Why The Left Fears Petraeus

I do not know if there is really a Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy or not, despite the constant admonitions from people connected with the Clintons. But this past week has certainly verified that the Left has such a machine. The New York Times breaks the law and its own policies in order to run a full-page character assassination on General Petraeus by a group known for its strong and increasing influence in Democrat affairs, and no leading Democrat is willing to denounce it for the vicious smear it so obviously is. Indeed, Schumer goes so far as to claim we must thank terrorist warlords for the decrease in violence, and Hillary Clinton states that it would take a “willing suspension of disbelief” (a phrase commonly associated with fiction) to accept the sworn testimony of a career military officer and combat veteran, who was unanimously confirmed by the Senate in his role. A certain duck colleague of Bugs Bunny will need a new stage name, because the Left has laid a firm claim on “Daffy”!

But aside from pointing out the obvious, what is the deal with the Left’s hysteria? Although it’s well known that they have a psychotic reaction to the President and anything he says or does, the Left usually lets the President speak before they blow up. Shoot, they hate Rove but don’t go out and campaign in the media against him, so there’s a special emotion going on in the hard little rocks which serve as hearts in the Left, where General David Petraeus is concerned.

That emotion is fear. Raw, powerful, growing fear.

Recognizing this fact, we would reasonably next wonder why the Left fears Petraeus so much. And I have an idea.

California.

It all comes back to the 2008 elections. The Democrats have done very well for themselves over the years in politics. They are the acknowledged masters in most local and Congressional races, especially in major cities and the large states. But they have never been able to lock up the White House. Oh sure, they win every so often, but not as often as they expect, and never in the kind of numbers they think should happen. And rather than examine the problem critically, with an eye to root causality and a logical response, the Left takes a very emotional perspective, and demands that the world act on the orders from Never-Never-Land. Or DNC headquarters, which tries hard to play the role of Tinkerbell. While Bill Clinton won 2 times in 1992 and 96, he never got a majority. Only two of the last seven Presidents have been Democrats. And the Donks have not out and out stomped the GOP candidate since 1964. So the White House race is always dicey for the Left, and this time is no exception.

So what’s the deal with California? History, for one. Cali is worth 55 Electoral Votes, more than 20 percent of the tally needed to be elected President. So that’s big right there. But what’s even more important is that the GOP does not need California, but the Democrats do. Dubya won twice without California, but in the last 9 times that the Democrats lost California, they only won the White House twice.

Also, California is on the move. W. took 44.4% of the Cali vote in 2004, 41.7% in 2000, Dole took 38.2% in 1996, and Bush I took 32.6% in 1992. See the trend?

Sure, it would be a real surprise if California got into play for 2008 but if it does, the Democrats are done. Period. End of story. So the Donks cannot afford to lose Cali. The problem is, Cali is not all Democrat, not by a long shot, and the trend is to close the gap.

There’s a lot of military people from California. Catch a Padres game on an afternoon in San Diego, and you will see a sea of Navy in the bleachers. The Army still has the Presidio in San Francisco, and the Marines come from all over Cali. And besides the bases, there’s the military families. The Democrats played a gamble, when they decided to oppose the War. They figured the GOP owned the pro-war side, so they could try to neutralize it by flashing patriotism of their own or else they could try to play against the war, and from 2002 on that was their game. They’re one-for-three in elections on that strategy. But that election gave them both Houses of Congress and they felt strong for 2008, so they doubled-down on the Anti-War effort, with all the major Donk candidates shoving each other to prove themselves the biggest opponent to the war. When General Petraeus came up for a vote, it seemed a sure thing that extra troops would mean higher casualties, more to use against President Bush, and when General Petraeus came back to report, he’d be admitting disaster and thus serve the Democrats well.

The reality was a bit different. The surge is working, so well in fact that the Democrats are desperately worried that it looks like we are winning. And winning not only would take away the ‘War-Monger’ card to play on the public All those Democrats who were on the record as saying we could not win, well they’d look weak and spineless at best. And every single Democrat running for the Oval Office could and would be painted as a defeatist. There was but one, desperate hope. A foul, nasty, dirty little trick of a hope, but the Democrats devoured eagerly and made it their identity. Just as they had misrepresented the war and its conduct for years, so now the Democrats turned on the leading figure in that war, General Petraeus. Never mind that they themselves had unanimously approved the man. Never mind that the troops found him eminently credible and a fit leader. Never mind that on his watch, entire regions of Iraq had become manageable and countless lives saved, military and civilian both. It was far more expedient to the Democrats to sacrifice the last vestige of their honor, than to accept the consequences of their earlier deceit and treachery. Having subtly demeaned and maligned the troops already in many separate decisions, it was just one more step to take that step into public derision of the military.

While things have been difficult for the GOP in recent times, it must be remembered that to keep the White House, they only need to hold the states they have. And winning in Iraq improves those odds for the Republican candidate and hurts the Democrat. But states with heavy military populations, are truly wild cards, and if the Democrats’ war-hate gamble fails, states like California could flip and make the race a laugher for the Republican. If Petraeus is believed by the average American, the Democrat will not be supported in the election. So they fear him, because the consequences of their decision are more ominous for their personal egos than they ever imagined possible.