Praise the Glorious Freedom Fighters of Anbar Province

Remember when Osama bin Laden was a "freedom fighter"? Maybe not. It's been a while -- way back before Ronnie told Mikhail to "tear down this wall" and Evil was vanquished forever.

Wait. My bad. I guess Evil wasn't vanquished forever. Anyway, back in those days the Evil Empire had its headquarters in Moscow. They sent their orcs to invade Afghanistan, and heroes from all over the Middle East made their way to places like Tora Bora to hide out and strike the Soviets when they least expected it. They were like Zorro or Robin Hood and his merry men or something. And we helped. We sent money, weapons, and CIA advisors. It was a glorious victory, David slaying Goliath and all that. Remember those guys? Today we call them Al Qaeda.

Now let's talk about Anbar Province.

Anbar was all but written off by a Marine intelligence report last August. And then, well, I'll let Senator Lindsey Graham tell the story:

The surge is producing results. The biggest result from these brave men and women’s new effort is that the Sunnis who’ve tasted al-Qaeda’s life in the Sunni part of Iraq, Anbar province—when he [Senator Webb] was running for the Senate, it was declared lost. Well, it has, it has been recaptured. And the people living in Anbar have chosen to align themselves with us, because al-Qaeda overplayed their hand.

Got that? The surge is working almost as well as that heroic Afghan struggle against the Evil Soviets. It's been so successful, in fact, that (according to the Initial Benchmark Assessment that the administration just sent to Congress) "The provincial government ‑‑ for the first time in a year ‑‑ is now able to meet in the province." Wow. You really know you've "recaptured" a place when the government is able to meet inside the territory it's supposed to be governing.

How did we do it? Well, we found some new good guys: the tribal sheiks of Anbar. They are the ones who are "aligned with us" now. A lot of them used to be insurgents, but they're freedom fighters now. Like Osama.

Wait. My bad. Osama isn't a freedom fighter any more, is he? How does the President talk about him now? Like this:

Now we're in a new and unprecedented war against violent Islamic extremists. This is an ideological conflict we face against murderers and killers who try to impose their will.

Freedom fighters, killers -- it's so hard to remember whether we're at war with Eurasia or Eastasia, isn't it? I get confused.

But thank God the President doesn't get confused. He always knows what to do. And I especially thank God that he's been able to find new Good Guys that we can give money and weapons and advice to.

With the help of such wonderful people, I'll bet we'll soon vanquish Evil forever.