Rooting for the enemy

Cathy Young:

ARE SOME Americans, including journalists, rooting for the enemy while their country is at war? This question is coming up with increasing frequency as the troubles in Iraq continue.

The May 15 issue of the British magazine The Spectator published an article by Daily Telegraph correspondent Tony Hamden, recounting a conversation he had with an unnamed "American magazine journalist of serious accomplishment and impeccable liberal credentials."

According to Hamden, "Not only had she `known' the Iraq war would fail, but she considered it essential that it did so because this would ensure that the `evil' George W. Bush would no longer be running her country. Her editors back on the East Coast were giggling, she said, over what a disaster Iraq had turned out to be. `Lots of us talk about how awful it would be if this worked out.' " Hamden goes on to say that when he asked the woman if "thousands more dead Iraqis would be a good thing," her answer was, essentially, yes.

If this story -- tailor-made to confirm every conservative's worst suspicions about the media establishment -- is true, it illustrates a repugnant mentality. But some of those criticizing such attitudes reveal a mindset that, in some ways, is equally misguided. On the widely read

Instapundit.com weblog, University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds writes, "To explain things in words of few syllables: It's wrong to root for your country's defeat." Reynolds adds that it's especially wrong "when that defeat would mean the death of innocents" and "when it's merely for domestic political advantage." It's hard to disagree with the last two statements. But what about the sweeping assertion that rooting for your country's defeat is wrong?

This view is hardly limited to Reynolds alone. The other day on the Fox News Channel news show "From the Heartland," while interviewing left-wing cartoonist Ted Rall, host and former congressman John Kasich expressed dismay and shock that anyone could root against their own country in a war.

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