How the war got so partisan.
I still think Democracy Arsenal called it right: -- the US isn't going to be retaining politically-tenuous levels of troops in Iraq for that much longer (that is, for much longer than suggested by most timetable or benchmark plans being floated), regardless of what Administration line is.
But the politics are a different thing.
It's worth remembering that a majority of national Democrats actually voted against the IWR back in October, 2002. But a majority of Democrats aren't ever going to be serious presidential candidates (my shilling on Carl Levin's behalf notwithstanding). Because the party leadership -- Daschle, Reid, Kerry, Edwards, Clinton (with vocal support from her husband), Lieberman, and Gephardt in the House -- voted aye and basically supported the war for the next two years, the whole thing was basically touted, legitimately, by the press as "bi-partisan".
What's changed fundamentally is that, from here on out, it can't be touted as such. The Democrats are now the "anti-War" party; which essentially means they're the party of withdrawal timetables.
Hillary Clinton joined the roster of formerly pro-war senators to endorse withdrawal and/or (sort of) repudiate their votes in favour of the 2002 resolution, following Biden, Kerry and Edwards. Nancy Pelosi today went further and joined Murtha's demand for a strict, timed withdrawal plan. The main theme in the press is still that the Democrats are fatally divided among themselves; but it's wrong. The Dems were as divided in 2002, but the line that eventually emerged was that they supported the war, because the leadership and presidential hopefuls did. Now, it's the leadership and the presidential hopefuls (not more publicly marginal figures like Steny Hoyer) who are going to forge the party line in the public consciousness. Besides the very lonely (though loud) voice of Joe Lieberman, their are no more prominent elected Dem hawks. And the only Big Dems who can really even afford to stay neutral on Iraq are governor types who aren't cursed with that pro-war vote -- Warner and Richardson, for instance.
And then, yesterday, Bush made the partisan divide official (to my surprise, admittedly) by sticking to his unpopular Superpower Doing Good rhetoric and swearing off the use of "artificial timelines". Granted, it's basically a rhetorical divide. As the The New York Times explains:
In a speech here to cheering midshipmen at the United States Naval Academy, Mr. Bush described a military strategy for Iraq that loosely follows methods being adopted in Afghanistan: focusing American forces on terrorists who could reach beyond the country's borders and leaving the Iraqis to deal with insurgents and the remnants of Saddam Hussein's government.
"We will continue to shift from providing security and conducting operations against the enemy nationwide to conducting more specialized operations targeted at the most dangerous terrorists," he said. "We will increasingly move out of Iraqi cities, reduce the number of bases from which we operate, and conduct fewer patrols and convoys."
So we're ramping down, and no doubt more before the midterms. Politically, though, the rhetorical difference is enough. The debate is over how, how fast and how overtly to exit, and the Democrats are uniformly now "on the left" of the issue. Pelosi, by backing Murtha, and the Times editorial, by flaying Bush, made it explicit after Bush got through:
Americans have been clamoring for believable goals in Iraq, but Mr. Bush stuck to his notion of staying until "total victory." His strategy document defines that as an Iraq that "has defeated the terrorists and neutralized the insurgency"; is "peaceful, united, stable, democratic and secure"; and is a partner in the war on terror, an integral part of the international community, and "an engine for regional economic growth and proving the fruits of democratic governance to the region."
I still have no position on withdrawal; I just don't know if a longer US presence can possibly mitigate the eventual showdown between the Sunni insurgency and the Shia Death Squads. I haven't really read enough (though this Economist piece provides a good overview of the codundrum; bad arguments on all sides.) I don't know whether the emerging Democratic consensus is, in the abstract, the right one. It doesn't much matter except as a matter of politics. The main thing about a war is starting it, not ending it; the starting of it, and the hedging Democratic complicity in it, was a disaster that (I think) cost us two elections, and did God only knows how much international damage. The ending of it is comparatively a quibbling over (mainly awful) details.
But politically, it will be an interesting test. Public opinion is against the war; but public opinion traditionally reflexively favours the "strong" party on military issues -- the one that, as the Times editors put it, promises a"total victory". And it still looks like Iraq and terrorism are going to be dominating the political landscape for the next few years. The Democrats will be able to claim that the Bushies are following their lead when the soldiers start leaving the Iraqi cities and then the country. But the Republicans will be able to accuse the Democrats of hypocricy for changing their minds on Iraq once the damage was done and of lily-liveredness for wanting to leave too soon (even if only a matter of weeks ahead of what the White House wants).
At any rate, if the lack of distinction between the parties on Iraq was a political problem (and I don't think it was exactly the problem -- the problem was how Dems like Kerry tortured themselves into taking positions they didn't believe and couldn't effectively argue) it shouldn't be anymore. The war is now a strictly partisan issue and how it shakes down politically will tell us a lot about how the lines are drawn in American politics 30-some years after the last US soldiers left Vietnam.
But the politics are a different thing.
It's worth remembering that a majority of national Democrats actually voted against the IWR back in October, 2002. But a majority of Democrats aren't ever going to be serious presidential candidates (my shilling on Carl Levin's behalf notwithstanding). Because the party leadership -- Daschle, Reid, Kerry, Edwards, Clinton (with vocal support from her husband), Lieberman, and Gephardt in the House -- voted aye and basically supported the war for the next two years, the whole thing was basically touted, legitimately, by the press as "bi-partisan".
What's changed fundamentally is that, from here on out, it can't be touted as such. The Democrats are now the "anti-War" party; which essentially means they're the party of withdrawal timetables.
Hillary Clinton joined the roster of formerly pro-war senators to endorse withdrawal and/or (sort of) repudiate their votes in favour of the 2002 resolution, following Biden, Kerry and Edwards. Nancy Pelosi today went further and joined Murtha's demand for a strict, timed withdrawal plan. The main theme in the press is still that the Democrats are fatally divided among themselves; but it's wrong. The Dems were as divided in 2002, but the line that eventually emerged was that they supported the war, because the leadership and presidential hopefuls did. Now, it's the leadership and the presidential hopefuls (not more publicly marginal figures like Steny Hoyer) who are going to forge the party line in the public consciousness. Besides the very lonely (though loud) voice of Joe Lieberman, their are no more prominent elected Dem hawks. And the only Big Dems who can really even afford to stay neutral on Iraq are governor types who aren't cursed with that pro-war vote -- Warner and Richardson, for instance.
And then, yesterday, Bush made the partisan divide official (to my surprise, admittedly) by sticking to his unpopular Superpower Doing Good rhetoric and swearing off the use of "artificial timelines". Granted, it's basically a rhetorical divide. As the The New York Times explains:
In a speech here to cheering midshipmen at the United States Naval Academy, Mr. Bush described a military strategy for Iraq that loosely follows methods being adopted in Afghanistan: focusing American forces on terrorists who could reach beyond the country's borders and leaving the Iraqis to deal with insurgents and the remnants of Saddam Hussein's government.
"We will continue to shift from providing security and conducting operations against the enemy nationwide to conducting more specialized operations targeted at the most dangerous terrorists," he said. "We will increasingly move out of Iraqi cities, reduce the number of bases from which we operate, and conduct fewer patrols and convoys."
So we're ramping down, and no doubt more before the midterms. Politically, though, the rhetorical difference is enough. The debate is over how, how fast and how overtly to exit, and the Democrats are uniformly now "on the left" of the issue. Pelosi, by backing Murtha, and the Times editorial, by flaying Bush, made it explicit after Bush got through:
Americans have been clamoring for believable goals in Iraq, but Mr. Bush stuck to his notion of staying until "total victory." His strategy document defines that as an Iraq that "has defeated the terrorists and neutralized the insurgency"; is "peaceful, united, stable, democratic and secure"; and is a partner in the war on terror, an integral part of the international community, and "an engine for regional economic growth and proving the fruits of democratic governance to the region."
I still have no position on withdrawal; I just don't know if a longer US presence can possibly mitigate the eventual showdown between the Sunni insurgency and the Shia Death Squads. I haven't really read enough (though this Economist piece provides a good overview of the codundrum; bad arguments on all sides.) I don't know whether the emerging Democratic consensus is, in the abstract, the right one. It doesn't much matter except as a matter of politics. The main thing about a war is starting it, not ending it; the starting of it, and the hedging Democratic complicity in it, was a disaster that (I think) cost us two elections, and did God only knows how much international damage. The ending of it is comparatively a quibbling over (mainly awful) details.
But politically, it will be an interesting test. Public opinion is against the war; but public opinion traditionally reflexively favours the "strong" party on military issues -- the one that, as the Times editors put it, promises a"total victory". And it still looks like Iraq and terrorism are going to be dominating the political landscape for the next few years. The Democrats will be able to claim that the Bushies are following their lead when the soldiers start leaving the Iraqi cities and then the country. But the Republicans will be able to accuse the Democrats of hypocricy for changing their minds on Iraq once the damage was done and of lily-liveredness for wanting to leave too soon (even if only a matter of weeks ahead of what the White House wants).
At any rate, if the lack of distinction between the parties on Iraq was a political problem (and I don't think it was exactly the problem -- the problem was how Dems like Kerry tortured themselves into taking positions they didn't believe and couldn't effectively argue) it shouldn't be anymore. The war is now a strictly partisan issue and how it shakes down politically will tell us a lot about how the lines are drawn in American politics 30-some years after the last US soldiers left Vietnam.
1 Comments:
I am starting to think that the Democrats are coalescing around a good strategy. Most Democrats Senators are, I think, like a lot of the country - they were so stunned by 9/11 that they didn't have a coherent strategy for opposing terrorism. So they didn't have an alternative to the Iraq war, and felt like they didn't have an alternative but to vote for the war. I think there are a fair number of Americans who felt the same way - they weren't enthusiastic about the war, but they couldn't think of anything else to do. But now that it's clear that the war was a mistake, the Democrats, along with a fair number of people in the country at large, are opposed to it, when they were once ambivalent. It was perfectly legitimate to be suspicious of Hussein having WMD's and a connection to Al Qaeda. It was also perfectly legitimate to feel powerless and desperate for somebody willing to do anything. So I think a fair number of average Americans see the Democrats struggling with the war, and a response to terror generally, and see their own struggles.
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