TERRORISM - AMERICA AS VILLAIN

In his partisan fervor, Democratic power broker George Soros can't detect a
moral distinction between U.S. soldiers in Iraq and the terrorists who flew
hijacked jetliners into the twin towers.

Speaking to a group of liberal activists hosted by U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham
Clinton, Soros described the Abu Ghraib prison abuse as torture, then
launched into a broad attack against the war on terror.

"In the terrorist attack," he said, "we were the victims. ... The way
President Bush conducted the war on terror converted us from victims into
perpetrators. ... The war on terrorism ... has since caused more innocent
victims than the victims of the (Sept. 11, 2001) attack on America."

True, Bush did not have to fight back. He could have allowed al-Qaida to
keep slaughtering Americans and other "infidels."

While the humiliation of some prisoners was reprehensible, it was not an
official policy and the suspects are being prosecuted and the guilty
punished. The attack on America was carried out by al-Qaida as part of a
broader strategy for world domination. It was not the work of rogue elements.

Likewise, there is a difference between accidentally killing some non-
combatants during wartime, despite a policy of keeping those casualties to
an absolute minimum, and intentionally blowing civilians to bits with car
bombs.

Soros, a European-born multibillionaire, has spent vast sums promoting drug
legalization. He favors euthanasia. He has written articles warning about
capitalism, which he calls a greater threat than communism. With that
background, it would be easy to dismiss his speech as merely more ranting
from an eccentric old leftist.

His role in the presidential election makes that impossible, however. Soros
has pledged $15 million to get his neighbor John Kerry elected -- and says
he would spend his entire fortune if he thought that would make the difference.

Kerry should either endorse or repudiate Soros' statement about Americans
being perpetrators of war, rather than victims.