EDITORIAL - It is a very rare occasion when I don?t use this space to act as a contrarian to the politically charged rhetoric of the liberal left. Most of the time, it isn?t a chore to point out the political opportunism and the politics-over-government mentality in their statements and actions. After reading Senator Joe Lieberman?s recent editorial in the Wall Street Journal titled, ?Our Troops Must Stay,? I have decided that I must commend someone from a party with which I usually disagree.

In a stunning rebuke to most all on the liberal left, Senator Joe Lieberman (D-CT), having just returned from a fact-finding mission to Iraq and the Middle East, reported that the US effort in Iraq to rid the region of Islamofascist terror and dictatorial totalitarianism is succeeding, that the Iraqi people are embracing democracy and that President Bush?s plan for success in this conflict, whether articulated adequately or not, is working.

Let?s simplify this a bit. A Democrat, a man who was nominated by his party to run for vice president against President Bush and Vice President Cheney in the 2000 election cycle, is stating with out reserve that the president?s initiative in Iraq and the War on Terror is working, that the facts support this and that we, as a nation should continue on the path we are traveling in order to be victorious.

It is a wonder he hasn?t had his DNC membership revoked for his statements.

Not surprisingly, some on the liberal left take great issue with the facts that Sen. Lieberman brought back with him from the Iraqi Theater and are either refusing to accept them or disingenuously ignoring them to continue their partisan political attacks on the president.

"What the president did not do today, again, is acknowledge the fundamental reality of the insurgency," said Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) at the unveiling of the National Strategy for Victory in Iraq. One is left scratching his head at this statement.

President Bush and his administration have repeatedly recognized and acknowledged ? fundamentally and every other way ? the terrorist insurgency as mainly comprised of supporters of Saddam Hussein, resisters to the new Iraqi government and radical Islamist terrorists who have joined forces with these two pro-oppression, pro-brutality factions to battle against democracy and freedom for the Iraqi people. The proof that they have recognized these groups of murderous thugs as the ?insurgency? is the fact that coalition forces are killing them before they can blow-up more mosques, hotels, hospitals and police stations killing more innocents and freedom defenders.

Kerry goes on to say that he believes this group of terrorists, who wage war in support of a regime that raped, murdered and tortured its own subjects while actively trying to undermine the international community by pursuing weapons of mass destruction, will not be, ?beaten at the face of a gun. They will be beaten through the political resolution, through a solution that has to be achieved politically."

It would seem that Senator Kerry was too busy to notice, or perhaps he doesn?t want to recognize, that as millions of Iraqi people braved terrorist death threats in order to exercise their new found right to vote, the very thugs that issued those threats to the Iraqi people were busy doing everything they could to keep the political process from taking place. The fact that Senator Kerry doesn?t recognize the fact terrorists usually don?t sit down at the negotiating table, adhere to free elections or that they can?t be trusted to keep their word, is proof enough that the voters of Massachusetts truly do believe in the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Kerry isn?t alone in his ignorance of the facts, facts that Sen. Lieberman was kind enough to gather for the American people during his visit to Iraq. Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) exhibited that he too has been skipping through the meadow of doom-and-gloom in blissful ignorance.

After the unveiling of the National Strategy for Victory in Iraq, Senator Reed said, "One of the feelings I have at least is the president talked about, sort of, the security forces, because at least he has a check list of accomplishments he can cite. When you get into the area of political development, and particularly economic reconstruction, it's a much bleaker picture, given the two years we've been there." This is in direct conflict with the truth that Sen. Lieberman brought home to the American people.

In no uncertain terms, Sen. Lieberman praised the economic development and the reconstruction process that he saw in Iraq. He noted that reconstruction is going far beyond what Saddam Hussein?s regime ever had in place with utilities and opportunities afforded to those who Hussein and his demonic sons specifically terrorized and oppressed.

So, questions beg to be asked.

If those who are fighting the terrorists in Iraq keep insisting that we are winning, that progress is being made and that we should stay the course, why is it that liberals like Kerry and Reed don?t believe them?

If those who the coalition liberated keep insisting that freedom loving people are winning the battle against Islamofascim and that they need us to stay the course, why is it that liberals like Kennedy, Reid and Pelosi don?t believe them?

"If a Democrat the liberal left was willing to elected to the vice presidency comes back from a fact-finding mission in the Iraqi theater and insists that we are winning the war for freedom, that the Iraqi people are thankful for what we are doing, that progress -- militarily, politically and economically -- is being made, that the president's strategy is working and that the worst thing to do would be to put in place a date-based timetable for the withdrawal of our military personnel, why is it that the liberal Democrats of his own party dismiss him and essentially call him a liar?"

The term ?political opportunism? comes to mind.