It Depends Upon the Meanings of "Associated" and "Betray"

As widely publicized, Moveon.org (which never moves on) ran a full page ad on Monday in The New York Times (discounted by $102,000) attacking Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, with the headline "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?"

At an important Congressional hearing, Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker testified on the U.S. future in Iraq. At that hearing, this exchange took place:

Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida): "...I offer my colleagues the opportunity to use this hearing to distance themselves from the despicable ad that was published today calling into question the patriotism of General Petraeus.”

Rep. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii): "Point of order, Mr. Chairman! Nobody has to distance themselves from something they weren’t associated with.”

Liberals defended the ad and said that the inference that that the general is a traitor is wrong because "the word 'traitor' appears nowhere in the MoveOn.org ad.... The word 'betray' used by MoveOn in the ad implies many meanings, but does not directly imply 'traitor'."

Here are my thoughts:

• The ad is wrong and offensive to say that our commanding general in Iraq betrays our country.
• The Democrats do not consider that taking money from MoveOn.org, accepting its publicity, and participating at its convention is the same as associating with that organization.
• The word betray, when used in context of military leadership, clearly suggests that the general is a traitor.
• The Democrats are not distancing themselves from the ad, much less condemning it.

It's bad for a major suporter of Democrats to suggest that our general betrays us, it's bad for an elected U.S. represetative to not "distance" himself from such a statement, it's bad to hide behind the word "associated" and an unexplicable definition of it, and it's bad to defend the ad with a strange definition of "betray."

The Democratic dictionary sure keeps people confused (not to mention that they end sentences with prepostions.)

Can't the Democrats quit hiding behind words and just come out and say that the ad is wrong because they are loyal Americans and serve in Congress? (You don't have to answer that.)

But, just to show how simple this should be, the word "betray" has a clear meaning when used to describe a military person, it is offensive and misleading to use that term to describe this general, I have no association with MoveOn.org, yet, I can not only distance myself from its ad but, as a patriot, I condemn it as well.

Try it yourself. If we can show Democrats that we can condemn the MoveOn.org ad, then maybe they will know that it's possible.

In the meantime, people should be reminded of the cowardly refusal of the Democrats to do the right thing, and people should continue to pressure them to condemn disgusting attacks on a good and competent general. We wouldn't want the Democrats to be put into a position where others would say that they betrayed our soldiers and our country.