Adam Schiff: “in the early days of World War II, the government commissioned director Frank Capra to make a series of films that would…”

“in the early days of World War II, the government commissioned director Frank Capra to make a series of films that would explain the nature of the war to a hastily mobilized Nation. Over the course of the next 3 years, Capra produced a remarkable series of films collectively known as ``Why We Fight.'' These films were instrumental in elevating the war from a fight for land and resources to a struggle between the ``free world'' of the Allies and the ``slave world'' of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan. As a Nation rooted in an ideology rather than ethnic or geographical identity, the United States has always looked at its wars as ideological conflicts between freedom and tyranny. Our national reluctance to go to war has shaped the prerequisite that when we fight, we do so for a high moral purpose that honors our principles and values. When he addressed the Congress, the Nation and the world in the wake of the September 11 attacks, President Bush laid out the challenge posed by terrorism. Al Qaeda and radical Islamists, the President declared, attacked us because ``they hate our freedoms, our freedom of religion, freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other.'' The moral clarity the President expressed nearly 3 years ago has been clouded by the administration's ambiguity over whether the rule of law applied to the prosecution of the war on terrorism or in Iraq.”