The first was published on Sunday in the New York Times with the headline: “Iraqis Lead Final Purge of Al-Qaeda.”   You can see why this headline caught my eye.   After all, I am one of those few patriotic Americans left still following the War in Iraq.   So, a news report that declares Al-Qaeda has been purged (something that the Left in this country told us could never happen) is good news, and the fact that the Iraqi Army is doing the honors (again, something, the Left in this country told us could never happen) is even better news.   Here are some details from the report: “American and Iraqi forces are driving Al-Qaeda in Iraq out of its last redoubt in the north of the country in the culmination of one of the most spectacular victories of the war on terror.   After being forced from its strongholds in the west and centre of Iraq in the past two years, Al-Qaeda’s dwindling band of fighters has made a defiant ‘last stand’ in the north city of Mosul.   A huge operation to crush the 1,200 fighters who remained from a terrorist force once estimated at more than 12,000 began on May 10.”   Iraq’s freely elected Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki goes on to declare: “They were intending to besiege Baghdad and control it, but thanks to the will of the tribes, security forces, army and all Iraqis, we defeated them.”   Add President Bush’s name to that list. Major General Mark Hertling, American commander in the north reiterated: “I think we’re at the irreversible point.”

Much to the chagrin of the Left that repeatedly declared the War in Iraq lost, this report only confirms what is now being universally recognized, Bush’s Iraq strategy has worked and Al-Qaeda has been decimated.  That’s right.  The group of terrorists responsible for 9-11 and most capable of attacking us again, has been defeated.  How? Well, President Bush said it best when he laid out the plan in his State of the Union Address after 9-11 in 2001: “We will direct every resource at our command -- every means of diplomacy, every tool of intelligence, every instrument of law enforcement, every financial influence, and every necessary weapon of war -- to the destruction and to the defeat of the global terror network.”  He said it in 2001 and then did it.  How many of our leaders in government can make that claim?  I, for one, am thankful he had such resolve to stand firm in the face of the relentless abuse of his political enemies.  We are all safer because of him. I am also thankful that we didn’t listen to the Left who repeatedly called for our surrender and withdrawal from Iraq.  Barack Obama himself called for the immediate withdrawal from Iraq in September of 2007: “Let me be clear: There is no military solution in Iraq and there never was."  Based on his own words, it is a certain fact that had Obama been President, he would have surrendered in Iraq, pulled out our troops and handed the country over to Al-Qaeda.  That’s the change he wants us to believe in.

The second news story is a real gem.  On July 6, an Associated Press report titled: “US Removes Uranium from Iraq” reveals that Saddam Hussein did in fact have a nuclear program and a stockpile of WMD components.  In the Tuwaitha nuclear complex just south of Baghdad, we uncovered 550 metric tons (over 1.2 million pounds) of “yellow cake” or concentrated uranium and multiple devices that could be used in a nuclear weapon. Guess how many nuclear weapons you can build with 500 tons of yellowcake? 142.  Apparently, President Bush and the military knew about this stockpile for some time.  So, why was it kept secret?  After all, we were repeatedly told by the Left and the media that President Bush “lied” about WMDs to trick the American public into going to war.  The phrase: “Bush Lied: People Died” became the mantra of the Left as they pushed their surrender and withdrawal strategy on the American public.  Sadly, many Americans bought into this and the President’s approval rating plummeted.  It seems to me that all President Bush had to do to stop the unwarranted criticism was leak the fact that we had found all of this “yellowcake”.  So why didn’t he?  Simple.  He cares more about the future of this country than his approval rating.  Lyle Krahn, a spokesman for the Canadian Company that purchased the uranium explained: “We are pleased…that we have taken the yellowcake from a volatile region into a stable area to produce clean electricity.”  President Bush feared that terrorists would steal the uranium, so at the expense of his own reputation, he kept the discovery and operation to remove it covert.  The AP report said it best: “… in a symbolic way, the mission [to remove the WMD components] linked the current attempts to stabilize Iraq with some of the high-profile claims about Saddam's weapons capabilities in the buildup to the 2003 invasion.” Sweet vindication.

So, now that you know there were WMDs in Iraq and that by invading Iraq and taking the fight to Saddam and Al-Qaeda, both threats have been effectively eliminated; and that by creating a functioning democracy in the Middle East, would be terrorists and suicide bombers have an alternative to blowing themselves up; and that by defeating the Taliban in Pakistan, Al-Qaeda is in disarray globally and millions of women were freed from brutal oppression, are you ready to give President Bush some credit yet?  If not, History will.

An even better question is how can we trust the Left in this country to protect us when they have been dead wrong at every turn?  As it stands today, our enemy’s only hope of survival is to get someone in the White House that will surrender to their ideals and appease their aggressions.  Guess which candidate has pledged to do just that?

...click here for more columns by Todd A. Carges