The choice - a lasting rift within the party?

From the Boston Globe

The choice

As Democrats struggle to shape a post-9/11 foreign policy, two defining moments in their history, the dawn of the Cold War and the '60s antiwar movement, present stark alternatives -- and reflect a lasting rift within the party



EARLIER THIS MONTH, two contenders for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination stood together to stop what they saw as a dangerous drift in their party's stance on national security. At the National Press Club on May 9, Indiana Senator Evan Bayh summoned Democrats to dig in for ''what will in all likelihood be a generation-long struggle against jihadism and radical, suicidal terror." Former Virginia governor Mark Warner agreed that his partymates had to refute Karl Rove's taunt that they cling to a ''pre-9/11 worldview" by championing their own plans to fight al Qaeda. Though neither man named names, they implicitly chided their party's growing antiwar faction for railing against Bush's record without offering a vision of how to protect America.

The vision Bayh and Warner offered is one being heard increasingly from a host of younger journalists and policy mavens-from newly formed groups like the Truman National Security Project and the Foreign Policy Leadership Council to New Republic editor-at-large Peter Beinart, the author of a much-discussed new manifesto. It's an approach that repudiates the Democrats' post-Vietnam reluctance to use military power. Yet it also views armed force as part of an arsenal of tools-including economic development, robust alliances, and international law and institutions-that the US, as the world's de facto leader, must be ready to employ.

Such a vision would seem quite appealing, especially in a global age when there's no drawbridge for America to pull up. Yet no sooner had reports of Bayh and Warner's remarks appeared than they-and their way of thinking-came under fire from the bloggers and pundits whose influence among party activists they were seeking to curb. Across the Web, the politicians and their ilk were slammed as ''warmongers," ''Vichy Democrats," and ''enablers" of a Republican regime. And such attacks are nothing new. For months the left has been belittling the thinking of the internationalists, scoffing at how many of them backed Bush's invasion of Iraq, with The Nation-the flagship magazine of the antiwar faction-refusing to support any Democratic office-seeker who won't seek a speedy pullout.

Beneath this internecine party warfare lies a fundamental, and possibly debilitating, ideological divide. Liberals, who tend to view terrorism as the chief foreign policy concern, have been trying to revive the philosophy of internationalism-the belief that US intervention abroad can be noble in intent and beneficial in its results. Leftists, on the other hand, viewing the Iraq War as the most urgent problem, more often subscribe to a philosophy that might be called anti-imperialism-the belief that US intervention abroad is typically avaricious in intent and malign in its results.


more...

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/ideas/articles/2006/05/21/the_choice/?rss_id=Boston+Globe+--+Today's+paper+A+to+Z

who realistically view this Iraq adventure as harmful to our national interest and peace? I don't think FDR, Truman, or Kennedy would have entangled us in this mess. Portraying it as a replay of the Vietnam debacle is wrong. The American people are not as divided on Iraq as they were on Vietnam and the pro-war sentiment is not as intense. Any Democrat who supports this imperialism is probably writing a political death warrant. I also think Iraq is a huge vulnerability for John McCain, provided Democrats choose an Iraq skeptic to run against him.

Both were viewed at the time as "hawkish" on foreign policy. That said, I probably would have supported both over their Repuke challengers, but it's important for history and the truth's sake that their stances be accurately remembered and assessed.

to believe that Truman was right to come to the defense of South Korea with the express support and sponsorship of the United Nations. We may have inadvertently led the North Koreans to believe that we did not regard South Korea as strategically important to defend. Truman's additional mistake was in disregarding China's interests in North Korea by sending our forces to the Yalu River instead of ending offensive operations once South Korea's viability had been assured. Truman was a realist, not a hawk. (By realism I do not mean the cynical use of power promoted by the likes of Kissinger, but rather the more humane pursuit of interests advocated by people like George Kennan.) Truman did not compound his mistakes by further escalating the war with China as MacArthur wanted to do. Likewise Kennedy was a realist. He followed the lead of Eisenhower in trying to shore up the South Vietnamese government, but he did not take the step that LBJ later did of making Vietnam an American war. A credible case can be made that Kennedy would not have made that mistake. He had long recognized the legitimate national aspirations of the colonialized areas of the world and had demonstrated an understanding that the battle against communism did not require always choosing the most bellicose policy alternatives. An accurate assessment of both Truman and Kennedy will recognize these nuances. A "Hawk vs Dove" analysis is much too simplistic, ignoring the fact that our national interests and a decent respect for the opinions of mankind may require the use of force. However, neither President in my opinion would have engaged in the irresponsible and essentially unilateral adventurism of the Iraq incursion which seriously endangers our national interests, undermines realistic internationalism, and forfeits American leadership in the world. To hold otherwise likely fails to understand the radical departure of the Bush sanctioned PNAC agenda from all prior variants of modern American foreign policy as well as from International Law.

That's why it was so outrageous to make such a half-assed effort in Iraq. It'd be nice if someone had a template for this war on Islamofascism. So far, we only know what failure looks like. Or success is awful ugly.

The U.S.A. financed 75% of the French involvement in the First Indo-China War to help them defeat the Vietminh, because as far as Washington was concerned, any communist was a part of a world-wide Soviet conspiracy headed by the Kremlin.

After the French defeat at Dien Bien Phu, the U.S.A. took the leading western rôle in Vietnam; sponsoring South Vietnam and helping to collapse the Geneva Accords which stipulated all-Vietnam elections. The U.S.A. sent technical and economic advisers, and increasingly military advisers as the Vietminh restarted its guerrilla war against the South. This was all before JFK. Entanglements in Vietnam were a result of successive policies of Truman, Eisenhower, JFK and LBJ.

after World War One, when Ho Chi Min's requests for democracy in Vietnam were ignored by President Wilson because the French wanted to retain their colony.

i don't agree with the jargon the author used to describe the divide in the party ...

i think the view of the "left" as "anti-imperialists" is fine ... but i don't think calling the Clinton-wing "liberal internationalists" is adequately narrow ...

does "the left" not believe in foreign aid and other forms of "internationalism??" i think they do ...

the proper name for those who support the use of military force even in situations that don't pose an imminent threat to the US is "international militarists" ... the conflict within the party is NOT between "liberal internationalists" and anti-imperialists ... it's between "anti-imperialists" and "international militarists" ... that's an important distinction ... the solution to global terrorism concerns, seen from the left, is not "non-internationalism", it's an enlightened view of foreign policy that promotes good global citizenship ... when you occupy other countries and steal their resources, some people will resist ...

if you support the idea of never having invaded Iraq in the first place and you now support not just "OUT NOW", as I do, but also support helping Iraq rebuild its infrastructure, it's hardly appropriate to view the left as non-internationalists ...

wings you identify have widely differing degrees of scepticism vis-a-vis "globalism." Anti-imperialists, of whom I count myself one, tend to look askance at "globalism" as advancing corporate power at the expense of social justice, whereas international militarists see globalism as the most rational way to build global prosperity (under arcane economic theories of "comparative advantage" and such-like).

.... but I think the point is pretty clear.
I have heard it summed up a quite different way.
There are those of us who liked the democratic party the way it was.
And there are those who like the new republican lite model.
Pretty clear choice and all contained in one nice neat package.

It's a lot more complicated than that.

Okay .... I didn't read the whole article. Because I couldn't get past that phrase.
That is SO right out of the RW talking points. The article starts with diuscussion on Warner and Bayh's larger 'national security' views. But to then jump to use of the phrase 'anti-war wing' is too, too much for me. It conflates just like everything else coming from the right tries to conflate.

Fact: in context the invasion of Afghanistan - the 'real' war was and continues to be viewed as justified and a correct action, even if it was ultimately screwed up by Il Dunce. I dare say there was and still is little opposition to it on our side.

Fact: Iraq was an adventitious and unrelated event. It had ***nothing*** to do with 'terra'. It had everything to do with Il Dunce's delusions and inherent evil. Most everyone who is part of the 'anti-war wing' is, quite simply, anti ***that*** war.

Given that jewel at the start of the article, I wasn't able to continue reading it.

Iraq - war of choice

Afghanistan - war of necessity (and "idiot son" let binLaden get away)

And "idiot son" has conflated the two to stifle dissent.

That **is** the divide. To avoid acknowleging it is to trinagulate. Mark Bayh and Evan Warner seen to do that a lot. Along with a few others.

I just don't see either of them having the lifetime experience to deal with these issues with out a lot of adviser(s) input. Whether these advisor's are from the same school of thought as the bushco advisor's remains to be seen. The next trick is to coalesce behind the winner of this debate in the primaries. I think ultimately they serve to help Hillary appear more of a centrist within the Democratic Party.

Afghanistan was and is an impossible war to fight and win. I'm sure the Russians are still laughing at us for grabbing that particular tar baby.

Raids. Targeted strikes to take out the terrorists, fine. But invade? That was actually as insane as going into Iraq.

Personally, I have no qualms about killing Taliban men. They have earned extremely ugly deaths. And I get the Caspian Basin ambitions, which are ridiculous and indicate a need for better mental health in this country. But Afghanistan is guerrilla heaven. Nobody wins there.

A genuine leader would never have given in to the impulse to ruin us in an unwinnable war over a crappy act of terrorism. And I say that as a downtown New Yorker.

That is what Bush has done.

Regardless of choice of means and methods - we could not let Taliban/AlQaida go unpunished and undiminished in capability (what Bush has done in Iraq has probably strengthened the Taliban/AlQaida)

We will be in the Caspian Basin if we don't shake our crack cocaine-heroin addiction to oil.

I am a veteran - a Volunteer Responder - and my wife is from NYC.

It is an analog continuum - and indeed runs from gamut from Bushian imperialist use of military force (to assert hegemony over oil) to the economic rebuilding and redevelopment of the Marshal Plan (and, domestically, the real GI Bill).

An off-shoot was the use of the DOD and NASA Budgets for the greatest age of scientific and technological development we have seen before or since - far surpassing the Post Civil War "Morrell Land Grant Colege Act."

Worth noting that a few months ago we had people on here pretending that Osama Bin Laden presented no threat whatsoever....

Isolationism was silly and short-sighted in the 1930s...it's no less so now.

the article made no mention of isolationism ...

the article described the perspective of the left as "anti-imperialism" ... it would be wrong to make the leap from there to isolationism ... most of my lefty friends believe in a very active foreign policy ...

where they differ with the "other wing of the party" is NOT on foreign involvement but on the use of force, be it military or otherwise, to exploit poorer and weaker nations for commercial gain ...

the path to peace lies NOT in isolationism but rather in a policy of "enlightened engagement" ... invading Iraq to acquire oil can in no way be seen as "enlightened engagement" ... any concerns we had about Saddam as either a threat to us or as threat to his own people could easily have been resolved with a carrot and stick approach as opposed to a stick and stick approach ...

I like 'enlightened engagement'.

I'm not so sure Saddam could have 'easily' been redirected. But I'm even less sure we could ever make an honest case for any need to unseat him. In fact, of the latter, I am almost certain.

to react to 9/11 and al Qaeda.....but it is far too late for that now.

And now that we have smashed Saddam's Iraq, do we just abandon the Iraqis to face the chaos, terrorism and civil war we've loosed there?

to the "do we just abandon the Iraqis to face the chaos, terrorism and civil war we've loosed there?" It's what's going on there at the moment, isn't it?

The way I see it, the best thing for Americans to do is to withdraw US forces to safe haven areas on the borders of Iraq, let the civil war play itself out, and then reoccupy as part of a true UN peacekeeping force.

But I do not see it as much of a moral choice. And at this point, I don't think the administration could get the UN to do anything....we've lost our moral standing and we don't have enough allies to muscle anything through any more.

on military issues, since it is the policies, as well as Bush as an individual, that are rejected by the majority of the world AND the nation.

"We can do it better" will never work, and everyone here knows it.

Stick to fantasy, Kenny. You're in over your head discussing the real world.

Iraq was the exact opposite - dead wrong.

As to the notion of a 'law enforcement approach', I couldn't agree more. Kerry tried to make that case during the 04 campaign. He was right on the issue and not so right on his framing. Who else has said this? I only know that Kerry did.

is the failure in Afghanistan.....where, by the way, Osama still operates, unhindered.

as Warner and Bayh called on us to do in the OP, can bring nothing but more death and misery.

The Democrats can only win if we clearly represent a different and better worldview.

Running as more competent militarists can't work.

we are keeping the insurgency going simply by being there.

And agreeing to stay in Iraq means spending so much money there it would commit Democrats to be exactly like Bush on domestic issues. Which, as even you would have to agree, would make a Democratic victory meaningless.

Good choice, Kenny. Remind me to care even less about what you think is a winning message with voters.

Please let us know when you have a criticism based in reality.

amd speaking of reality, who was that who pulled a proposal out of the air and then tossed a hissy fit because it wasn't taken seriously as anything but fantasy? Oh yeah, that was YOU.

You're just mad because you have no snappy comeback to proposals you haven't read from a DUer you've long since decided not to take seriously. After having demanded those very same proposals. :D

that's not on the table anywhere but in your own mind.

I forgot that you don't take seriously suggestions from citizens that aren't backed by thinktanks and associated groupies and focus groups.

That's your personal problem, not mine.

:)

if you use Republican code phrases.

And it isn't "cutting and running" to admit that the war is unwinnable and that our troops and Iraqi civilians are dying for nothing.
Do you really honestly think we should just stay there indefinitely?

And what's so "vote winning" about staying in a war the American people are now against?

We should have people there to rebuild the country, work on infrastructure, but it now goes without saying that we are doing no one any favors by keeping troops there. The reality is, 80% of the Iraqi people want us to leave.

(BTW, would you rather the Dems had supported staying in Vietnam 'til the bitter end, as well?)

"most of my lefty friends believe in a very active foreign policy ... "
Funny, most of what I see from the far left is a lot of ranting about what a traitor Clinton was for NAFTA and a lot of isolationism.

you say you agree with it and then put your own spin on its conclusions ...

i'm LOL too ... i think you see why ...

and skunk cabbage would be just as foul if it were called "spring heliotrope"

Funny, most of what I see from the far left is a lot of ranting about what a traitor Clinton was for NAFTA and a lot of isolationism.

would make more sense if NAFTA was the only way in which to engage with the world. Since it isn't, being against NAFTA is not ipso facto isolationism.

Other than a lot of whining and finger-pointing what do (for example) the PDA have to say? Nothing worth hearing is the answer.

economic globalization with labor and environmental protections?

the far left coming up with actual proposals for that likely to fetch most voters....especially considering what they bring to the debate now.

Not sure what I was expecting, though. :eyes:

I've long suspected most fo the rage about the DLC is based on the fact that they have actual proposals.....

My own distaste for them is based on the fact that many of their proposals, while they might pass muster with focus groups, suck as policy.

So, a few proposals then:

I propose that NAFTA and CAFTA both be scrapped and rewritten with strong labor and environmental protections.

I propose that CAFTA be rewritten without the protections for US pharmaceuticals that deny cheap knock-off drugs to the HIV-positive poor in Central America.

I propose (quite modestly, I think) that the Pentagon budget be cut by a quarter (cut waste, get out of Iraq, etc.) and that the savings be used to improve schools and feed hungry children. (That last, of course, is a DLC goal as well.)

I think that'll do for now.

Is a wage tariff: a tariff set to add the diference between what an employer pays labor abroad and the domestic minimum wage, or a set "living wage" perhaps, above that. Doing this would doubtless require the abrogation of a number of treaties, but breaking them would not bother me much....

An excellent proposal, my friend. How are you?

But my expectations are pitched pretty low, as you know.

For what it is worth, I have tried that one on with persons of decided rightist sympathies in the past, and found little disagreement from them with it.

It would have some problems in execution, of course, that should not be overlooked. Poor and exploitative as conditions often are in the cheap labor sinks that feed the "global economy", a great many people do rely on them for what little they have, and the throwing out of work of literally millions in the third world and China, that would certainly result from this, is not a light thing. That their economies might well develop better in the future if structured to local need would be scant comfort, and would have the hollow sound that the "all this is for the best" merchants trot out here has.

But my expectations are pitched pretty low, as you know.

All peace and health to you, as always.

It would have some problems in execution, of course, that should not be overlooked.

True. I can't believe, though, that as smart a species as we are, that we can't find a way to ameliorate at least the worst of the effects. What's lacking is the will.

Even in the poorest country on earth, there is really enough to go around that everyone could be adequately provisioned.

which not even the PDA seem to have on the table.....ho-kay.

You just seemed to think that the "far left" had no proposals at all. I know better than to think that you'd follow the proposals of a radical leftist like me, such as feeding poor children...

more suited to a greeting card than a political discussion....

"such as feeding poor children..."
Oh, let's get them kittens and puppies too.....

your efforts at furthering the discussion overwhelm...

how much some people hate actual proposals that have a chance of being enacted, it already wasn't going much of anywhere....

Proposals that harm people are a different question, however.

Kittens and puppies can be eaten, you know....

It's your side that acts like it is entitled to be the natural leadership of the party, and that the rest of us should bow and scrape to it and learn our place.

Well, that's an intolerable attitude when the last three electoral cycles(2000, 2002 and 2004) prove that the basic DLC approach(try to sound as conservative as possible, attack and deliberately distance yourself from your own core supporters, and put the needs of corporate power ahead of the working class majority)don't work. All the DLC has to say is "stay the course. Change nothing. 48% is good enough because we don't deserve any more."

Why should the party tie itself to an approach that we all know will never work again?

Why not try, instead, being the party that mobilizes the excluded majority?

As the Ragin' Cajun would put it "It's the ARROGANCE, stupid".

When the matters on the table concern economic policy, the D.L.C. is open to great deal of criticism. Its "whole hog" espousal of "free-marketeer" economics is, to put it in the mildest terms possible, extraordinarily misguided. Not only will such policies not lead to a general prosperity for the people of the country, they even undercut one of the organizations stated and genuine goals, namely to recall many working people who formerly voted Democratic back to our Party's standard. A great proportion of those people are fed to the teeth with "free trade" and "globalization" because these reduce their wages and cost them their jobs.

The plain fact is that mutli-national corporations are going to continue to pursue global policies...and the far left seems to think that if the problem is not addressed (beyond a lot of hand wringing and high minded blah) it will subside on its own.

The alternative, ti seems to me is whether we find ways to rein them in with trade agreements that voters support, or we let them buccaneer as they wish.

I sure don't see a lot of voter sentiment for dismantling corporations.

Be more votes for a reining in of corporations than meets the conventional pundit's eye, particularly if the matter is presented in terms of nationalism and patriotism, those sturdy perrenials of popular emotion and fury that are the most elemental drivers of political life. Most people have more personal horror stories of unfair and abusive treatment by private corporate bureaucracies than they do of government ones; people interact with the private nabobs much more often than with government functionaries, and do not like them. If a properly constructed line was pressed, a great many people might find themselves nodding in agreement, just as they do when confronted with a new product that somehow meets a need they really were not aware, till they saw it, that they had....

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=108&subid=206&contentid=253727

as well as for proposals like this....

http://www.dlc.org/ndol_ci.cfm?kaid=114&subid=143&contentid=253861


Again, if there are serious proposals along these lines from the left, I haven't found them. Nor do I see much on here besides a round of dreary Democrat-bashing and a bunch of puerile babble about "corporowhores" and "the ruling elite" and the like.

What NAFTA and the other trade agreements did was to give those corporations the power to ignore the democratic will of the people in country after country. They gave those corporations the power to force sovereign nations to cut social spending, loosen environmental regulations, repress unions and otherwise make democracy meaningless. The rise of people like Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales(people you and the DLC would have us be just as hostile to as the Bushies are)is the result of the people of the world saying "No, we won't accept this anymore. We will fight for our lives and our dignity".

History has shown that free market economics is always the enemy of social justice and a liveable world.

We need to find trade policies that genuinely limit what corporations can do and that put popular sovereignty and democratic values ahead of market values. That's what Democrats should be doing, and that's what Clinton was too cowardly to do.

We need to say that, if this country wants to limit immigration, the way to do it is to allow the nations of Latin America and the rest of the world to redistribute their wealth and to allow the poor and working peoples in their countries the right to a decent standard of living. That can work. Saying, as Republicans and Al From do, that Mexicans and others are just obligated to stay home and suffer, can never succeed in stopping a single person from sneaking across the Rio Grande, or even in finding ways around that fascist wall.

(unless you believe that Gore's "side agreements" ever actually had the slightest effect on anything.)

You're just the bobo to listen to for election advice, all righty.

Show me a single instance in which those trade agreements worked to the benefit of anyone but the wealthy.

Show me how those agreements had any effect at all but to pit US workers against foreign workers in a race to the bottom.

Why do you trust corporate power to be anything but bastardly, Benchley?

You can't tell the difference, in policy terms, between what DLC Democrats do(mostly)and what Republicans do.

And most of what the DLC does is intended as a continuing rebuke to progressives, at a time when we no longer bear any responsibility for the party's troubles.

What the Democrats need to do is be a party that stands up for working people against the rich, are willing to defend the country but not fixated on starting a war as the first step in every situation, and will defend the country's best values(democracy, civil liberties, and the right of people to be themselves and be accepted as fully and legimately American no matter what they look like, think, say or do.)

The DLC don't practice inclusiveness. They basically accept the Republican myth that white suburbanites are intrinsically more American than everyone else, and that everyone who isn't a white suburbanite(preferably a white, male, heterosexual suburbanite)should be made to feel like an inferior outsider.

Democrats don't prosper by adopting the worst features of the Republican evangelical mindset.

Is not that "white suburbanites are intrinsically more American than everyone else," it is that they are more numerous than any other single group in the polity. That is not a myth but a fact verifiable from census data. God, as they say, is on the side of the biggest battalion: in electoral politics it is certainly possible to put together a larger bloc of votes without reference to the votes of the largest single bloc avaiable, but it will never be easy to do, and even when on occassion it is done successfully, it will always remain an damned close run thing, that can be upset by a trifle.

What I object to, and what I question most deeply, is the idea that Democrats can only gain votes from them by, essentially, taking their side to a degree against everyone ELSE who lives in this country.

Must we appeal to the scarier demons in the suburban nature, rather than the better angels?

As well, I don't think we need to assume that white suburbanites will automatically insist on the exclusion or disempowerment of the rest of America. After all, many progressive Democrats were(and are)white suburbanites.

that the DLC practices any sort of discrimination is palpably false, as is most of Kenny's ranting.

"The DLC don't practice inclusiveness"
Says you. But then we can see what THAT is worth...which is precisely nothing.

and corporations should come before the view of everyone else in this country.

It isn't inclusiveness when a Democratic president accepts the right-wing lie that the poor were lazy and just need to be forced to work, when the truth was that the poor(and the rest of us)needed universal health care so the poor could afford to take the work that was available without depriving their children of medical care and that the children of everyone else would have it too.

It's not inclusiveness to push for "parental notification" laws on abortion when we know the only purpose of those laws is to give dads the chance to beat the shit out of their teenage daughters just for getting pregnant.

It's not inclusiveness to expand the death penalty and take the side of the bosses against the workers on most labors issues either.

"It isn't inclusiveness when a Democratic president accepts the right-wing lie that the poor were lazy and just need to be forced to work"
Feel free to back THAT wowser up...but you and I both know you can't.

But in 1993 and 1994, Clinton could have pushed for a progressive alternative to welfare, based on a real program of job training and, where necessary, jobs programs. Clinton, who I did vote for and who had some redeeming features(and yes, was better than what we have now to a degree)wouldn't do this, even though, with his story of high achievement and success as the child of a single parent who received government assistance, he could easily have demolished the Republican lies about the alleged immorality and laziness of the impoverished.

There was a window of opportunity for change, for the empowerment of the poor, that Clinton allowed to close. He let it close because he was obsessed with never being seen as supporting the poor against "the forgotten middle class"(never mind that, with his support of Republican/Corporate trade policy, Clinton always supported the wealthy against the middle and working classes). A crucial part of the Democratic base was abandoned and betrayed in the service of appeasing voters who never voted Democratic and never will. Even submitting legislation outlining a progressive alternative to the existing welfare policy would have helped, but Clinton wouldn't do that. Why?

All Clinton did in that situation was wait and react. And then, in 1996 he signed a vicious and basically racist welfare bill without getting any meaningful concessions from the Republican Congress. Bill Clinton led Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich punish the poor for being poor, and he did so without any fight whatsoever. He could have at least negotiated.
The Republican majority wasn't veto proof, so they would have to have given him a lot.

Despite this, the Democratic coalition mostly showed Clinton the loyalty he never displayed towards them.

It didn't have to be this way.

Now peddle your silly fantasies to somebody else.

He was talking about economic globalization with environmental and labour protection.

If that sounds far left to you, perhaps you should consider joining the John Birch Society.

Mr. B has long since decided that I'm a bomb-throwing radical.

pretty mainstream in other Western democracies gets one branded as fringe left in the U.S. And it's downright pathetic that such attempts at marginalization occur here at DU.

he was talking about his own proposals....

You could have attacked the idea on it's merits, but instead you made an ad hominem attack.

If you want to whoop and holler for it, go to it.

Good luck winning the Reagan Democrats with that kind of outlook.

But I guess you already knew THAT.

but I know you can't be when you're only dealing in meaningless rhetoric.

What did Clinton ever gain for the party by embracing it.
And can you still deny that the sole beneficieries of NAFTA and the other Republican trade deals were the rich and the other enemies of what the Democratic Party stands for.

Why do you want the Democrats to be this country's SECOND conservative party?

That NAFTA was only to the benefit of the rich and screwed working people in the US and everywhere else. Whatever else you can say about the Slickster, there's no reason whatsoever to defend him on that.

"Free Trade" is only for Republicans and corporations. It never helps workers.

Yeah, except for the unintentional comedy value, your posts are pretty much worthless.

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silly and short-sighted in the 1930s, as well.

Or maybe I missed the memo about "Osama" being in Iraq.

Nothing could be more isolationist than unilateral invasion of another country without support from Allies.

Choosing to fight Osama and his terrorist network through international law enforcement agencies was and will be much more effective.

There's a big difference between fighting terrorism through police investigation and tracking down criminals and invading countries and overthrowing governments. The latter has been very expensive and has failed miserably.

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Domestically and abroad.

It means being just as bad on Latin America policy as the Republicans are(for example, it means keeping the pointless and unjust economic embargo on Cuba in place) and it means agreeing with Bush that Venezuela and Bolivia should be forced to lower themselves back to capitalism and the eternal rule of the wealthy. Which, as in Chile, means telling the poor to give up hope forever.

It means being not one inch to the left of Clinton/Gore. Which, of course, means settling for victory in name only. It means giving up on social justice, worker's rights, the environment, civil rights and civil liberties forever, since no one is progressive when carrying a gun. All progressive values die in times of long-term militarism. Any war party has to be exactly like the Bush Republicans. There is no alternative model anymore.

I don't want my grandchildren and their grandchildren to be soldiers. Bayh and Warner don't care if my grandchildren end up in an endless series of foxholes. And then end up at Arlington.

There can never be a progressive war again. That idea died on VJ DAY, or maybe on VE DAY, since the Pacific war was not a war for democracy against dictatorship, but just for economic interests.

Here's the end of any rational discussion...

And I was going to thank him for that, but then he just started brutally lashing out for no reason again.

and obscures any points he might make with his ad hominum attacks.

A real discussion killer, this guy...

Would you say the successful efforts in Kosovo reflected this type of thinking. Working with allies, building consensus, a targeted military effort which most likely prevented mass genocide.

Good for discussion...but then...discussion and compromise got us Bush II and Bush I and all the "inside the beltway crap" that's about ready to implode. But..."THEY" don't see it.

Just my Populist viewpoint. Take it for what it's worth. Which to you guys enthralled with this article is also Hogwash.

Anti-Global Imperialism and Anti-Doctrine of Pre-Emptive Strike Americans amd lump them into some mis-named "Anti-War Faction" of the Democratic Party. There are indeed some Democrats who are pacifists (Quakers & others) and that is their right...but they hardly make up the membership of "Move On.org." or the Lefty Blogosphere.

Again...using the Inside the Beltway Crowd and M$M to bring back the ghost of McGovern and paint those of us who know we should never have gone into Vietnam or Iraq as somekind of cowardly hippies who just can't see that America has terrible enemies who "hate us for our freedoms."

These new "Think Tanks" are just a remake of the ones that already exist and more of the inside the Beltway think which has gotten so out of touch with most Americans that it's in danger of becoming extinct. As Arianna Huffington says in her new book....You can "smell the fear" from the inside the Beltway and NYC Crowd who run these Think Tanks.

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facts got your panties in a wad?

it made us aware, totally aware, of the other votes our Democrats were taking to give Bush his agenda.

It is not just anti-war, it is mostly about an attitude of the think tanks who have begun to think they are actually the party itself.

They have become so sure they are the ones who are right, and they will actually ridicule the rest of us.

..just not all in once place and tied together. Fascinating stuff. Some I've had to independently verify through other sources.

As I read this article, and others, I was reminded of the many conversations I've had on DU and in the real world concerning this part of Democratic party history.

I can recall the cries of "American Imperialism" when Clinton went into Kosovo, and the same when we went into Iraq. Though I feel Kosovo was justified and Iraq wasn't, neither rises to the level of anything near Imperialism.

Compare to the passage in the article referencing Greece:

When in 1947 Truman proposed to help the governments of Greece and Turkey put down Communist insurgencies, Wallaceites called the move ''American imperialism"-but Democrats went along.

Best as I can tell, Greece today is not part of an American Empire.

There was one long drawnout thread on DU once on whether "liberal internationalism" even existed, with someone declaring it was cooked up by the DLC.

This book should be quite informative to those who decide to read it, and should adequately quell the moveon/KOS declaration that they are "taking their party back." Afterall, they never actually had the party and, at best, have only been sharing the party since the late 60s.

Now, you may have principles on American foreign policy as practiced by coldwar-era Democrats as long as you don't kid yourself into believing the party has ever been some progressive utopia. From Woodrow Wilson to Bill Clinton, every Democratic president has been a proponent of liberal internationalism - right or wrong.

Beinart phrased it nicely in an interview with US News:

One of the great problems with liberalism today is its lack of historical memory. Conservatives have a much better understanding of the rise of their movement, starting with the Goldwater campaign.

Even in THIS thread, post 14, someone is calling this Think Tank Hogwash from "Inside the Loop." LOL!

At least on the International Front? The "Left" has always known that Democratic administrations and policies were complicit in the US cold war crimes around the globe. The "Left" has had no illusions about the Progressivism of the Democratic Party in regard to the use of US power to protect US business interests abroad, or its support of torture, repression, dictatorship, and oligarchy in the name of US "cold war" interests.

BUT - as Ken Burch noted in post #184, the “Left” – so maligned as impractical purists by some on this board – put aside all that in 2004 to work 24/7 for months to elect Kerry, based on the very practical assessment that whatever the failings of the Democratic Party, the illegitimate impostor in the WH was an imminent threat to the Globe. If I remember rightly, even Zinn and Chomsky called on the Left to support Kerry in 2004.

AND - at least for this very Left non-Democrat and many others, the Democrats have, historically, stood for a more Progressive agenda. Many of us, whatever our theoretical underpinnings, have supported and worked for Democrats based on that Domestic agenda. The cry to "take our Party back" refers, I think, to THAT agenda, one summarized on the Democratic Party's own site - an agenda that for most people - again, IMHO - isthe meaning of being a Democrat.

from: http://www.democrats.org/a/party/history.html



The problem, for many, is that the "DLC" "Centrist" Democrats appear to have largely abandoned that agenda, despite popular support reflected in poll after poll. Americans poll as supporting some form of National Health Care, as supporting meaningful assistance for the poor, strong environmental protections even at the cost of higher taxes, etc. But the Democrats – whatever Bills they have supported – are largely silent on these issues in the public perception while they spend their time on talk shows rattling sabers and talking tough.

Much of this “Centrist” abandonment of positions supported by a large majority of Americans was detailed in:

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20050103/sirota

but more recent polls can surely be found to support the majority’s continued support for a more “progressive” agenda than is being aggressively pursued by “centrist” Democrats – at least in any way that brings it to national attention.

History is important, and I applaud the efforts of those who continually point out the Democrats Cold War crimes.

What I don’t understand is the insistence that what was must always and forever more be – particularly since (again, IMHO), most Americans being largely ignorant of US interventionist history around the Globe in support of torture, murder, and Oligarchy and having a common perception that the Democrats are the more “progressive” Party – people DO remember Carter’s and Clinton’s efforts toward peaceful resolutions in the Mideast, for example, and see the Democrats as having a more sanely reasonable respect for the functions of the UN.

What is wrong with calling on the Democratic Party to live up to the perceptions it has fostered, particularly on domestic issues but also on international policy? Perceptions that it is the Democrats who will support and protect the interests of working people, not the elite, support Fair trade that promotes the interests of working people around the globe as well as protects jobs at home, respects International Law, seeks partnership with other Countries, and rejects Militarism as the first resort to international problems?

To reject that vision is to accept that indeed, there is no point to the Democratic Party, that there is no substantive difference between the two Parties, and that there is no way forward but a Third Party solution.

And though not a Democrat, and very “far Left” (as long as “far Left” is not construed to mean advocating violence, which I reject), I am still working for Democrats this election cycle, so I guess I am not quite willing to reject that vision, nor do I understand why anyone would call it illegitimate and continuously disparage it. It is, after all, quite proudly touted on the Democratic Party’s very own site.

The purpose of Iraq was planting a permanent military boot in the faces of everyone living in the Middle East. What in hell else would you call Clinton's demand that Serbia allow permanent NATO occupation and sell off all its state-owned industries to avoid war> What do you call Bremer's orders (which cannot be annulled by any act of the Iraq government) allowing Iraqi enterprises to be sold off 100% to foreigners?

What's not considered, but perhaps significant, is a split in the left itself over the Balkans wars. A stark separation became clear between the anti-imperialist left and humanitarian interventionist left as sides came down over Bosnia and later Kosovo, with the tragic non-intervention in Rwanda in between -- as I say, this happened on the left, among veteran new lefters, in fact, not between left and center. That separation has never been resolved, either. For me, absent a direct attack on the US or allies with a clear case for defense, it's what I want our armed forces doing, serving as diplomatic leverage in a global approach to conflict resolution, activated militarily only when diplomacy fails, with the aim of preventing an imminent genocide.

I think Beinart might agree.

you described an interesting divide among the left as the anti-imperialist left versus the humanitarian interventionist left ... i'm not sure it's reasonable to see the two definitions as mutually exclusive ... i say that because i see myself as easily fitting into both definitions ...

i strongly support genuine humanitarian intervention ... for example, i see no way we can turn our backs on the nightmare in Darfur ... to those who like to criticize "the left" as isolationist, i say, get a clue ... i think that way over-generalizes ...

but i also believe that virtually all American foreign policy, even where a potentially legitimate use of force is called for, is nevertheless primarily driven by the greedy pursuit of profits and the exploitation of resources ... from this view, both legitimate and illegimate uses of force are used as justifications for occupation, oppression and exploitation ... the two policy objectives need not be exclusive ... so, the anti-imperialism left does not necessarily object to either intervention or military action but is right to see most military aggression as imperialistic in nature ...

the overall point here is that the labels are lacking and overly simplistic ...

and for those who question the imperialistic motives of the US in Iraq, you only need to review the control multi-national big oil has taken over future Iraqi oil extraction ... estimates i've seen have indicated that big oil now controls roughly 2/3 of the Iraqi oil fields ...

and al-Maliki stated a few days ago that Iraqis should be able to have full military control of the country, except for Baghdad itself and Anbar province, by the end of this year ... just one day later, he somehow reassessed the situation, and said it would take until the end of 2007 ... yup, Iraq is being badly exploited by the US ... how can anyone really believe bush is in there to build a nice, American democracy??? they can't be serious ...

If I understand you, you're saying that underlying motives of greed make both "legitimate and illegimate uses of force" illegitimate in the end -- is that correct?

I agree -- I think we can all agree -- that stopping genocide, despite the costs entailed, is morally right and thus justified.

The question in my mind is about "self-interest" vs. "greed." Is there a point where US "self interest" is not greedy?

I think it has a lot to do with the broader view and mission of our country. As with any organized group of people, if we are doing good in the world, our "self-interest" is in the interests of the rest of the world, as well. Sort of like "put on your own oxygen mask first," or the need for non-profits and charities to prosper in order to continue to exert positive influences.

But to the extent that we do NOT see our nation that way -- to the extent that our foreign policy is tied to global corporatism and everything that entails (from human rights abuses to oily deals to imperialist policies), "self-interest" equals "greed."

But I don't think it has to be that way. Do you?

here's my best shot at answering them ...

as to your first question, i.e. your inference that i concluded that underlying motives of greed make both "legitimate and illegitimate uses of force" illegitimate, i think that's not exactly what i was trying to say ...

i think we have to distinguish between our values, say the prevention of genocide, versus the real objectives of those who call in the military ... Iraq lends a convenient example ... just to clarify my point, let's accept my view of Iraq ... i don't think bush gives a damn about the Iraqi people ... in fact, i think the longer they fight with each other, the happier he is ... why? because each and everyday the war and occupation continues, it destabilizes oil markets and gives bush a credible justification for continued troop presence in OPEC country ... again, whether or not you agree with this perception, let's accept it here just to make a point ...

so, given that perspective, be it right or wrong, would it ever be legitimate to overthrow someone who committed genocide against his own people? the situation sees bush as an imperialist, but, again hypothetically because we really don't know the facts regarding Saddam, the objective of trying to free the Iraqi people from a tyrant could potentially be legitimate ... the problem we face now, however, is whether destabilizing Iraq will truly ever help the Iraq people or whether it will turn them against themselves, absent a strong central government, and condemn them to poverty, civil war and hopelessness ... to label MY objective of free, prosperous Iraqis as a legitimate use of force may be acceptable; to do so with an imperialist like bush in power may not be ... we need to recognize that what should be, or at least may be, a legitimate desire to see the Iraqis better off may be the perfect excuse for those seeking to weaken them and exploit them ... so i struggle with the statement about calling a legitimate purpose run by an illegitimate imperialist either legitimate or illegimate ... we need to separate the act from the actor and this requires two labels; not one ... my primary criticism of those who voted for the IWR was that it implicitly required trusting bush ... it's the same for those who say we "can't just leave" ... you either have to accept the fact that bush is at least trying to make things better in Iraq (even if he's been horribly incompetent) or you don't ... my view is that if you're not supporting OUT NOW you are trusting bush to solve the problems and make things better ... i don't trust him one bit ...

and then you asked: "Is there a point where US "self interest" is not greedy?" ... hmmmm, another tough one ...

i'm not sure this is where you were going with this question but consider this: let's say that the US was running desperately low on oil ... and let's say OPEC and other oil producers saw an opportunity to hurt the US for its hawkish practices by cutting off oil sales to us ... here we have an obvious case of "self interest" ... the goal in this hypothetical is not greed but rather our ability to sustain our way of life without a major collapse of the US economy ...

what then? just as an aside, the final scene from the movie Three Days of the Condor raised this very question ... it's a tough one to answer ... do we "play by the rules" or do we kick some butt and take what we need?

for me, the most important component of issues like this is telling the American people the truth ... if the national interest really is at stake, it should be up to the voters to decide the direction we take ... in an empire, that's not how things work ... we are told, we are always told, that every cause, every military adventure, is justified ... after all, we're the good guys ... if we're not helping some oppressed people overseas, we're taking legitimate actions to help our own country and its people prosper ... so, if bush is in Iraq not to profit the oil companies, and unfortunately not to help bring democracy to Iraq, but, hypothetically is there to protect our vital supply of OPEC oil, this issue should be put before the American people to decide ... it should not be the domain of our government to deceive us with disinformation; that's not the way our democracy should function ...

so, yes, it is certainly possible that we COULD have our "self interests" not be "greedy" interests ... in fact, i think that's the only path to peace in the world ... what could be more in our national interest than an understanding that we'll live in a much safer world doing all we can to build allies instead of enemies ... i'm afraid though that, given a government of imperialists, that is never their primary objective ...

i must sound like a broken record about this but i would highly recommend a book called "The Sorrows of Empire" by Chalmers Johnson ... it's a truly stunning history lesson ... you can read many of Johnson's ideas in a two part interview (from 2004) right here ...

great questions, Sparkly ... hope i answered some of them ... there was plenty to think about ...

.... than not.

I'm not trying to take over your conversation with Sparkly, but wanted to just jump in on one point.

Is it fair to say, in your example about Iraq (the stipulated assumptions you made would also have been mine were I making your same argument) would it be fair to conclude, given the inherent uncertainty of the whole ball of wax, that the case being one or the other (greed or honest humanitarian concern) would depend on who was leading us?

After all, the visible actions are essentially the same. The only difference is in intent. And that comes down to who was in the lead on our side.

Bush = greed

Kerry/Edwards/Dean/Clark/etc = humanitarian

You're still in the doghouse for starting that flamewar, ya clown! :P

sheesh ... what are we paying you for??

i cannot tell you with any degree of certainty, whether all, or most, or at least some Democrats are a "party to empire" ... our nation's history has been sadly constant regardless of its visible power structure ...

so, "yes" as to whether it matters who is leading and "i wish I really knew" when it comes down to just who is on which team ... others will protest this statement with great certainty; i can't tell you how much i wish i had some ...

Your "after all, we're the good guys" point is key, I think. We have to BE the "good guys."

I also agree that telling the truth to people is essential (which is why the media is such an issue).

I could NOT agree with you more about your views of the ways "self interests" could be non-greedy -- you said it very well.

About "out of Iraq now," though -- If I understand, you're saying anything less is trust in Bush. Well, that's something for me to think about! It is unquestionably a horrific, tragic, criminal situation, and I have NO faith that it will improve during the Chimp's tenure. He is using our military to do nothing but "put out fires" which will keep those fires blazing unless a political solution -- treating it as a REGIONAL and then international problem -- is established, and he can not, and will not, get there.

So it's the lesser of two evils. Under this administration, it's fubar, I agree. If we leave as is, will it worsen to the point that it turns into a world war, causing more bloodshed in future, more deaths and injuries in the long run? Or if we "stay the course" (since they have no intention of changing the course) will it escalate in the same way, just more slowly?

I think it can't be resolved during BushCo's regime, either way, no matter what (because of what they are unwilling and now UNABLE to do, in terms of international politics and diplomacy -- they are far too weak and discredited). The only question in my mind is what can/should happen until the Bush regime is GONE -- two and a half more years...

But I am right there with you about most of this, and appreciate the book recommendation!! :hi:

EDIT: On second thought, there's actually little we can in the next two and a half years except espouse things, build constituencies who agree, and win elections -- and THEN we can start holding some feet to some fires.

This is a different era, but at the time I refer to, it was entirely stark - you were either interventionist or noninterventionist; interventionist meant humanitarian, while anti-interventionist meant anti-imperialist. That's what the family fight was all about. I still lived in NYC in the 90s, but I came in on the new left and not in Democratic politics, although I voted Democratic, so I didn't experience what's described in the article. I was on one side of a split in the left as a member of the antiwar left, but not a split in Democratic politics, since party politics weren't a factor, especially. In general, though, I agree labels are simplistic and subject to inaccurate portrayals of real people and beliefs. But I don't believe internationalism, even apart from humanitarian intervention, has to be imperialist. I agree with your analysis for the most part. I just don't think it has to be as it has been if we put our hearts and minds to it as a nation.

... towards being a liberal interventionalist, if it weren't for the fact that I have no confidence whatsoever in our modern leaders, selected using a broken system, to make the correct decisions about when intervention is necessary or even warranted.

Last paragraph.

"Now, as the Iraq mess worsens, the dilemma becomes acute. Internationalism or anti-imperialism? Each worldview draws on different traditions, prescribes different policies, and envisions a different Democratic Party. Democrats face no more momentous choice than this in the months and years ahead."

I don't believe in spreading Democracy. I don't presume to think we have the right to do so.

combined together. There are plans for a whole new generation of nuclear weapons and advanced spaced based systems. Is this "liberal internationalism"? How on earth would that help prevent another 9/11, much less help spread democracy and freedom?

I'm even more concerned about Mr. Beinart's phrase "fighting Islamo-fascism" than I am concerned about his call to purge moveon and almost he entire progressive wing from the Democratic Party. Can anyone seriously maintain that this phrase does not elicit racist and jingoistic emotions? And what does this phrase mean? If it means Al Quada, well fine. But if he means possible military action against a whole range of theocratic movements in the Islamic world, the U.S. is going to find itself in a never-ending state of conflict with a large portion of the peoples of the world. Let's reflect on the events and sometimes sponsors that created these movements in the first place.

The simple fact is that the vast majority of the Islamic world, like the vast majority of Latin America and in fact the vast overwhelming majority of the whole world is not going to believe that U.S. foreign policy is being driven by altruist motives or even legitimate motives of self-defense. I would dare say that if one tried to sell this line to ordinary people anywhere in the Middle East, Latin America or almost anywhere else, one would be greeted with a chorus of laughter and ridicule even from the more conservative and relatively pro-western elements. I have lived close to half my life abroad; Europe, the Middle East and the Far East, so I do know this from experience--and I am talking about the relatively pro-western elements.

It is not isolationist or utopian to recognize the simple historic reality that military conflict creates a ceaseless series of new enemies and new military conflicts. It is realist. It is not pacifist to recognize the absolute horror of war along with its short-term and long-term after affects and to face the fact that war almost always creates as many or more problems than it solves. It is realist.
It is not utopian to recognize the words of former President Eisenhower who said that there is a point were military spending becomes so wasteful that it weakens the nation and that we simply cannot afford to continue down the same tract and also hold together America's social cohesion. It is being practical and far-sighted. Given the monstrous capabilities of the weapons of the world today, it would do America well to learn quickly what it took our European friends centuries to learn.

:yourock:

My one or two small caveats are not worth expounding on, in the face of so well considered an expression of a very sensible view.

Joni Mitchell, a Canadian btw, wrote this back in 1969 ... it doesn't seem like we've learned too much since then ...

The Fiddle and the Drum

And so once again
My dear Johnny my dear friend
And so once again you are fightin' us all
And when I ask you why
You raise your sticks and cry, and I fall
Oh, my friend
How did you come
To trade the fiddle for the drum

You say I have turned
Like the enemies you've earned
But I can remember
All the good things you are
And so I ask you please
Can I help you find the peace and the star
Oh, my friend
What time is this
To trade the handshake for the fist

And so once again
Oh, America my friend
And so once again
You are fighting us all
And when we ask you why
You raise your sticks and cry and we fall
Oh, my friend
How did you come
To trade the fiddle for the drum

You say we have turned
Like the enemies you've earned
But we can remember
All the good things you are
And so we ask you please
Can we help you find the peace and the star
Oh my friend
We have all come
To fear the beating of your drum

the US military is currently fighting for which is: global corporatization. The PNAC vision is in fact the de facto position of US foreign policy, the debate between parties is simply on of tactics rather than strategy. What I believe the "left" should argue is that Iraq
has exposed the BIG LIE that healthy development whether it be cultural or economic can exist in the context of a unipolar world in which a single power tries to govern through "total spectral dominance". The Untied States has tremendous assets at its disposal with which to influence behavior, but the big stick without the carrot is merely a blueprint for increasing conflict and courting environmental disaster.

It didn't work out so well.

I say, now, we try it our way. We always hear how out of touch the "anti-war left" is, but for some reason we're never given the opportunity to vote for anyone who stands up for our position.

For shits n' giggles, why don't we find out JUST HOW far out of the mainstream we actually are (here's my guess: The American People agree with us in far greater numbers than the media wants to let on) by running someone who has been clear and consistent on this Administration, and Iraq, from the get-go.
Someone who has recently shown a real willingness to fight and take stands that make the "conventional wisdom" nabobs quiver in their $300 Italian Shoes. Someone who has the brains to understand that the Environment is THE TOP "security" concern facing us ALL in this coming century.



Who could that candidate be? Who, indeed.

That was a hard sell once the General Election began. If your logic is that we tried that, I can only wonder if you remember we tried that in 2000.

The Iraq war didn't start until 2003. I don't know what kind of "anti-war" credentials you could have when there wasn't really a war going on.

As for Gore's 2000 campaign, he readily admits the obvious errors (beyond his VP choice, of course) but chief among them was his playing it "safe", listening to the Gergen n' Morris crowd who were doing focus groups to see which shade of Khaki he polled best in.

And he should have depended on Bill Clinton more. That much is clear.

Al Gore ran a tepid, middle of the road campaign in 2000. That was a mistake. He played to the all-powerful center which doesn't exist. Didn't then, sure doesn't now.

And we're in a different world, now.

Al Gore has more than redeemed and renewed himself in many of our eyes.

but in that year he wasn't particularly running as a "peace" candidate. Gore in 2000(and I have to say he now speaks with much greater and clarity and passion and would be a far stronger choice in 2008)ran as someone who appeared to stand for nothing and who appeared not to care about much of anything.

So no, Gore's showing in 2000 said nothing about the viability of any antiwar candidacies.

meaning, let the voters decide.

I say, now, we try it our way. We always hear how out of touch the "anti-war left" is, but for some reason we're never given the opportunity to vote for anyone who stands up for our position.

And you're never going to be GIVEN the opportunity, you have to EARN the opportunity by winning the most votes in the primaries.

For shits n' giggles, why don't we find out JUST HOW far out of the mainstream we actually are (here's my guess: The American People agree with us in far greater numbers than the media wants to let on) by running someone who has been clear and consistent on this Administration, and Iraq, from the get-go.

Guess who THIS is about...

_________ said last night that the time had come for a "final reckoning" with Iraq, describing the country as a "virulent threat in a class by itself" and suggesting that the United States should consider ways to oust President Saddam Hussein.

In a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York, ___________ generally praised President Bush's performance since Sept. 11, but raised questions about how Mr. Bush had worked with other nations in the war in Afghanistan and against Al Qaeda.

________, speaking four miles from the ruins of the World Trade Center, applauded Mr. Bush for singling out Iraq, Iran and North Korea as an "axis of evil" in his State of the Union address.

In advocating that the administration consider whether the time had come to try to remove Mr. Hussein, ___________ seemed to be in line with Mr.Bush's emerging policy.

"So this time, if we resort to force, we must absolutely get it right," he said.

and their golden boy Dennis Kucinich scraped the bottom of the barrel....he couldn't even muster 10% in his home state of Ohio....

description. As part of the "Anti-Iraq Invasion" crowd that some would like to paint as "Pascifist/Anti-War" ...I and everyone else I knew felt that we needed to route the Taliban out of Afghanistan and find bin Laden.
Invading Iraq was Pre-Emptive invasion of a sovereign nation. That's why we protested to try to stop it. No one protested against invading Afghanistan to find the Taliban.

As for Vietnam...it's the same. We should never have gone into Vietnam. And so one could say that the Anti-War Movement was an "Anti-Vietnam Invasion" Movement which was associated with anti-nuclear movement and was dedicated to working for Peace over working for War.

As long as we Democrats and Republicans allow "Anti-War" to be associated with us we will be tools of Media Fascists and RW Think Tanks who paint us as Peaceniks who are against keeping America safe and don't have a plan. The disinformation is what needs to be rooted out not our ideas unconstitionality of "Doctrine of Pre-emptive Strike" and the Neo-Con's view of foreign policy.

"Anti-war" will continue to be the common usage: three syllables beats seven every time....

It seems, I don't know, disingenuous to pretend the anti-war people aren't holding up a banner that says "anti-war" themselves....

http://www.antiwar.com/

http://artcontext.org/antiWar/index.php

http://www.campusantiwar.net/

http://www.dawndc.net/

So according to you, they must all be tofu-eating, birkenstock wearing, international A.N.S.W.E.R. supporters.

Most people think the war is a failure, and so do not want to persevere in it; most people think the war has been incompetently executed, and do not like the sight of a botched job; many people have come to understand they were sold a pack of lies, and stampeded into a panic, which they rather resent.

These things are very different from opposition to war in general, which the opposition to the war on the left is widely perceived as being rooted in. Most people, for better or worse, accept war as a thing necessary on occassion, and an uncomfortably large number of people think it somewhat of a good thing, and find some vicarious satisfaction in it.

and read about US Marines shooting an 8, a 4, and a one year old baby girl in cold blood, or "execution style" as the Washington Post so drily put it.

As I asked my wife over breakfast, "who is really surprised by this? It's an inevitable outgrowth of an untenable situation that we've seen time and again in the past; war of occupation on a civilian population that doesn't want us there. Scared kids in uniform who just want to make it home in one piece. It happened at My Lai, and of course it's gonna happen in Iraq."

But hopefully DU will forgive me, if, on this morning when children shot in cold blood with my tax dollars are on the front page of my paper, I don't really feel like spending a whole ton of time on what a ludicrous, "loony left" philosophical position it is to be opposed to war-in-general.

That said, I supported the Afghanistan invasion immediately after 9-11. Of course, I thought the point really was to "get" the perpetrators of that crime. Not that I had any faith in the competence of this administration, but I did think the American people would not let the administration do anything short of bringing the people actually responsible for that day to justice.

I may have given the American People too much credit, there.

As far as the specifics of this sub-thread. Most Americans have come to realize the Iraq invasion was a mistake. But they don't do well with "nuance". So they couldn't understand why, in 2004, John Kerry was criticizing the Preznit and his war- a war which Kerry himself had voted for.

Which is why I think, on this very crucial issue, we need to run people who have been consistent, or at the very least who can articulate a morally cogent position on the matter.

Peace.

that the anti-war people weren't themselves saying "antiwar"?

they're probably saying all different kinds of things.

you wouldn't see anybody trying to run away from the label....but someone was.

...absolutely nothing.

Ho-kay....

And I don't think anyone should. We've got US Marines shooting babies 'execution style' in the Washington Post. Yeah, "anti-war", who would want to identify as that?

"Yeah, "anti-war", who would want to identify as that?"
You tell US why they're running away.....

"As long as we Democrats and Republicans allow "Anti-War" to be associated with us we will be tools of Media Fascists and RW Think Tanks ..."

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2648169&mesg_id=2649808

I'll sleep perfectly well at night being "anti-war".

Not that it's not sometimes necessary.

I think the premise of that post is wrong.

because the OTHER guy is wrong....ho-kay.

exactly how you think prevaricating, obfuscating, and straddling both sides of the fence with regards to the Iraq war is a good idea--- not just from a moral perspective, but from a political one.

Birkenstock wearing peacnik" image. And, maybe folks will seriously look behind the "anti-war" logo's as to what people are really trying to say about the Military Industrial Complex gone Wild.

Reframing the issues is long overdue. And, some of us here tried to convince folks to use the phrase "Anti-Iraq Invasion" every time someone posted something like "You "Anti-War" people or why do "Anti-war" yadda, yadda, yadda.

It does get complicated trying to explain it which is where Dems always get stuck with their foot in their mouth...when they try to explain nuances.

Anyway, I got your point but we need to change the label image in some way so it better defines what being opposed to war can really mean.

That's what my 2 cents is trying to say...

meaning, the war in Iraq.

Actually, it's very simple. We need to run people who are clear, consistent, and not so terrified of what the "conventional wisdom" nabobs say that they never take a stand on anything.

Howard Dean is a fine example of what I'm talking about. So is Barbara Boxer. So is Russ Feingold.

I don't need my candidates to wear birkenstocks or be "peaceniks".. although Al Gore IS a Deadhead.

:hippie:

I was the conservative to my "hippie friends" and look at where I am now. :D. Here on this "prentend to be" radical Dem Underground site.

:rofl:

:loveya:

was a reason for finding a simple phrase like "Anti-War." It would be nice if one could say "Anti-Unjustifiable War," "Pro-Peaceful Solutions" or some other kind of combination...but there it is..."Anti-War" where the Right never fails to conjure up pictures of flower children giving daisies as the threat of Commie or Islamic missiles loom overhead.

We who want diplomatic solutions to avoid war need to work harder to reframe our message.

I did understand what you said. :-)'s

Face it....the label on the can wasn't why voters didn't buy the product.

"And so one could say that the Anti-War Movement was an "Anti-Vietnam Invasion" Movement which was associated with anti-nuclear movement and was dedicated to working for Peace over working for War. "
One could say all sorts of silliness.

And silly me, I supported Kerry throughout the primaries. I thought he was the "practical" choice. I thought his Vietnam record would make him immune to the bullshit character crap that the GOP would inevitably throw.

I was wrong. I think Dean would have been a better nominee. I think one of Kerry's biggest problems was that he couldn't speak with moral authority on Iraq precisely because of the "qualifications" that the conventional wisdom nabobs told us made him the better candidate- things like his IWR vote.

It was classic Rove ju-jitsu. He wanted us to believe that he was scared of Kerry and wanted Dean to run. In truth, I think it was exactly the opposite.

In hindsight, I should have gone with my heart and supported Dean. I didn't. I won't make that mistake again.

and failed to catch fire, except among internet whoopsters...

"I think one of Kerry's biggest problems was that he couldn't speak with moral authority on Iraq"
So what was Dean's military record, pray tell?

We've got a deserter from the National Guard who spent Vietnam welded to a barstool-- currently in the White House.

Kerry's "Military Record" didn't do SHIT for him, Jack.

And that's after certain would be know-it-alls in our party kept floating the bs about how he was some kind of impervious superhero, protected by the magic armor of his Vietnam experiences.

Yes, Kerry was -and is- a genuine war hero. Which didn't do shit for us. In fact, Karl Rove used it against him.

But that doesn't have anything to do with "moral authority" on Iraq. Kerry's MORAL AUTHORITY on Iraq was questionable because he tried to run against Bush- and Bush's war- when he himself had voted for it.

Howard Dean ran a damn respectable campaign, until the media (and the 'conventional wisdom' nabobs who kept telling us that Rove would eat Dean alive- the same gang that now wants us to accept an inevitable Hillary nomination) torpedoed his campaign. In an exceedingly cheap fashion.

Dean's moral authority on Iraq came from the fact that he didn't vote for the war. Now, he wasn't in the Senate, so he wasn't in a position to be cornered by the vote; but it is worth noting that many senators did manage to find the courage to vote "No" on the IWR.

Lastly, speaking of "moral authority", maybe you missed this little story:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/26/AR2006052602069.html



I really don't know how anyone who has spent any of the past six years shilling for the Neo-Con agenda, in any way, shape, or form, can fucking sleep at night. One thing's for sure, though, I aint voting for 'em--- not if I can at all help it. Enough. No more.

The anti war people aren't the problem, Benchley.

and now that it's shown that your hero has none you want to change the subject.

"Dean's moral authority on Iraq came from the fact that he didn't vote for the war. Now, he wasn't in the Senate, so he wasn't in a position to be cornered by the vote"
So Dean not doing something he had no fucking way on earth to do equals "moral authority"? Hahahahahahahaha....

Military Bases and the infamous "Blackwater" mercenary compound.

You'd be surprised how the "little elf" managed to draw crowds. You'd be surprised at what an excellent speaker he is and that he survived on small donations... It was a good sign for the future.

That's not silliness...it's fact.

"You'd be surprised how the "little elf" managed to draw crowds."
Clowns are often popular.

"It was a good sign for the future."
The future of what? Comedy?

It was a good thing.

--that the only way he could have won was to visit every county in the entire country, or alternatively have organized enough others to stand in for him. A year and a half isn't enough time to do that.

read, millions of Democrats said they agreed with Kucinich on the issues but felt they had to sell out and vote for Kerry because "he's electable". So don't dismiss Dennis so smugly. He had no money and Dean got his votes when Dean didn't deserve them. You have to admit Dennis did show a lot of guts in staying in the race and fighting for his principles to the end.

And you can't give the left wing of the party any blame whatsoever for the defeat. We weren't the one who told Kerry never ever to fight back against the smear campaign. Running as Kerry did, he would have lost just as solidly had he run on Clinton's exact platform.

And I, too, bought into the Kerry "electability" meme.

Kucinich isn't a bad guy (he's VERY popular where I live), but I still don't think he's ready for prime time.

(Although some of those were silly to use against him...I mean, so what if Dennis is a vegan? Is it a crime for a presidential candidate to have almost no cholesterol?)

but he was the only genuine progressive in the race, and I felt that if we didn't try to support him, other politicians would say "see, that's what happens when you run with principles. Include me out. I'll settle for the meaningless feel-good statements and feel perfectly governing as a Republican...sorry, I meant moderate".

I thought the best possible combination of candidate and issues we could have had would have been if Clark had run on Kucinich's agenda. That would have been, in my view, an unstoppable force that would have led to a crushing victory.

I'm ready for someone- anyone- to stand up for some third rail type stuff which needs to be addressed. A SPHC system, an end to the drug war and the war on pain patients, withdrawl from Iraq.

But it has to be the right voice, I agree.

Funny thing about Kucinich's veganism- and you're right, what's the problem? If anything, it means the guy would probably live longer than most other Presidents- I remember watching MSNBC during the primaries (before I swore off cable "newz" for good) and it was some talking head going on about how "Chip, you'll never believe what we (snicker, snicker) found in Dennis Kucinich's hotel room! After the break"

I was thinking, what could it be... gay porn?

Turns out she goes into his room, opens up a ice chest, and pulls out.. (gasp!) TOFU and VEGGIE DOGS! Oh My! How weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeird!. Back to you, Chip.

I dunno. I'm not a vegan, but I eat a lot of vegetarian stuff, including tofu, veggie dogs, etc. My cholesterol dropped over 100 points when I stopped eating fried foods, red meat, and the staples of the regular 'merkin diet. Maybe it's where I live, but I didn't think veggie dogs were that freaky.

:eyes:

"you can't give the left wing of the party any blame whatsoever for the defeat"
Bullshit.

We didn't tell Kerry not to speak coherently.
We didn't say not to fight back against the smear campaign.
We came back to the party by the millions.
We fought to get progressives to switch from Nader to Kerry, and largely succeeded.
We worked hard to get the vote out.
We canvasses, phone banked, did everything that anyone could ask
What can you possibly blame the left for in 2004?
Please tell us why 2004 was OUR fault.
If you can't, than stop saying it.

Someone so infalliably right about everything, they don't need to make sense.

The put their principles aside in the false belief that Kerry was "more electable".

And then heard millions of voters saying throughout the fall they couldn't vote for Kerry because they weren't sure what he believed in.

There is no indication that any Democrat running to Kerry's right on the issues would have done better.
If there had been we'd have NOMINATED Lieberman. Nobody could have stopped him if he'd really looked like the most electable candidate.

The voters were ready for change and our ticket looked like it wasn't. And our ticket wouldn't respond to the smear campaign led by Rove, a strategy which made most voters think the smears were true.

You aren't really saying that Kucinich hurt the party's chances by even running, are you Benchley?

And the corporate media (the same people who are, even now, puffing up the 'inevitability' of a Hillary nomination) did their best to torpedo his candidacy.

You can snicker, belittle, compare everyone opposed to the Iraq War to ANSWER mumia sign-holders, whatever. But you can't get around this simple fact: Kerry's vote for the Iraq War was a problem, not a "Plus" in the 2004 election.

Next time, we need to run someone who the general public perceives as consistent, particularly on that issue.

except in NH where he came in second, and Vermont (big surprise)....

I don't think Iowa and New Hampshire are indicative of where most of the party sits.

Anyway, in case you remember, I supported Kerry in the primaries. I now think that was a mistake. I think the American people are a good deal farther to the left- particularly on social issues- than the conventional wisdom gang wants us to believe. And I think when it comes to issues like Iraq, or a SPHC system, they don't want fiddling around the edges, they don't want Republican-lite, and they don't want "nuanced positions" which sound an awful lot- to them- like lying.

What they DO want, more than anything, is strong positions from people who aren't afraid to take stands. Watered down pablum from the 'let me poll you so I can tell you what I believe' gang isn't gonna cut it.

Nuff said.

"I think the American people are a good deal farther to the left- particularly on social issues- than the conventional wisdom gang wants us to believe."
So how DID that Dennis Kucinich juggernaut fare at the polls?

There's nothing intrinsically "honest" about letting Iowa and New Hampshire prune the candidates before the voters of New York and California get a crack at 'em. Just like there's nothing inherently 'democratic' about the fact that the 400,000 residents of Wyoming control 1/50th of the US Senate, same as the 33 Million residents of California.

Because it's always been done that way doesn't mean it's the right way to do things.

The people who can't win honestly are the folks on the right, Jack. That's why you see massive disenfranchisement of poor people and minorities.

Now, true to form, please come up with a snide, one or two sentence non-response, preferably repeating a "point" you've made twelve other times elsewhere in this thread.

So tell us, when Califronia gives us Dianne Feinstein, and New York gives us Hillary Clinton (and there ain't a damn thing wrong with either one of them except among the Democrat Haters Club) how are you going to change the rules next?

"The people who can't win honestly are the folks on the right"
And the far left can't wait to emulate them....

rewrite them into something you'd like to have an argument with.

That, and you toss out this stuff that I'm sure you think sounds good, but it doesn't have any basis in reality or fact. "and the far left can't wait to emulate them"? Uh... what does that even MEAN? Do you think about this stuff before you write it, or does it just come out in some kind of Bill Burroughs stream-of-consciousness rant form?

FWIW, I plan on voting against DiFi in the primary, and then voting FOR her in November, because I'm fairly sure she will be MY nominee for Senator.

I'm fully prepared to have her as one of my two Senators for six more years. I also don't "hate" Hillary. I think she has gone overboard with the neo-con pandering* and the craven political calculating recently, but overall, since she came onto my radar screen in 1992, I've generally been a fan.

See, Benchley- I'm fine with having her be one of the Senators from New York. She's earned that Job and it's up to the voters in that fine state to decide whether to keep her, or not.

That does NOT mean, however, that I think Hillary is somehow entitled -as a first term senator from New York- to be crowned the 2008 Democratic Presidential Nominee, no matter how much the Corporate Media, Rupert Murdoch, and a small but excessively loud minority in our party may want her to be. I think she would be an absolute fucking disaster as our 2008 presidential candidate.

*speaking of neo-con pandering... by the way, did you miss my post with the link to the Washinton Post story about the "execution style" killings of the 8, 4, and one year old children in Iraq? Cuz', you know, I know you've got a lot of loony left peaceniks that you need to ridicule with your pithy one liners, here-- but maybe, just for fun, you might want to address that at some point.

You can't win the primaries the way they've been conducted, so you want to jibber the system so you have a better chance....

"I think she would be an absolute fucking disaster as our 2008 presidential candidate."
And I'll give that the consideration it deserves....namely none.

as they've been constructed.

You're merely using the results of the primaries to back up your assertion - (actually, I'm not even sure what you're trying to argue here.. that equivocation and straddling both sides of the fence on the Iraq war is a good thing?) that the folks against the war in Iraq are some kind of minority. We're not, we're the majority - not just in the party, but in the nation as a whole- and waving Dennis Kucinch's name around like you're George Bush going "He said Global Test" isn't gonna change that.

And honestly, as things stand now, if you really don't see MAJOR problems for a Hillary campaign (I don't mean finding money. I mean WINNING) in the General election in 2008, I think maybe you should get thee to an optometrist.

"if you really don't see MAJOR problems for a Hillary campaign (I don't mean finding money. I mean WINNING) in the General election in 2008, I think maybe you should get thee to an optometrist."
Yeah, but I consider the source of such silly remarks....

...hey. So why, exactly, is Rupert Murdoch raising money for Hillary, again?

Why is it legitimate for YOUR wing of the party to do that and no one else?

And why should we even bother appeasing the war-loving, union-busting, wife-beating, gay-bashing Southern white men when they will never vote Democratic again no matter how far to the right we move?

The only votes Clinton got in 1992 were people who would have voted for any Democrat. Clinton won because the voters were sick of conservative presidents. Clinton failed because he chose to BECOME a conservative president. That's reality, Benchley.

And criticizing what Clinton did to our party's principles and our party's most loyal supporters isn't Democrat hating. It's DEFENDING Democratic voters and constituencies against a "Democratic" president who clearly hated THEM.

We have to get back to believing that poor people, union workers, people of color and people in non-traditional lifestyles are just as American and just as important as white suburbanites. It hasn't done a damn bit of good to leave those people out in the cold.

And yes, the DLC has had faces of color. But when you support the death penalty, right wing trade deals, a big defense budget and cuts in social services, you've basically turned into a white male spiritually anyway. If you were anything else, you lost yourself when you embraced all the above.

"The only votes Clinton got in 1992 were people who would have voted for any Democrat."
Funny, I seem to remember Clinton winning primaries...but then I'm actually remembering history, not writing delirious fantasy....

"Clinton failed because he chose to BECOME a conservative president. That's reality, Benchley."
No, that's your pathetic little fantasy, Kenny.

The media falsely declared the nominee right after New Hampshire so everybody voted for Kerry(even though the race should have still been considered wide open)because they wanted to be with the "winner".
Dean's failure to catch him was largely due to questions about Dean's temperment(the smear about his alleged scream in Iowa, which shouldn't have been an issue at all).

Kerry also hurt himself by running a bland, soulless, issue-free and politics-free convention that prevented him from framing the issues and where the party didn't put Bush on the defensive.

So once again, the left is not to blame for 2004. And you know it, Benchley. Bill Clinton would have lost just as badly, and so would Lieberman. Actually, Lieberman would have done worse, since he no longer had any national support.

Kucinich didn't even get 10% of the votes in his home state, because most voters considered him a laughing stock.


"Kerry also hurt himself"
Yeah, it's rich hearing YOU tell us what Kerry did wrong.

But how about we let the state with the most overall registered democrats (hmm. wanna guess which one?) have more of a say in the early primary 'weeding out' process, instead of giving us a warmed over plate of candidates that has been pared down by the statistically-more-conservative voters in certain rural heartland states?

Yes, the primaries are where these things should be decided, which is why folks should raise a skeptical eyebrow towards 'conventional wisdom' talking heads who want to crown a certain first term senator from New York the de facto 2008 nominee.


...As for your quote. Let me guess- Al Gore? When all is said and done, I will take his track record- particularly on Iraq- over any of the other names (short, perhaps, of Feingold) floated as potential candidates.

You can't defeat the Republicans by trying to BE LIKE THEM. The emphasis on things military, simply because the country was in some kind of military hysteria created by the right wing--was an unfortunate one. It was unfortunate because it wasn't practical, but it was even more unfortunate because it was wrong.

Since the hijacking of the Republican party by the neocons and fundamentalists, the whole dynamic has shifted. These are not Bill Clinton times anymore. The "New Democrats" are not new anymore, and the tactics that worked in electing Clinton will not work today. Too much has changed.

The very definitions of left, right, conservative, liberal--these have no meaning, particularly in a media climate that uses them to obfuscate and entertain at the same time. The country is in political transition. This shift is not based in ideology so much as in the power of the federal government and the corporate interests in D.C.. There is a real hunger for a populist movement, for real democracy, and for honest exploration and conversation about the future of this country. I won't even call it debate, because what passes for debate in our popular culture is something so base and so puerile that it makes me sick.

The talk radio industry, in particular, has contributed to so much ignorance for the sake of a buck...

So YES, the American people have far more in common than our popular culture media would have us believe. But that media culture makes a lot of money for many.

:toast: Cheers

First, I think the "Democrats' post-Vietnam reluctance to use military power" is a canard. There has been a reluctance among Democrats to misuse military power, which led to the opposition reflected in the PNAC. But Clinton, for example, used military power judiciously (and was hammered for it).

Second, "liberal internationalism" involving "intervention" does include non-military intervention ("economic development, robust alliances, and international law and institutions") and "leftist" anti-imperialism does include military intervention (which CAN be humanitarian, and not "avaricious in intent and malign in its results").

I think it's a simplistic, false divide.

"Internationalism" CAN mean engaging in the world without unnecessary war.

"Intervention" can be EITHER noble and wise, or stupid and imperialist.

In my own opinion, Warner and Bayh want to capitalize on muddied waters. It seems to me they want to stay rather inspecific about nuts and bolts, and rise above the nitty-gritty to appeal to the "middle" with rhetoric based on feelings ABOUT division: "we're not this, but we're not that -- we're the sensible center."

I think it's very important to appeal to the "center," but not by being vague, muddying the issues, spouting platitudes, or going back to the 1940s to mount "historical" divides. I think the "middle" would come onboard with a rational policy that makes SENSE. I don't see a big "divide" in our nation about that, let alone within our own party.

It's far more basic, and profoundly meaningful, than naval-gazing articles like these portray. It's far more about right here right now, and less about abstract discussions looking back 60 years or more.

What would Bayh and Warner DO? What do they actually think and propose? What speeches or articles show real DEPTH of their experience and knowledge in these areas? What work have they done to advocate for their positions? What have they done every day this month to make a difference?

Frankly, I see them both as empty suits, keeping their hands clean to appeal to the "middle." I don't see that as "moderate" -- I see it as politically convenient. When they show me something SOLID I can stand behind, I'll think otherwise. Mere rhetoric about the "center" -- without real policies defining what that means -- ring hollow to my ears.

And a classic example at that.

are labeled "liberals", and those against pre-emptive, unjustifiable war are labeled "leftists".
:puke:
If the US political spectrum shifts any more to the right, Barry Goldwater will soon be known as the "Father of Modern Liberalism".

If you think terrorism is the chief foreign policy concern, you're liberal.
If you think the Iraq war is the most urgent problem, you're leftist.
If you think there are valid uses for the military, you're liberal.
If you think the US has misused the military, you're leftist.

And, if you consider the "armed force as part of an arsenal of tools-including economic development, robust alliances, and international law and institutions," you need to be with the unifiers like Bayh and Warner!! Liberals and Leftists are so DIFFERENT on that!!

:eyes:

The way the whole range of discussion has drifted over the past three decades.

Speaking of Barry here is an old Goldwater quote I read in the American Conservative: “When the histories are written, I’ll bet that the Old Right and the New Left are put down as having a lot in common and that the people in the middle will be the enemy.” -- Barry Goldwater’s remark to aide Karl Hess

link: http://www.amconmag.com/2006/2006_01_30/article.html

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Democratic frequently because they think that the Democratic Party is less likely to lead the nation into war. There might be some, but I suspect relatively few, Republicans who would convert to Democratic voters if the Democratic Party was viewed as just as war-like as the Republicans. However, if we adopt a more military-interventionist image we have taken away a major stimulus for voting Democratic.

I just don't believe there is very much of a constituency of GOP voting, social-liberals or social-moderates who are hungry for more military conflicts. I would even doubt that there are that many social-conservatives who are not getting just a bit skeptical and weary of military interventions.

Roughly since the Viet Nam period, the public at large has tended to conceive the Republicans as more competent where military matters are concerned, and to conceive the Democrats as unable to cope with situations requiring military commitment. Thus, when the situation is one the public at large feels requires military action, or when military action is on-going, the Republicans will enjoy a certain advantage in mass appeal.

This is why it is so important that the line of Republican incompetence in Iraq be pressed hard by our political spokespersons, and suicidal for persons on the left to disparrage President Clinton's and Gen. Clark's campaign in Kossovo as imperialist and criminal and what not. The latter was a very competent campaign that should be exalted as an example of what Democratic leaders are capable of in military matters, and contrasted with the spectacle of botch and failure on-going not only in Iraq but in Afghanistan under Republican leadership today. Even a shift in popular perception to a view that the Parties are equally incompetent in managing military ventures would be a gain, and worth having, but the present situation offers the possibility, at least, of reversing this long-standing popular view to our advantage.

of who has the biggest gun or the biggest "dick" (to be crude). Democrats going around trying to beat the "I'm more macho than Repugs" war drum ends up looking like Lieberman.

Many DU'ers have a problem with Kosovo. At the time I felt we had to do something there. But, Kosovo was invading for what was felt to be a huge humanitarian,genocide problem and not comperable to our recklessly invading Grenada, Haiti or Iraq. The Repugs have yet to show their macho balls and invade Darfur for humanitarian reasons.

I think Democrats who have Principles will win out over pandering and challenging as to whose *____* is bigger.

Competence at violence remains the most basic standard for elevation to control of the government of a state. The state is, after all, merely an engine of violence, with no other real root: the basic diagnostic of whether or not a group of persons constitutes the government of a state is whether they are capable of enforcing a monopoly on the use of violence for political ends in a particular geographic area. A few exceptions are acceptable, but not many. People at large understand this in their bones, though most would not phrase it with such directness, and so long as this condition obtains, they will remain leery of entrusting state power to people they do not think can handle that basic element of the job well.

And I think the difference between the way it was handled and the way Bush has handled his fiascos is like night and day.

Of course, during the Clinton years half my friends (the half that went on to be Nader supporters in 2000, not so surprisingly) thought I was a sell-out for supporting the guy. I didn't think he was perfect, but he was a damn sight better than most of the other Presidents I've endured in my life.

Democrats aren't afriad of using military force; we never have been. We just use it judiciously and competently.

Unfortunately, it does not seem yet to be as widespread as it ought to be, and we on the left would be wise to adopt political lines that would aid its spread.

self interest, and not out of some sense of altruism, is not isolationist.

to be aware that the US often acts internationally out of narrow corporate interests, and NOT the self interest of the American people, is anti-imperialist and also not isolationist ...

I find it amusing that the "reality-based wing" of the party is the one now pushing the Polyanna view that the US rides a white horse at all times in its dealings with the wider world.

And excusing ourselves for it in the name of being "internationalists".

They are trying to excuse their support for Iraq by calling us anti-war fringe again, and that is not being honest.

Calling us names is not going to work forever. I have never seen so many labels used in one article before.

Shades of "Good Night, Vietnam."