senator Joe Biden and John Kerry courageously denounced it.

Of course I’ve made an assumption that none of the leading Democratic candidates believes that the General has “betrayed us”…or perhaps my assumptions are incorrect, and perhaps they concur with MoveOn.org. As presidential candidates and perhaps a future Commander and Chief, they have an obligation, indeed a responsibility to candidly share their views on General Petraeus.

What astounds me is the convoluted parceling of words by front runner, Senator Hillary Clinton that believing the General’s testimony required “the willing suspension of disbelief”. Her double talk sounded eerily familiar to that of her husband’s statement of what “is”…”is”.

We live in a dangerous world; our enemies monitor what we say, and what we do. We need strong and decisive leadership, not slick sound bites from our elected officials. It seems clear to me, that the radical left now sets the agenda for most within the Democratic Party, and the leading candidates seem either unwilling or afraid to criticize the likes of a MoveOn.org…for fear of being smeared themselves.

Perhaps this congress along with MoveOn.org needs to once again remind themselves, of our own recent history before they “demand’ a withdrawal date from Iraq or denounce a true American hero. It took us, as a nation almost a hundred years (87 to be exact), a civil war, and the assassination of a sitting president, before the principles of our own Declaration of Independence and our Bill of Rights were finally and fully enacted, and we’re still to this day amending its principles, and redefining ourselves as a nation. Yet we expect a country that has never known the breath of freedom, to do what we’re still working at, in a few short years.

The issue before us isn’t General Petraeus or the war in Iraq, or even the carnage that took place on 9/11; these are historical events that in time will define us as a nation, and as a people. We will be judged eventually by what we did, and how we met the challenges of the day. Did we preserve our freedoms with honor and integrity, for the generations yet to come, or did we succumb to expediency?

Copyright © 2007 Amo

More articles by this author:
» The invisible "Americans" among us
» A House Divided Against Itself Cannot Stand
» Is Bank of America jeopardizing our national security?
» Presidential politics, New York style