The Town Herald

Beauty means different things to different people. Some think of physical attractiveness, others think of their favorite color. But it is easy to overlook true beauty when one becomes focused on what is generally recognized as beauty. Simply looking pretty is not a requirement for something to be beautiful. Many things we take for granted and are commonplace in our lives are beautiful but we don’t notice them. When was the last time you looked at children playing in the grass and thought “beautiful”? When was the last time you stepped into a polling booth and thought “beautiful”? When was the last time you were outside your home without fear and thought “beautiful”? Probably not recently - if ever. Just living what most of us consider to be normal, happy lives is a thing of incredible beauty.

Let’s take playing children, voting booths, and no fear and transplant them to the Middle East; to Iraq. How precious and beautiful are they now? In a nation shredded by a dictatorship that gassed its own people, wrenched open by the arrival of American forces, and terrorized by monsters called “insurgents”; these examples of liberty are more beautiful than any supermodel or any color and there are more examples to show than ever before.

Since the beginning of the “surge” launched by President George W. Bush, violence in Iraq has steadily fallen and now is at its lowest level since 2004. Additionally, the last few months have seen the lowest number of American troop casualties since the beginning of the war. To top it all off, the Pentagon announced that 15 of 18 “benchmarks” of progress that were set at the beginning of the surge have been met. Iraqi confidence in their government is growing and areas that have been held by militias and insurgents for years are in the hands of the legitimate Iraqi democracy.

What all of this translates into is beauty. More children playing, more citizens voting, more people safe outside their homes. The beauty that freedom, democracy, and liberty bring to nations is beginning to show through the dust and blood of a hard-fought war. The insurgents are on the run and the hideous veil of terror is finally being swept away. Iraqis are starting to live normal, happy lives and Iraq is looking more and more beautiful with each passing day...