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Written by Jonathan Haase
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Thursday, 18 December 2003 |
It's that time again. The time when the ad campaigns for and against
various political candidates start running. So far all I've seen out
there is the ad campaign against current President Bush. The ad
basically is built on the premise that Pres. Bush is not a "leader" but
rather a "mis-leader". Their whole point is the fact that he has
submitted proposals to spend another several billion dollars in Iraq,
when there are supposedly more pressing issues that the money could be
spent on here in the US.
On the one hand I would almost bring myself to agree with at least part
of their theory. There are things that the money could be spent on here
in the USA. However I would have to disagree with the main idea behind
their ad. Questioning why we should spend the money to help rebuild
Iraq. I guess they just don't get it. Some people were apparently never
taught to follow through by their parents.
I mean the basic idea of following through is that you have to finish
what you start. However I guess in today's world that concept has lost
quite a bit. After all we don't want to "damage a child's self esteem",
by insisting that they do something they don't really want to do. Not
so when I was raised. I was taught by my parents that I should always
finish what I start. It's not always the easiest thing in the world to
do, but if you can start to do something and then when it becomes
difficult just quit, then how many projects out there would be left
unfinished.
Think of where we might be today if this was encouraged by our
ancestors. What might have happened if Edison decided to give up after
his first couple of tries at creating a light bulb, because if was just
too hard. This same concept applies to many different circumstances.
One of which being the continued aid in rebuilding Iraq. It doesn't
matter if you agreed with our going over there to depose Saddam or not.
The fact remains that the United States committed itself as a country
to bringing down the old regime in Iraq. In doing so we also committed
ourselves to helping to rebuild the country once Saddam fell.
Now that Saddam is out, we cannot allow ourselves to simply quit now
and say "OK we did what we came to do, Saddam is gone, the country is
yours to run" and then pull everything back home to the US. It is
absolutely necessary that we stay in Iraq and help to rebuild their
infrastructure and government. If we pull out at this stage, we are
doing a disservice to the citizens of Iraq. Yes, we will have
eliminated their "evil dictator", but what will we have left them in
his place, anarchy and total chaos. I don't know that I would consider
life in a situation like that to be necessarily better than life under
Saddam.
Once we commit ourselves to a task we've got to see it through to it's
ultimate conclusion. This is true for individuals and it becomes even
more true in things dealing with our nation as a whole.
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