For the longest time we on the right have been wondering when President Bush was going to come out swinging against his critics on the war. As time has progressed and our victory in Iraq become more manifest, the drumbeat of leftwing lies and slanders about the war has merely grown louder and more strident. The endless shriek of leftwing lies have become more and more echoed in the MSM and in the senior leadership of the Democratic Party – to listen to the critics, the liberation of Iraq was begun with no justification whatsoever and has been an unmitigated failure from start to finish. President Bush, in his speech earlier today, finally answered these critics directly:

While it is perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began. Some Democrats and anti-war critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war.

These critics are fully aware that a bipartisan Senate investigation found no evidence of political pressure to change the intelligence community’s judgments related to Iraq’s weapons programs. They also know that intelligence agencies from around the world agreed with our assessment of Saddam Hussein. They know the United Nations passed more than a dozen resolutions citing his development and possession of weapons of mass destruction. Many of these critics supported my opponent during the last election, who explained his position to support the resolution in the Congress this way: ‘When I vote to give the President of the United States the authority to use force, if necessary, to disarm Saddam Hussein, it is because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a threat, and a grave threat, to our security.’ That’s why more than 100 Democrats in the House and the Senate, who had access to the same intelligence voted to support removing Saddam Hussein from power.

The stakes in the global War on Terror are too high, and the national interest is too important, for politicians to throw out false charges. These baseless attacks send the wrong signal to our troops and to an enemy that is questioning America’s will. As our troops fight a ruthless enemy determined to destroy our way of life, they deserve to know that their elected leaders who voted to send them to war continue to stand behind them. Our troops deserve to know that this support will remain firm when the going gets tough. And our troops deserve to know that whatever our differences in Washington, our will is strong, our Nation is united, and we will settle for nothing less than victory. (emphasis added)

It is about time the President spoke out against the critics who would rewrite history and whose lies – sick and cruel lies -encourage the enemy to kill more people, including American soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines. There is not the slightest truth in the anti-war criticism – each and every assertion they have made about pre-war intelligence and the course of the war in Iraq has been false from the start. I am sick and tired of it – and I’m glad that the President is sick and tired of it.

The Bush-haters are so desperate to derail the conservative agenda of the President that they have no compunction about lying to the public, about damaging the morale of the American troops in harms way, and about putting those brave servicemen in jeopardy.

For a full transcript of the President’s speech, go here.

For other commentaries go to Blogs for Bush, Michelle Malkin, Instapundit, Stop the ACLU and Daily Pundit.

MORE: Don Surber says it was Bush’s Gettysburg Address