"We Shall Surrender In The Fields and in the Streets; We Shall Surrender In the Hills . . ."

That is the voice of our Democratic leadership channelling Churchill and the famous speech he gave to rally his country during the dark days that followed the 1940 British retreat from Dunkirk. Doesn't it make one proud to see our Democrats, refusing to concede against all odds, determined to achieve their version of "victory" at any cost. That is in the true spirit of Churchill.

Well, perhaps not the true spirit. There are a few minor differences between the spirit of Churchill and the things that animate our quartet of Murtha, Pelosi, Reid, and Obey of course - principles, ethics, intellectual honesty, a sense of reality and loyalty to country to name but a few.

And those differences were very much on display yesterday. If you did not see it, Congressional Democrats Jack Murtha and David Obey appeared at a news conference. The Washington Times has the report:

House Democrats' point man in the war-funding showdown with the White House today dismissed U.S. military gains in Iraq and vowed to tighten the purse strings until President Bush accepts a pullout plan.

"Look at all the people that have been displaced, all the [lost] oil production, unemployment, all those type of things," said Rep. John P. Murtha, chairman of House Appropriations defense subcommittee. "We can't win militarily

The Pennsylvania Democrat conceded violence was down dramatically and some normalcy was restored on Iraq's streets, but he said U.S. victory remains unattainable as long as Baghdad fails to pass national-reconciliation laws

"To change the political law, it doesn't seem to me you need the military stability," Mr. Murtha told reporters on Capitol Hill.

The non-sequiter of that last statement is near breathtaking, is it not? Murtha is saying that stability is unnecessary for Iraq to progress from this point. This man is such an idiotic menace, one has to, in the words of Hillary, "suspend disbelief" when listening to him. Likewise is his refusal to acknowledge the grass roots progress by Iraqis towards reconcilliation that has made this period of peace possible. And indeed, Murtha must willfully ignore it as, for all practical purposes, that grass roots progress largely renders moot the benchmarks upon which Murtha hangs his hopes for legislating surrender. Long gone are the days when he and all his colleagues were able to justify their clarion call to surrender on the assertion that Iraq was in a state of civil war.

Actually, my favorite part of the news conference was when Murtha dismissed the pax Americana now descending on Iraq as a "lull" in hostilities. I believe it was Mort Kondracke that commented to the effect that "yes, its a lull in the fighting, just like there was a lull in the fighting after Sherman burned Atlanta." And Krauthammer pointed out that it is not like this "lull" is the result of al Qaeda having gone on a short vacation.

It is not hard to read between the lines here. The Democratic leadership's refusal to fund the Iraq War and their determination to continue treating it as a lost cause is a desparate bid to buy time in the hopes that something major will go wrong in Iraq between now and the end of January, when military funding runs out. They bet the farm on defeat in Iraq, with the high water mark of their charge being Harry Reid’s declaration of defeat and capitulation in response to four suicide bombings by al Qaeda in April. Now, rather than do the right thing in response to changed circumstance, they have chosen to double down their wager on defeat. Their perfidy is despicable - and criminal. How many lives are they willing to sacrifice for political power?

Imagine for a second the ramifications to our national security that would emenate from a legislated defeat in January, even as America has brought a significant measure of peace to Iraq and, in so doing, largely destroyed the radical Islamists of al Qaeda. Indeed, al Qaeda has been beaten to the point that Osama bin Laden was himself moved to declare, just two weeks ago, that the "the darkeness" in Iraq has become "pitch black."

If we left Iraq now, forced to withdraw by legislation, the radical Islamists would certainly claim it as a victory that would take on mythical proportions. Never forget that it was the belief that Islam had defeated the "super power" of the Soviet Union that drove the growth of radical Islam through the 1980's and 90's. Now with their defeat assured on the ground, to be granted a victory over the American super power could only come - as the story will go - from the direct intervention of Allah. God help us all if that occurs. Radical Islam will take on a new life not heretofore imagined. And, as the world's premier Orientalist, Bernard Lewis has stated, speaking of the immeasurable consequences of a withdraw from Iraq last year - before we had largely destroyed al Qaeda - "the consequences--both for Islam and for America--will be deep, wide and lasting."

At any rate, the two front war against the mortal enemies of our nation continues. And its most dangerous enemies are inside of our borders.