Yesterday Bush pulled out his dog whistle and signaled to the minions that it was now time to declare open warfare on the anti-war majority. In the next few days and as Bush’s record-long vacation comes to an end, you can expect the rhetoric to get a good ratcheting up in order to shore up those poll numbers. He’s not running for re-election but there’s the supreme court fight coming up, along with the 2006 elections and general legacy building to be done.
For the first time in about 5 years, the Bush team is playing defense. It isn’t unprecedented unity amongst the progressive movement that has brought this about – in fact until Cindy Sheehan’s protest the anti-war movement has been idiotic in its attempt to persuade opinion, and with the addition of relics like Joan Baez to the proceedings the protestors are once again becoming ineffectual – but the simple fact that the facts are bad for Bush and his supporters. The daily drumbeat is U.S. troops being killed by insurgents, along with mass casualties for Iraqi civilians. It’s gotten so bad that the Republicans have not even bothered to use the draft of the Iraqi constitution as yet another sign that relief is around the corner, the same way they did with the toppling of Hussein’s statue, Bush’s “Mission Accomplished”, the Iraqi “elections”, and the result of the 2004 elections.
With 2006 on the horizon, we are at a definite turning point, one in which history chooses a path and our nation follows. But we aren’t simply slaves to the passage of time, rather, our actions define the times. That is why the Democratic party and its leaders needs to quit weighing the pros and cons and ups and downs and maybes and shouldas. They need to forcefully and stridently challenge this unpopular president directly to his face. It is smash mouth time, and its quite clear that these guys can be taken down if Democrats just present some backbone.
This isn’t just one speech where you come out and demand something then tepidly disappear, instead this needs to be a daily drumbeat firmly and patriotically demanding that there be a reasoned withdrawl from Iraq and the president present to the congress a realistic timetable for doing so. Again, I cannot stress how important it is for this mantra (whatever the actual text may be) to be repeated over and over again, not just by individual Democrats but by everyone associated with the progressive movement. Too often we see progressives stray off the reservation because they want to be seen as mavericks or because they’ve got some sort of pet issue at stake. That is a formula for failure. In today’s mediaverse, achievements are made through rapid repetition.
There are a lot of Democrats who voted for the war, either because they really believed what Bush was selling or because they wanted to protect their rears come election time. At first blush, these folks may say that challenging the war will hurt them. Wrong. It’s that sort of namby-pamby thinking that got us stuck like this in the first place. It’s a simple matter of leveling to the American people and stating that you were wrong.
“I voted to authorize the invasion of Iraq, because I believed the President when he made the case that Iraq had ties to terrorist groups like Al Qaeda and that Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. As we know now, those reasons were deceptive, and the decision to go to war has made America less safe from the threat of terrorism. It is time for our troops to come home to defend America and their families. It is time for us to exit Iraq in a sensible fashion, and return to destroying the terrorists who threaten America.”
Why do I think saying something like the above would make sense to people? Because its largely the same decision making that the public has gone through. When the president of your nation presents a threat, it is historically in your best interests to believe him. I was always skeptical of the case made for invading Iraq, but I do understand that the authority of the office spoke to many people and convinced them to support the war. But these people haven’t just all turned off their televisions. They see that we’ve found no WMD, that Al Qaeda is alive and well and attacking London, and they see the daily increase in our casualties and the obvious lack of a coherent strategy from the president and his supporters.
It is long past due, but it is time for prominent Democrats to make some variation of this message resonate, before the GOP’s message machine springs back to life in the fall as it always does. Progressive bloggers can help create noise, but none of them has the authority of prominent Democrats (in this case, Senators, a few governors, and Clinton/Gore). If this case and this line of attack is to be made, it must be made by those who have a following within the Democratic party:
Howard Dean
John Kerry
John Edwards
Joe Biden
Hillary Clinton
Russ Feingold
Evan Bayh
Mark Warner
Al Gore
Bill Clinton
While I support Leaders Pelosi and Reid, there comments will not get the traction needed for this initiative to take hold in the press. The ‘08/’04 candidates can get coverage because they are known names or making their names known. President Clinton because he is a former president and a popular elder statesman of the party, and Al Gore because he could still be president and has the added advantage of being right about Iraq all along.
If prominent national Democrats do not begin challenging the Republicans and their version of the war in Iraq, the Democrats and the progressive movement will once again damn themselves into irrelevance in our national conversation. There is only so much that can be done at the grassroots level, by morally clear protests, and by people with keyboards.
At some point people need to be led.
Related:
The Gut Primary: It s Safe To Go In The Water
Democrats: Time to Cowboy Up
Has Gary Hart been reading OW?
From a WaPo op-ed, via TalkLeft:
This also happens to be a list of 10 people who could, with both hands tied behind their back, make four times the President than the current Chimp-In-Chief. (If only we could get Bill back.)
Howard Dean
John Kerry
John Edwards
Joe Biden
Hillary Clinton
Russ Feingold
Evan Bayh
Mark Warner
Al Gore
Bill Clinton
I completely agree. The anti-war movement is finally underway.
Say goodbye to the GOP in 06 and 08. 8 years of stupid people making extraordinarily dumb policy decisions, and in the case of Iraq, add the word disasterous.
(I know that Jay gets all antsy when I call people that think like him dumb. Truth is, they are.)
JK
Unfortunately, the Democrats will need to come up with more than:
1. He’s the next John F. Kennedy!!!
2. We’re against everything George W. Bush is for.
3. Let’s go back to the 1990’s “law enforcement” strategy for terrorism containment.
4. Let’s go back to the 1970’s-80’s appeasement/negotiation strategy for placating terrorists.
I’m no Democrat and I’ve never been one. But at least I would like to see a good candidate with a fresh, realistic set of ideas who could debate them honestly with a Republican opponent.
John Kerry was an utter failure in all of these regards – he was a 1970’s Vietnam protester, ineffectively retrofitted into a completely awkward “war hero” by the very same people who had spent the last 30 years denegrating and impugning his “war.” He had a miasma of “plans” but couldn’t explain any of them, save for assuring us that they were not what the current administration was doing.
Unfortunately, most of today’s younger Democrats have focused their entire energy on knee-jerk opposition to any plan that the Republicans or the US Military puts into action. They have yet to come up with anything other than “Bush was wrong” or a retread of 70’s or 80’s foreign or domestic policies. And zilch in the way of strategic military planning.
Democrats have lined up behind the microphone to say “I voted for the Iraq war because I trusted the President, but I never would have voted for it had I known that it would turn out like this.” That’s the most idiotic and meaningless statement a politician can make, period. It is completely worthless because the Democrats offered nothing as a counter-proposal, offered no plans, offered no goals, offered no timetable, offered no objectives, offered no contingencies — in short, they had no better ideas at the time. And now they want the priviledge of 20/20 hindsight just so they can say how “right” they were? Give me a freaking break.
Unless the Democrats can come up with a real strategy — military objectives, timelines, goals, deployment plans, civilian casualty estimates, military casualty estimates ( or a law enforcement strategy, or a netogiation strategy, whatever) — and make it public, and allow debate and deconstruction and analysis of their plan, then they are in no position to be trusted with national security or military planning. And they are in no position to say that Bush doesn’t have a plan or that the Pentagon doesn’t know what they are doing.
Unless they are willing to really stick their necks out and prove to us that they are as smart as they think they are, and that their plans are superior, then they are not worthy of leading.
Dugger, you represent the following policy: let’s just stay in Iraq, get killed and let Al Qaeda run wild. That’s what the Republican policy is. It isn’t understanding the insurgents, its pretending they aren’t there and having our soldiers be killed by them. It makes no sense. (please explain how George Bush showed toughness and beat “two” Democrats? By smearing the war record of one and fraudulently winning another? I’ll always argue that Dems don’t fight dirty enough, but to depict Bush as “tough” is a laugh)
Yeah…, Dubya’s real tough. Not too smart though… but tough.
He’s spending too much money.
He’s got his troops pinned down in a distant, foreign adventure.
But…, he’s tough. Credit where credit is due. He’s tough.
Fine for the Democrats to all become little Kucinichs (sorry, thats redundant), but they will NOT sway the American people by calling for unilateral withdrawal from Iraq. It won’t work and when Feingold says “C’mon gang. Everybody with me?” He’s met with a whimper not a roar. They have to have an effectibe way to fight terrorism. Right now the cornerstone of the Democratic foreign policy position as characterized here: Retreat from Iraq!” The question remains: how will you specifically fight the war on terrorism? How will you “Mr/Ms future Democratic President” overcome the anti-military, anti-pro-active foreign policy constituent on your left, the “we must understand the legitimate complaints of these insurgents” crowd”. Are you prepared to kill and bomb? To be called a murderer by distraught casualties of all sorts. To tough it out? Fighting a war ain’t pretty and can’t be done with cumbaya platitudes. To your dismay, George Bush, an otherwise weak candidate, knew that; showed real toughness, and beat two Democrats. Now you are advocating a return to McGovernism. Good luck.
Dugger
Then again, if you completely disregard the notions put forward by Democrats, you can keep yelping that they haven’t got any plan.
Step one: we should leave Iraq in a timely fashion, and dedicate resources to killing terrorists. Is that clear enough?
>> And they are in no position to say that Bush doesn t have a plan or that the Pentagon doesn t know what they are doing.
Bush’s “plan” was to invade Iraq, and ask questions later. Now, he’s got this country in what one GOP Senator publicly worried was another “Vietnam.” He’s going to have to live with himself for the rest of his life, with the blood of thousands of American troops on HIS hands, and his hands alone, as far as I’m concerned. A man who can’t admit he made a mistake, and respond accordingly, is not a man I want running my country. Especially during a time of war.
If he had been a smarter, genuine, battle-tested soul like his father, a discerning policy wonk like Bill Clinton, or even a “street smart” no BS politician in the mold of say..Harry Truman, we wouldn’t be in this mess. As George Will said back in 2000…we risked electing a frat boy. We got the frat boy…and now, soldiers are dying because we don’t have a leader at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
That is what we lack. Not just a plan to end the war, but a strong leader that can advocate intelligently to do the right, moral and responsible thing. If you don’t have the right leadership in place, change is nearly impossible.
This whole things is degrading into another Vietnam, and Bush is in denial, telling us all that we need to keep up the fight against the enemy. Not at all having learned the most horrible lessons that history should teach us.
Because of the utter incompetence of this administration, our conception of who the real “enemy” really is, has become so diluted as to be hardly recognizable. That to me, may really be the most dangerous turn in the path that George W. Bush has taken us on.
It sounds to me that you would not be open to any opposing solution to the mess, so long as it came from a Democrat. So be it.
I’ll agree with you on one thing, though…I’ll be damn angry if they don’t step up to the plate here, and offer America real strategy for an end to this war.
JK
I don’t actually represent the policy you say I do. I’m saying that making ithe focus of the Democrats policy is a huge mistake. Its defeatism. They/you need a positive message: this is how we will fight and win the war on terrorism; this is how we will kill terrorists. You can’t sem to help yourselves: you invariably kneejerk back to defeatism and America is wrong.
BTW, Bush didn’t smear Kerry.
Dugger
>>BTW, Bush didn t smear Kerry
What election were you watching? Just because it didin’t come out of the dumb bastard’s mouth doesn’t mean he didn’t quietly “endorse” what those Swift Boat retentive’s were up to.
I said it then, I say it now….Bush could have stopped those attacks. If he truly honors the service of American troops in battle, he would have stopped those attacks.
Dugger..for a guy (girl? I don’t know your gender) that says an awful lot….well, let’s just say you’d do yourself a favor if you’d stop speaking out of both sides of your mouth.
JK
Yes, I imagined the whole “Kerry is a flip flopper”, “Kerry wants to be sensitive to terrorists” thing.
Killing terrorists isn’t a positive message? It’s defeatist to say our soldiers shouldn’t keep dying in Iraq in order to create a new Islamic republic? Up is down and down is up with you guys.
And saying “I don t actually represent the policy you say I do.”? Pot. Kettle. Black.
Somehow Dugger I don’t think you have the best interests of the Democratic party in your heart.
Karl Rove was Right!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Brilliant! Bush would have “honored the service of American troops” by telling 200 of them they didn’t have the right to speak up during an election.
dugger said:
I disagree. It’s what people want. We’re tired of it. We’re tired of this little experiment in democracy that has done far more harm than good. We’re tired of our valiant young men and women dying for a war that we didn’t need to fight in a country that can’t get its act straight for a cause that keeps changing. We’re tired of having a president tell us one thing when he really means another. We’re tired of constantly having shady deals made behind the backs of the American people. We’re tired of not seeing any light at the end of the tunnel. We’re tired of American businesses getting rich off this war. We’re tired of having chickenhawks run our military. We’re tired of having to wake up with this reality of half the world hating us because of stupid things our president does. We’re tired of corporations owning our government and having carte blanche to dirty our air as much as they want and pollute our water as much as they want. We’re tired of being told our economy is stronger now than during the previous administration when the evidence doesn’t back it up. We’re tired of having arbitrary religious beliefs be a deciding factor in federal policy when not even a majority of our people attend regular church services (recent surveys put the figure at 46%). We’re tired of this president not telling us what we deserve to know, things like who made up our energy policies and why are we giving no-bid contracts to large multinational conglomerates who are being investigated for bribery by our own government when smaller, pro-American businesses can do a better job. We’re tired of our president speaking of the need to sacrifice something for the war then driving off in an entourage consisting of no less than five Ford Excursions. We’re tired of a president that speaks of having a good environment then caves to car manufacturers and energy companies at every opportunity. We’re tired of a president that thinks that we don’t have to abide by treaties. We’re tired of a president that considers Pat Robertson a close friend. We’re tired of being scared. We’re tired of our president taking a month-long vacation when there’s a war going on. We’re tired of being kept in the dark about decisions that affect our day-to-day lives. We’re tired of a president that’s a fake rancher, a fake texan, a fake environmentalist, and a fake samaritan.
America’s tired. We want to rest. We want to be friends with the world again.
Oh, I also wanted to add that there’s this billboard in Indiana that’s paid for by Prevent Child Abuse Indiana that says, “Deliberately scaring me is abuse. Stop It.”
I think of this administration when I see that sign.
I know. It’s been 13 years…
It’s a smear when he didn’t flip flop. It’s a smear when the Bush campaign accused him and Democrats of being sissy appeasers. It was a smear from start to finish. When you can admit the basic truths perhaps we can have honest conversation.
OW,
Calling Kerry a flip-flopper is hardly a “smear”. An attack, sure. But smear ? Nahhh.
Calling Republicans “liars and thieves” is a smear.
JK
May we then assume that every nasty remark made about Bush anyplace is directly attributable to Kerry? Cynthia McKinney is a Democrat. Why didn’t Kerry do something about her? Or maybe you do believe Bush had prior warning re 9-11 and ignored it. Her D daddy sees a problem with J-E-W-S. Where was Kerry, JK, ol’ bud, on that one? How do you like your silly standard, now?
pionar,
All bad arguments.
The last chickenhawk (to use your surly term) I can remember in the chain of command is Bill Clinton. Who are you referring to now? I have already explained that obviously, since the military votes Republican, that there are then more (MORE, THAT IS) Republicans than Democrats out there doing their patriotic duty. Yet 27 Democrat senators. How come those bad Democrats vote for war and then expect a Republican military to fight it, Pionar?
Corporations don’t own the government. The American people do. We vote. We elected Bush twice. If your side made more sensible arguments you would be in power and your politicians would be dealing corporations (like, ahem, Hughes).
Where do you get it that religious beliefs are a factor in establishing federal policy? People can believe and act on any basis they see fit. that action is legal or illegal. A far right winger might be voted by some reliogious nonsense, a far left winger by some outmoded 19th century garbage social theory. As a motivation, either is legal.
The day is too long to respond to the rest of your litany.
Dugger
Hmm, it cut off my comment, so I’ll respond to dugger’s third bit of nonsense here. How about stem cell research? How about gays in the military and women in combat? How about Pat Robertson and his ilk having private meals with the president? How about the degradation of abortion rights? How about the tightening of FCC controls on the whim of a religious organization? How about our president saying that he thinks God put him in the post and told him he should invade Iraq?
Those are quite good examples, I think.
Oh, so he stayed consistent?!? (just one of MANY links. I would lay them all out but sentient people realize just how laughable Oliver’s assertion is.)
Honestly, you keep pushing that tripe and the Democratic Party will become extinct faster than you can say “Bull Moose”.
SaveFarris, there’s a difference between flip-flopping and changing your positon. So, was Bush flip-flopping on his pledge of no nation building, or his pledge to stay out of the Israel-Palestine situation, both assertions he made during the 2000 campaign?
I don’t think so, and I don’t think you would say so either. That Slate article was taking positions from over 10 years ago, comparing them with things Kerry’d done recently, and declared that he changed his position every week. Sloppy editorializing.
Situations change. Bush changed his stances faster than Kerry did.
An evolution on one’s position is not the same as flip-flopping like Bush does to boost opinion polls.
pionar,
You are wrong about Rumsfeld. He was a Navy pilot. Now who are those “many” who never served?
And on religion you seem mixed up. A person’s “motivation” for doing something may come from anywhere: religion, aging hippie college instructors, new age gurus, whatever. In fact, there is generally a motivation for everything a politician does. There are rules establishing a wall between church and state in terms of laws etc, but those rules have NOTHING to do with motivation. Sort it out. Democrats meet Sharpton and JJ, repubs with the polar opposites. All legal.
And no. I don’t believe corporations own the government. I could have voted for Nader or whoever. Corporations are very important because they create millions of jobs and make the economic wheels turn. That doesn’t equal ownership. Corporations also die. Simialr to corporations, conservatives could be paranoid about colleges (overwhelmingly liberal) wherein all of our leaders come from.
Dugger (notice no name calling)