As right-wing as I tend to be, I hereby pledge my vote for President to Joe Lieberman should the Democrats come to their senses and not nominate Kerry.

'Let Us Have Faith'

First, we must aggressively and thoroughly investigate what was happening at Abu Ghraib prison and at every other American military prison. We must hold accountable anyone who was responsible for wrongdoing, which requires that we undertake the most independent and unfettered investigation possible. I have high hopes for the special investigative group composed of former Secretaries Schlesinger and Brown, Congresswoman Fowler, and General Horner, which seems to have been given appropriately broad and independent authority, and the capacity to hire its own staff.

This investigation, and the justice it produces, should make clear to ourselves and the world that we Americans will not tolerate such inhumanity, even in the treatment of those who are themselves wantonly inhumane to us. The beheading of Nick Berg just because he was an American made painfully clear how little our enemies value life. Prison abuse must not blur the enormous moral differences between us and those we fight in Iraq, and in the world-wide war on terrorism.

And that leads to my second conclusion. We cannot allow the prison scandal in Iraq to diminish our own American sense of national honor and purpose, or further erode support for our just and necessary cause in Iraq. American opponents of the war may try to do the latter, while foreign critics and enemies of the United States will try to do the former. The misdeeds of a few do not alter the character of our nation or the honor of the many who serve in our defense -- and the world's -- every day. Winning the war we are now fighting in Iraq against Saddam loyalists and jihadist terrorists remains critical to the security of the American people, the freedom of the Iraqi people, and the hopes of all the Middle East for stability and peace.