From Salon.com’s The waning power of the War Myth: “For Bush, Vietnam’s real relevance to Iraq isn’t the early withdrawal issue — it’s the ’stab in the back.’ The ’stab in the back’ holds that America was only defeated in Vietnam because we lost the will to fight. And those who sapped our will, those who betrayed our fighting men, were cowardly protesters and craven politicians… The “stab in the back” thesis…brings together two keystone beliefs: the idea that America is omnipotent and incapable of defeat, and that any war the U.S. engages in must be noble and heroic. Therefore, if America is defeated, traitorous elites must be to blame.”