Re: my earlier post, a reader writes:

When Nixon offered “peace with honor” what he specifically meant was a treaty that left South Vietnam intact, a U.S.-trained South Vietnamese Army in place to defend it with American advisors, financial and logistical support to make sure that army could do its job. If North Vietnam violated the treaty the U.S. had the explicit right (and obligation) to provide land-based and naval air support to attack any invading force. That was a South Korea-style solution that could have held. Unfortunately, the post-Watergate “Class of ‘74″ gave the Democrats such unshakeable anti-war majorities in both houses that they were able to start a “slow bleed” approach to completely ending our involvement in that country, reducing funding to the point where ARVN field hospitals had to wash and reuse surgical dressings. When the invasion finally did come, the Democrats used their power of the purse to ensure that president Ford had no hope of providing the assistance the South Vietnamese had been promised and which they had every right to expect. So of course no Democrat could run a similar ad. Nixon’s plan then was, in essence, the same as Bush’s in Iraq now – hold until a stable, self-sustaining country is in place, turn over most of the defense to the population, stand by with the big guns to help in a crisis. And today’s Dems are still following the same 30 year old playbook – cut off the funds, betray our ally, use the crisis for political gain. By the way, the specifics of Iraq aside, I really think that Hillary really *is* the Democratic Nixon. I can’t think of another American politician she resembles more: paranoid, ambitious, steely determination combined with an oddly fragile, wounded ego, programmed, robotic, cold, calculating ,almost devoid of humor or any sense of irony about the self.