Jack Wheeler understands ... up to a point.

In today’s “To The Point,” Jack Wheeler points out the great distance between today’s Democrats and those who led the fight against the fascist powers in WWII. On the WWII Memorial in Washington are the words of FDR: “December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy … no matter how long it ay take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people, in their righteous might, will win through to absolute victory.” Read that again and let those words resonate in your mind. Then ask yourself if any of today’s Democrats, as Wheeler points out, “could demand that American’s ‘righteous might’ achieve ‘absolute victory’ over its enemies?”

Jack is right. Damn right! Here is a “moral certainty, the sure and certain conviction that America was in the right and the Nazis and Imperialist Japanese were in the wrong.” But it’s not just the Democrats. The Republicans are far better but still, Bush is not FDR in this regard. Bush says we are fighting a war against terrorism. But that’s a tactic! Imagine if FDR said that we are fighting a war against Blitzkreig! Bush praises the enemy’s ideology, Islam. FDR did no such thing concerning fascism or Nazism.

I’m afraid Jack doesn’t get to the root of the problem that underlies the moral doubt on the left and the failure of the right to explicate what makes our culture great and the enemy’s culture vile. No one dares say such things. There was the exception of Italian Prime Minister, who shortly after 9/11 explained the moral superiority of Western Civilization, but he retracted this statement in the face of criticism. The “moral certainty” that Jack Wheeler talks about and the “moral clarity” that Bill Bennett once championed are seldom heard. Who explains the difference in values, culture, and ethos? Who dares? What is lacking is intellectual leadership.