SecDef Rumsfeld, speaking before the Army War College the other day, graded the way the United States made its case to the world on the war against Islamists. "D plus," he said. "Maybe a D."

He's right. And it's worse than he thinks. Despite the beliefs of some that the Bush team pumps out doublespeak propaganda 24/7 via Fox News mind-control rays, the administration has been unable to persuade millions of Americans that death-cult totalitarians are an existential threat to the civilized world. You'd think the case would be self-explanatory, no? Us equals democracy, whiskey, sexy, as a liberated fellow once summed it up. Them equals theocracy, blood, the burqa. Everyone clear?

Apparently not. It doesn't help that the most vocal and famous elements of the left appear less concerned about the peril posed by the raving nutters, and think Bushies have embarked on some strange, inexplicable crusade to be mean to everyone who doesn't fall down Sunday morning and speak in tongues.

American actors like Gary Busey and Billy Zane appear in anti-U.S. movies for Turkish audiences; piercing intellects like George Clooney spend their time reminding us how the corpse of Joe McCarthy is the real threat to democracy; Western "peace" activists rescued by Spec-Ops from a sword-assisted skull removal couldn't bring themselves to thank the troops, lest anyone suspect that guns might be occasionally useful after all.

You'd call them useful idiots, but it's hard to see the "useful" part.

Most telling event: Yale admits a Taliban spokesman to study in the name of understanding his cultural perspective. The military can't recruit on campus because it discriminates against gays, of course.

But you want to talk about Brokeback Mountain? It's when the government pushes a stone wall on you for being gay. If our institutions of higher learning lack the intellectual courage to tell a Taliban mouthpiece to get lost, how can we expect the rest of the smart set to make the case for the West?

Divided we may be, but that hasn't always stopped liberal democracies from presenting a united front. In World War II the left was squarely behind Hitler-whupping, because they hated fascists, and because -- whew! -- Uncle Joe got on the right side of that issue in the end. But the hard fuming left was a marginal element in the larger culture; isolationism on the right was perhaps a larger force. It, too, came around.

Both recognized that America, for all its flaws, was something worth defending, particularly since the alternative was an illiberal nightmare. If anyone suggested that America lacked the moral standing to face off with Adolf because some drinking fountains in the South were off limits to "Coloreds," they got a hard look and rolled eyes. Look, pal, we'll fix America after we've saved it.

That sentiment now seems rather antique.

We have an ill-timed failure of confidence in the West, just when we need to assert what sets us apart from the bloody run of human history. Old Europe has a bad case of clay feet and gives constant examples where this sort of cultural timidity leads. In his heart the average Frenchman believes his values have more to offer the world than those of an Algerian village, but he can't say so. He's paralyzed by the official dogma of cultural egalitarianism. No one believes it, but they're better people for pretending they do.

If an excitable imam of a smoldering Paris suburb demanded the use of Notre Dame to call the faithful to prayer, you suspect the French would deconsecrate the place and turn it into a dance club. (As long as no one's happy, everyone must be satisfied.) They will sell themselves the rope with which they are hanged, and console themselves with the fact that it's made of organic hemp.

And how would you grade their ability to convince the enemy they had no faith in their own civilization? A, no doubt. A plus.