DURING HIS DECEMBER 8 SPEECH, Smith referenced the fact several times that he is a “student of military history.” As a self-professed military history buff, I hope Smith appreciates the following analogy: Smith is leading his Senate career and potentially his entire party into a political Cannae.

Conservatives who have been and remain stalwarts on the war will be disgusted by Smith’s change of heart and tone. Longtime opponents of the war will not welcome him into their fold. Even those who have traveled a similar intellectual path as Smith claims to have journeyed will find the sincerity of his alleged epiphanies, given their timing, to be implausible.

In short, Smith, any like-minded Republican Senators and the RNC if it decides to support such Senators, will wind up like the Romans at Cannae: Surrounded by hostiles, without friends, cut off from the outside world. Like the Romans at Cannae, their fate will also be destruction.

And it will be deserved. The fact that the 11/7 Republicans are prepared to play politics with matters of such import is contemptible. On Friday, my co-blogger Hugh Hewitt published the thoughts of Lieutenant Mark Daily, a UCLA grad who joined the army a week after we declared war on Saddam with the full intention of serving in Iraq. On why he decided to serve, Daily wrote:

“I simply decided that the time for candid discussions of the oppressed was over, and I joined…Please remember that America's commitment to overthrow Saddam Hussein and his sons existed before the current administration and would exist into our future children's lives had we not acted. Please remember that the problems that plague Iraq today were set in motion centuries ago and were up until now held back by the most cruel of cages. Don't forget that human beings have a responsibility to one another and that Americans will always have a responsibility to the oppressed. Don't overlook the obvious reasons to disagree with the war but don't cheapen the moral aspects either. Assisting a formerly oppressed population in converting their torn society into a plural, democratic one is dangerous and difficult business, especially when being attacked and sabotaged from literally every direction.”

Mark Daily was killed in Iraq this past Monday. To say that the Mark Dailys of our country deserve better than craven political opportunists like the 11/7 Republicans is to merely state the obvious.

But hey, perhaps I have Gordon Smith all wrong. Like I said, I tried to interview him to hear his side of the story. But if he feels any of this is unfair, I can offer him a far greater forum than Townhall.com to set the record straight. Hugh Hewitt has authorized me to extend an invitation to Senator Smith to appear on his radio show.

Hugh and I both hope the Senator accepts.