Over at liberal security site Democracyarsenal, guest blogger David Schanzer posts ‘Game On Now For National Security Debate‘.
Unfortunately, the Democratic frontrunners did little to dispel this notion during the first presidential candidates’ debate. Obama chose to talk about the Hurricane Katrina response when asked the first thing he would do after a terrorist attack on U.S. soil And, when Brian Williams served up the Giuliani quotes on a silver platter to Clinton, she did not discuss how to defeat al Qaeda or combat the spread of the global jihadist movement, but instead expounded on the virtues of greater port and subway security.
This isn’t going to cut it in a general election. Because of the still lingering security gap Democrats face, progressives cannot wait until the general election to start speaking convincingly about the threats the nation faces and how to deal with them. Promising to end the Iraq war (as if that could actually be accomplished), will not necessarily be enough to defeat a Republican opponent who is not Bush and will most certainly have his own plan to wind down the war.
Now is the time to get our game day faces on for the national security debate. And we will have to do better than our congressional leaders and presidential candidates have done in this regard since the election. In my posts over the next three weeks, I’ll be discussing some ideas about what I think progressives ought to be saying to prevail in this debate.
I’ll be checking back there and reading his posts with interest. Of course, he’s tagged as a ‘concern troll’ in the second paragraph. That alone may be reason to support him. I’m looking forward to his posts, and to engaging him in what I hope will be a useful and interesting discussion.
Well, this was all foreplay, so I went googling for Schanzer, and found a few brief articles “like this one.”:http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4155/is_20060910/ai_n16722375
What more will he have to say than this?
He wants to fight terrorism, not excluding military force. But he wants drop the “war rhetoric”:
Now, you can make a reasonable argument for that sort of thing, if you’re honest about what you’re doing. When you’re hunting down and killing terrorists with all your military infrastructure, calling that “war” is not rhetoric, it’s the goddamn truth. Shooting people and calling it “civic education” or something is rhetoric. To the extent that Muslims are eager to side with us, telling them obvious fairy tales is not the way to go.
Even more problematic, though, is his idea that we tell everybody that this is a choice between violence and embracing modernity. Wrong, wrong, WRONG! This is a choice between violence and non-violence, and the correct answer is B. Since when are we requiring everybody to embrace “modernity”, whatever that is? Isn’t that precisely the cultural imperialism that he claims to be telling us how to avoid? Isn'[t that the stuff bin Laden is telling everybody that we want to ram down their throats?
Schanzer likes democracy. Thank God for that. But of course – of course! – all the democracy in Iraq is baloney and everything we’ve done there is wrong.
Has the world turned upside down, and we’ve all switched places? This “progressive” is advising us to set up grassroots democracy all over the Middle East? (In Saudi Arabia? In Egypt?) Who the hell gave us leave? Are we going to tell anybody about this, or are we going to hit them by surprise?
Of course, he advises us to fix up the Israel-Palestine deal. No problem, we’ll get that patched right up. But he employs the deadly loaded phrase “honest broker” (when have we been a dishonest broker?) which turns me right off. We all know what an “honest broker” is. That’s a guy who gives a Jew a quarter after he screws them.
John Kerry summed all of this up in one sentence “I would have done everything different.” Which means: “I’ll do nothing at all, pretend that it works, and accuse anybody who disagrees of using Republican smear tactics – and every bogus progressive in the country will sing right along like a tweety bird.”
So if you’re going to watch this space, there’d better be something better than this.
Actually, Glen, I kind of like the idea of dropping the “war” phaseology, and think there’s a sound hawkish argument for it. Because using that term broadly leaves people believing that what we’ve done in Iraq represents the apex of Western warmaking.
As I’ve often noted, we have many notches on the dial left before we get to Cologne. I think that’s an important point to make, and making it will both keep us focused on what we;re trying to do – which is have the maximum impact we can for the minimal application of force, and keep our opponents aware that we have alternate plans that don’t solely involve suing for peace. It will focus us on talking while hopefully it focuses our enemies on the weaponry sitting behind us with the keys in the ignition.
A.L.
bq. …will not necessarily be enough to defeat a Republican opponent who is not Bush and will most certainly have his own plan to wind down the war.
While it might be true that this will be the choice we have, sadly, I believe that the election would go to the candidate, on either side, who will promise to heat things up.
From my own, unscientific, observations I think it isn’t that the anti-war view has grown popular as much as the hard-core ‘total war’ pro-war faction grew since 2003 and then became disillusioned with the restraints placed on the Iraq effort. I believe that a greater percentage than is ordinarily accepted in conventional thought of the swing in opinion on the Iraqi front has been the ‘total war’ advocates disavowing it as a half measure.
I believe time is shorter before Wretchard’s Three Conjectures comes into play then any of us realizes. This will effect the Presidental elections. Let us hope that this last throw of the dice with the Surge works.
StargazerA5
Glen,
If, as you say, “[t]his is a choice between violence and non-violence,” then perhaps dropping the war rhetoric might make some sense. Then again, since both sides are using violence to acheive their respective aims, perhaps the choice is NOT between violence and non-violence, perhaps it is a war. One or the other may be true, but it is difficult to understand how both can be.
mark –
We are not the ones who have a choice between violence and non-violence; it is the Islamist who has that choice. If he chooses non-violence, he doesn’t have to embrace modernity. If he chooses violence, then he reaps the whirlwind. Call it whatever you want, because changing the way we talk about things doesn’t change the things themselves, it only makes us more or less honest. I’m in favor of more candor and less rhetoric.
Glen, I’m sorry but I’m not buying that. You use rhetoric as much as the next guy. Your claim that Islamists have a choice between violence and non-violence but that we don’t is nothing but pure rhetoric–and not very good rhetoric at that. You might justly claim that our use of violence is justified, but you really can’t claim that we don’t use it in order to achieve our aims. We do. Plain and simple. Our militatry is well-trained to use violence to achieve the goals of our policy makers. That is its purpose. I’d call it a necessary evil.
Dems have strategically rejected violence in defense of America in all forms. This is not a winner.
Yes we will see the three conjectures come forward fairly soon.
Dems offer in response to Al Qaeda and Iran’s determination to destroy us “negotiation.” The specifically reject the Bush Doctrine which is not to wait for imminent threats but destroy them with unilateral military force without UN or EU or NATO approval before we lose cities.
Dems prefer to lose cities FIRST so we can be “moral.” Then they will call out the first responders. That’s the influence of Code Pink, ANSWER, Moveon.org, UFPJ who really run the Dem Party now.
No Dem is willing to discuss how he/she will use force unilaterally and pre-emptively to stop Al Qaeda or Iran from nuking us. They’ll only at most talk about symbolic retaliation (i.e. Hillary) and that itself is deeply unpopular in the party. Most Dems would choose to grovel and apologize, “surrender” on some form as Ian Buruma suggests to avoid more nuking.
Dems would prefer to be victims. Victims have “moral authority.” Status. Value in Dem politics. No Dem would say they’d nuke em if they had to save a US city. Behold the deeply feminized and feminist culture of the Democratic Party.
Are we going to tell anybody about this, or are we going to hit them by surprise?
No way it’ll be a surprise after the decade of wrangling it would take to get the crucial UN seal of approval necessary to set up a committee to select the delegates to send to a conference to discuss ways to engage UN-designated anti-democratic elements worldwide (especially in Florida and Ohio) in a non-confrontational and culturally-sensitive way.
mark:
You entirely misunderstand what I’m saying. It was Schanzer who posed this choice:
And it is that choice – posed to Muslims – that I criticized.
Talking about the US and the West choosing non-violence is completely beside the point, since Schanzer does not counsel that.
Uh. Progressives? You have to be kidding me. Socialism is regressive. OK. Beside the point. It is possible that there are “progressives” who are not totally insane. Who understand that profit and a liberal (tolerant – within broad limits) social order are essential. It is possible.
So how do you fight the “liberals” who are giving their marching orders to the Democrat Party?
Here is the test of a liberal: “Do you support democracy in Iraq”?
I Support Democracy In Iraq