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http://hereticalideas.com/ Archived: Sep 14, 2002 at 23:01:38 |
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As president, Bush takes Colin Powell's suggestions about the form of what he should say on the Middle East while hewing closely to the substance offered to him by Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld. It does not seem to enter Bush's mind to order his subordinates to shut up and walk single file behind him. Bush practices a form of coalition-building at home that inevitably creates confusion and unease abroad.Sounds right. I think Bush has been handling his foreign policy job just fine.The administration may well follow a mix-and-match approach by seeking a Security Council enforcement resolution on Iraq (a victory for Powell on process) that will set the bar on inspections so high that Saddam Hussein will reject it outright (à la Cheney and Rumsfeld). Bush will also try to accommodate key allies on matters of form without letting his hands be tied on substance. At his Camp David meeting with Bush last weekend, Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair won some input rights on the shaping of a U.S. draft resolution while work proceeds on a British draft as well.
Oh, the party's leaders speak: They appear on talk shows; they write op-eds; they convene congressional hearings. But most of what they say is best understood as highly articulate evasiveness. They have devised a series of formulations designed to make the party appear to be offering a clear response to the president's proposed war, when it is actually doing the opposite. In fact, Washington's leading Democrats have neither taken a forthright position on an invasion of Iraq nor seriously answered the Bush administration theory of preemption that justifies it. No one today can honestly say he or she is a Democrat because of what the party believes about the greatest threat facing the United States. The Democrats are a party of bystanders, a party without a position on the issue that matters most.It's distressing that in what is supposedly a two-party system, one party is abdicating its job. I think that if the Democrats were to take any stand, they'd be likely to gain votes. They'd most certainly gian votes if they sided with Bush. But the evasiveness is extremely troubling. Here's one thing I'll say for Bush--he pursues his agenda regardless of the polls. Can the Democrats say the same?
UPDATE: Also in TNR, Michael Crowley points out that Democrats would likely benefit from siding with the Administration:
In an ideal scenario, Democrats could wind up with the best of both worlds: pro-war votes that shore up the party's pathetic national security credentials and gains in midterm elections dominated by domestic issues. It's not a crazy notion. Consider this excerpt from the October 29, 1990, New York Times, one week before midterm elections and in the midst of obvious war preparations in the Persian Gulf: "[B]uoyed by Mr. Bush's showdown with Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Republicans actually thought they might defy the normal law of politics and pick up seats at the middle of the presidential term," the Times explained. "Now they are talking about minimizing their losses." Thanks largely to a weak economy, the GOP went on to lose eight seats in the House and one in the Senate. Two months later, in January 1991, some Democrats went on to cast Gulf war votes they sorely regret. But few of them are likely to repeat that mistake again. All of which suggests that for Democrats, the Iraq debate might bring less pain and more gain than anyone expects.Also a good point.
Events can turn in one of two ways: If we fail to act in the face of danger, the people of Iraq will continue to live in brutal submission. The regime will have new power to bully and dominate and conquer its neighbors, condemning the Middle East to more years of bloodshed and fear. The regime will remain unstable -- the region will remain unstable, with little hope of freedom, and isolated from the progress of our times. With every step the Iraqi regime takes toward gaining and deploying the most terrible weapons, our own options to confront that regime will narrow. And if an emboldened regime were to supply these weapons to terrorist allies, then the attacks of September the 11th would be a prelude to far greater horrors.I await to hear the chattering idiot classes response....If we meet our responsibilities, if we overcome this danger, we can arrive at a very different future. The people of Iraq can shake off their captivity. They can one day join a democratic Afghanistan and a democratic Palestine, inspiring reforms throughout the Muslim world. These nations can show by their example that honest government, and respect for women, and the great Islamic tradition of learning can triumph in the Middle East and beyond. And we will show that the promise of the United Nations can be fulfilled in our time.
Throughout history, freedom has been threatened by war and terror; it has been challenged by the clashing wills of powerful states and the designs of tyrants; and it has been tested by widespread poverty and disease. What has changed since Sept. 11 is our nation's appreciation of the urgency of these issues — and the new opportunities we have for progress. Today, humanity holds in its hands the opportunity to further freedom's triumph over all its age-old foes. The United States welcomes its responsibility to lead in this great mission."
-- President George W. Bush
And now these heroes lie here, in this field where their battle ended. This cemetery. This battlefield. This hallowed ground."
-- Dave Barry
Does the World Community support this next phase?
What do you think? Of course not. We had their sympathy when we were down on one knee bleeding, but that evaporated with the Afghan campaign. The world likes America with a bloody nose, and hates us when we smash the hand that smacked us. Now only Britain stands with us without reservation: surprise. Europe dithers and fumes - one of the interesting pieces of collateral damage from the WTC attack was the relationship between ordinary Americans and Europe; many here now sense the open animosity the European intelligentsia has towards Americans, and Europe no longer feel like an ally. Remarkable, but true. It’s not that Americans don’t like them; we just don’t care what they think anymore. (Get this: the president will be quoted, second hand, as not “giving a shit what the Europeans think.” It’s come to that.) We realize we’re going to have to go it alone - and in most respects this feels right. No one cares much about the UN anymore, particularly since they elected Libyans to chair the Human Rights division."
-- James Lileks
'When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse,' Osama bin Laden famously observed. He was right; he just backed the wrong horse."
-- Ronald Bailey
America has long sought to avoid foreign entanglements. But that won't work now. Today, and for many days to come, we must be like Gary Cooper's sheriff in High Noon, defending the townspeople, whether they like it or not.
-- Mortimer B. Zuckerman
New Yorkers from a hundred lands have become Americans.
Americans will not be deterred from their God-given right to pursue happiness. They will not be enslaved by fear. Liberty is presumed."
-- Scott Ott
On a perfect morning in September, these men took passenger aircraft and converted them into deadly missiles, using innocents as tools to kill more innocents, and staining the clear blue skies of New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania with the blood of Americans who had comitted no offense against them, except the offense that these men took at the existence of free peeople everywhere."
-- from A Perfect Morning, which also features many essays in memoriam of 9/11
And they said "no more". They drew the line: this far, and no farther.
Flight 93."
-- N.Z. Bear
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