Diane West writing in the Washington Times ponders if Senator John Kerry had won in 2004, and doesn’t envision what is happening right now any differently than if it occured under a Kerry presidency.

And that notion surely would have included something as cockamamie as the “neighbors’ meeting” on Iraq that was recently announced. This diplomatic potluck, calculated to seat jihad network “neighbors” Iran and Syria at the table alongside the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China, the Arab League and, of course, Iraq, might easily have had “Kerry administration” written all over it. But it is, unhappily, a Bush administration initiative, a new riff on the defunct Bush Doctrine: “You’re either for us, or you’re against us — we don’t care which.” What happened to the policy of not negotiating with terror-states like Iran? It’s gone, apparently, replaced by a deadly confusion of cross-purposes. We want peace and stability in Iraq; Iran is already at war with us to destabilize Iraq and drive us from the region. We want Israel to live long and prosper; Iran supports Hezbollah and openly promises “to wipe Israel off the face of the map.”

On a similar note, the London Times’ Gerard Baker wonders when the blame cannot be passed on Bush, will nations step up to the plate to fight against Islamism?

Take a look at the miserable mess that is unfolding in what is supposed to be the “West’s” fight in Afghanistan against the Taleban and al-Qaeda. Afghanistan was, remember, unlike Iraq, “the good war”. Within days of September 11, 2001, all the European members of Nato readily signed up to assist America in righting the wrongs of international terrorism by defeating the Kabul regime and its allies.

Even after the alliance fell out over the Iraq war, those who opposed that conflict reiterated their dedication to winning the one in Afghanistan. When the Spanish socialists pulled their nation’s troops out of Iraq in 2004, they insisted they were fully committed to the war against the Taleban.

But what is the state of that struggle? These days, despite the notional presence of a Nato force involving more than 15 countries, only a handful — Britain, the Netherlands, Canada, and plucky Lithuania included — are putting anything like the effort required in terms of resources and willingness to take the fight to the enemy.

Others — such as the Germans and the French — will commit troops and equipment but won’t let them fight, preferring noncombatant roles. Last week the Italian Government collapsed because some of its members actually want to make friends with the Taleban. European countries are not failing to fight the war in Afghanistan because they don’t like George Bush. They lack either the perception of the threat or the will to deal with it.

Does anyone really think the election of President Hillary Clinton will be greeted with a sudden surge of German and French troops to Kabul and Helmand, routing al-Qaeda militants in the name of multilateralism?

Read Baker’s full column, and if you have the stomach, read the comments to it which many of reinforce exactly what Baker argues. In my opinion, as long as there is a war against Islamism, that is to say until it’s defeated or it has defeated us, Bush will be blamed for just about everything.