HADITHA: If the charges are true, the perpetrators must be punished according to strict military law. But even if the charges are true, Americans will not stand by and allow the tragedy to be exploited by a media whose claims of nobility are no longer believed by most Americans. So says Patrick J. Buchanan, who has been struck (as I have) "listening to the breathless reports of Haditha, noting the glee and excitement in the voices of some correspondents, anchors and talking heads, one senses anticipation about what is to come." Money quote:

"But if the media are seen as exploiting Haditha -- again, assuming the allegations of a war crime prove true -- to undermine the war effort or the soldiers and Marines fighting, or damage President Bush or his secretary of defense, there will be a savage backlash. Any goodwill won by embedding reporters with troops on the drive to Baghdad will be wiped out, and the old Vietnam wounds, never healed, will reopen."

But of course the reopening of those wounds is precisely the goal of many in America's so-called "peace" movement, that callous cadre of permanent protestors who cannot identify an anti-American claim they didn't eagerly embrace. Today's sickening spectacle in this regard comes from the notorious maven of high progressive clownishness, Arianna Huffington, beside herself with excitement about how Haditha gives the anti-war left its long-awaited opening to reclaim "security" as a natural issue for Democrats:

...The killings in Haditha -- like Abu Ghraib, like Bagram, like Guantanamo, like all the everyday, unheralded horrors perpetrated on innocent Iraqi civilians -- have made America less safe. If Democrats can make this their defining issue, they can stop worrying about the laundry list of "what ifs" they are now obsessing over: What if people forget about Katrina and Abramoff and DeLay? What if gas prices come down? What if GOP gerrymandering trumps voter unrest? What if the gay marriage ruse works again? What if, what if, what if... They need to calm their nerves and keep it simple. It's about making us safe, stupid. And keeping our worn-out, stressed-out, missionless troops in Iraq is making us less -- much less -- safe.

Yes, Arianna. Urge your Democrat candidate friends in the House and Senate to focus their campaigns this fall on how American troops fighting to secure a foothold for freedom in the Middle East have made America "less safe." Mr. Bush may have had second thoughts about the following phrase, but I haven't: Bring it on.