The King of France rides Again

His Royal Highness Sen. Harry Reid is at it again. He was asked about how he felt about the Congressional approval ratings being just under 25%, lower I might add then our embattled Commander-in-Chief. His response was like the end of a MasterCard commercial, priceless. Sen. Reid responded that the numbers were so low because of the war in Iraq. I think he may be on to something here, because I tend to agree with him in part. There is a lot more to it than just Iraq. First you have to take into account that everything promised by both the House and Senate have not even begun the path of becoming legislation. Sen. Reid and Rep. Pelosi made all kinds of promises on everything from Iraq to immigration reform to be handled in the first 100 hours; still the majority of those promises have not even been brought to the floor of either chamber of congress. I guess it is hard to approve of broken promises. Ok, so they blame their lack of progress on obstructionist Republicans, but they control both chambers and did the same thing two years ago, didn’t they? When the Democrats played the same game they were just looking out for the people! Tuning that same logic around, I can see where the Republicans are just looking out for the people, especially those in camouflage uniforms serving all over the globe killing and capturing bad guys. Proposed domestic policies play a role in their popularity downfall. Especially, the Immigration Reform/Amnesty bill S 1639. It was not just a one sided assault from those of us on the right side of the political aisle. There were numerous fronts in this fight, even the AFL-CIO rallied against our legislators in this fight. Just listen to what our valiant law makers are saying. America must be an evil, brutal place to live. I wonder why so many people still want to come to live here. Why reform or add new laws to the books that will go unenforced for the next 20 years? The Democrats are pushing to close POW detention centers, like Guantanimo Bay (GITMO), and bring the terrorists onto the Continental United States so they can have access to lawyers and our court system. As a former Marine this does not make any sense, never in the history of this country have POW’s had access to our court system. The laws of war and the laws of a civilized nation are two totally separate systems. They, the left, say that we are not properly applying the Geneva Conventions to these bad guys that we capture on the battle fields of the world trying to kill our sons and daughters, the same sons and daughters the left wants brought home to save their lives. The terrorists, who expect that because of the goodness of our civilized society we will follow the conventions, do not adhere to the same. In the Part III, Section II, Article 43, Paragraph 3 states: 3. In order to promote the protection of the civilian population from the effects of hostilities, combatants are obliged to distinguish themselves from the civilian population while they are engaged in an attack or in a military operation preparatory to an attack. Recognizing, however, that there are situations in armed conflicts where, owing to the nature of the hostilities an armed combatant cannot so distinguish himself, he shall retain his status as a combatant, provided that, in such situations, he carries his arms openly: (a) during each military engagement, and (b) during such time as he is visible to the adversary while he is engaged in a military deployment preceding the launching of an attack in which he is to participate. Acts which comply with the requirements of this paragraph shall not be considered as perfidious within the meaning of Article 37, paragraph 1 (c).

Terrorists have the habit of hiding in and among civilian populations. They either find a sympathetic group, as is done in the Gaza Strip and West Bank; or through the use of torture and other violence intimidate a population to hide them, as has been done in Rhamadi, Faluja, Haditha, and numerous other towns in Iraq.