Month: October 2004

As usual, impenetrable. But civilized. And, at times, quietly contemptuous of the views of someone like Gary Bauer. Compare it to Bill Kristol’s hysterical notion that mentioning someone’s publicly acknowledged homosexuality amounts to “McCarthyism.” Yes, he’s lost it – but for a good reason. The reason is that Kristol can see when he’s been check-mated. It is indeed difficult to base part of an election campaign on the inferiority of a whole group of citizens if the family of the vice-president includes two (Mary and her partner). Kristol is incensed that the old gay-baiting tactics won’t work – because you actually have to bait your own offspring – and that Kerry has finally had the balls to call this bluff. Still, let the record show: this is the first time in history that Bill Kristol has ever written a defense of gay people. Again: better late then never.

CONSERVATIVES AGAINST BUSH: Another email:

I completely understand your frustration with the current administration and President. I too, am a classical conservative who feels completely abandoned in this campaign by the Republican platform, and am surprised how far right the dems have moved in recent months adopting so much of the opinions I find important. Although I still am hesitant to cast a vote for Kerry – I’m at this point abstaining out of protest – I find myself leaning much more towards Kerry than Bush.
Have you ever thought a Kerry election might actually save the party from the Fundamentalist Idealism that plagues the current administration? I think a witty slogan on your site might be: Save the Republicans, Vote for Kerry. Maybe a Kerry election will force the Republican brass to see they can no longer win national elections catering to their bigoted and close minded base, and thereby force them to adopt a more Reaganite approach to economic policy as well as finally dismissing its attacks on certain groups to enrage and engage this base.

If Bush wins this election, on the other hand, all bets are off.

Yes, there are some heartening developments – in Sammarra, as I’ve noted. Falluja is now headed, it appears, for a big showdown; and we can only pray for success. There seem to be cracks in the insurgency – between domestic anti-Americans and the Zarqawi fanatics. Great. Let’s try and widen them. But the security situation hardly seems to be improving. The Green Zone, which I was warning about a couple of weeks back, is no longer safe. If you cannot maintain minimal security in the inner sanctum of your own capital, then security itself is a misnomer. And now we have indications of some reservists – the victims of Bush’s awful war-management – who are simply refusing to go on what they are calling “suicide missions.” Even America’s soldiers are having a hard time defending themselves in a country where chaos reigns. Whose responsibility? Bush’s. Will he take it? Never.

“The quote you use for the Poseur alert was a joke! The paragraph continues, ‘The crude animation, much maligned, brilliantly distills and exteriorizes its makers’ Weltanschauung.’ Then comes the payoff: ‘Also, I really love the talking/singing poop that leaves big splotches of shit wherever it lands.'” Yeah, you’re right. My bad. Sorry, David.

From the Wall Street Journal.

Lots of you have written to say I’ve gone “left.” If being left means balancing the budget, winning a well-planned war in Iraq, fighting Islamo-fascism, cutting spending, reforming entitlements, keeping taxes low, defending states’ rights, defending the drug companies, increasing military strength and bringing marriage into the gay community, then I guess I’m a lefty. On the Cheney thing, as on all these issues, my position is the same now as it was four years ago. You want proof? Here’s some.

It’s too soon to make huge conclusions from this – but Bush is up in the Zogby poll. It may be, as I wrote after the debate, that Bush’s newfound charm outweighs Kerry’s forensic superiority. But the Kerry mo has been stopped, I’d say. And the Mary Cheney thing is a brilliant maneuver by the Republicans. Rove knows that most people do find mentioning someone’s daughter’s lesbianism to be distasteful and gratuitous. So he can work it to great effect, exploiting homophobia while claiming to be defending gays. Again: masterful jujitsu. I tip my hat to the guy. Poisonous, but effective.

EMAIL OF THE DAY: “As the former legislative director of the Christian Coalition, I find it hilarious, ironic and shameless that those who have long employed gay bashing as a political tool are feigning their outrage over Kerry’s sensitive notation of Cheney’s daughter’s sexual orientation. This is truly a moment of desperation for the Bushies. On the one hand they are sending out gay bashing mail and on the other hand they are sounding like charter members of the Human Rights Campaign. You’ve got to laugh!” – from Marshall Wittmann. Yes, I’m laughing, when I’m not crying.

Gary Bauer has long denied he’s anti-gay, or catering to anti-gay prejudice. But this morning he came clean, in referring to Kerry’s mentioning Mary Cheney’s lesbianism:

“I think it is part of a strategy to suppress traditional-values voters, to knock 1 or 2 percent off in some rural areas by causing people to turn on the president.”

Think about that for a minute. Bauer believes that his core supporters would be likely to “turn” on the president just because the vice-president’s daughter is a lesbian. Notice that there’s no indication of homosexual “acts”, just a revulsion at Mary Cheney’s simple identity as a lesbian. This is their base. This is why they’re worried. Some of the subtler arguments I’ve heard overnight say the following: it’s not that homosexuality is wrong; it’s just that many people believe that and Kerry therefore exploited their homophobia to gain a point. I don’t buy it, but let’s assume the worst in Kerry’s motives for the sake of argument. What these emailers are saying is that Kerry should hedge what he says in order to cater to the homophobia of Bush’s base. Why on earth should he? The truth here is obvious: Bush and Cheney are closet tolerants. They have no problem with gay people personally; but they use hostility to gay people for political purposes, even if it means attacking members of their own families. What they are currently objecting to is the fact that their hypocrisy has been exposed. To which the only answer is: if you don’t want to be exposed as a hypocrite, don’t be one.

“It is a good thing Bush has an idealistic streak that informs his vision of the world. That idealism leads him to a belief that ‘freedom is not America’s gift to the world; freedom is the Almighty God’s gift to each man and woman in this world.’ But, without demanding accountability from his administration, that messianic zeal is being corrupted, and his policies are lurching out of control. Without a defined, limited overall vision of the war on terrorism and a corresponding commitment to government accountability, Bush can hardly claim to be the champion of ‘conservative values.'”– Robert A. George, explaining why he, as a conservative, cannot vote for George Bush. I understand entirely.

EMAIL OF THE DAY: “One of the most refreshing things on the campaign trail last year was seeing stodgy old Dick Gephardt talk about how he loved his lesbian daughter Chrissy. He did it at almost every campaign stop. He did it so much it got boring, like everything Gephardt does. But it was from the heart.
Can you imagine Gephardt’s reaction if he were a candidate and Bush had said something like Kerry said last night? Simple: Warmth and gratitude. Gephardt never implied there was anything unseemly about his daughter or her partner – they were both on his family’s Christmas card! Bush wouldn’t have had to mention her. Gephardt surely would have beaten him to it.
The only damn difference is that Bush & Cheney’s base is anti-gay. That’s why Mary Cheney’s off-limits, not privacy or anything else. If their base were pro-gay, she would have had a prime-time convention speaking slot. But because they’re homophobes, Kerry is supposed to shut up and act accordingly.
Andrew, I hope to God we’re just 18 days away from having leadership that doesn’t feel it has to whisper about a loved one’s existence.” Don’t miss a huge dollop of feedback on the Letters Page – huge because of 150,000 visits yesterday.

It’s a simple argument and it goes as follows. One reason to vote for Kerry this time is that, whatever his record, he will, as president, be forced by reality and by public opinion to be tough in this war. He has no other option. You think he wants to be tarred as a wimp every night by Fox News? Moreover, he would remove from the Europeans and others the Bush alibi for their relative absence in the war on terror. More important, his presidency would weaken the Michael Moore wing of the Democrats, by forcing them to take responsibility for a war that is theirs’ as much a anyone’s. As Bob Kagan put it recently,

There are many reasons why, in theory, the US would benefit from a Democratic victory. It is important for the Democrats to own the war on terrorism and not simply be the opposition. Also, we would have a fresh start with the Europeans and other allies, though they would quickly be disillusioned to learn that Kerry wouldn’t be that different from Bush in some respects.”

Max Boot, another neoconservative, echoes the theme:

I am not at all averse to giving a Democrat a shot. In fact, a Democrat might be better able to sell skeptics abroad and at home on the need for toughness. It also would be good for the Democrats to buy into this long-term struggle, just as Republicans bought into the containment policy with Dwight D. Eisenhower’s 1952 election.

I’m not saying this is obvious. I am saying it is perfectly possible to be pro-war and pro-Kerry. Especially after the mishandling of the last year in Iraq, our frayed relations with important allies, and the president’s fiscal undermining of our future military capacity.

MORE ON IRAQ NUKE SITES: This story continues to gain ground:

The mysterious removal of Iraq’s mothballed nuclear facilities continued long after the U.S.-led invasion and was carried out by people with access to heavy machinery and demolition equipment, diplomats said on Thursday… Several diplomats close to the IAEA said the disappearance of the nuclear items was not the result of haphazard looting. They said the removal of the dual-use equipment — which before the war was tagged and closely monitored by the IAEA to ensure it was not being used in a weapons program — was planned and executed by people who knew what they were doing. “We’re talking about dozens of sites being dismantled,” a diplomat said on condition of anonymity. “Large numbers of buildings taken down, warehouses were emptied and removed. This would require heavy machinery, demolition equipment. This is not something that you’d do overnight.”

Why were these sites not guarded? Not enough troops. We launched an invasion to prevent dangerous materials from being exported to terror groups or enemy regimes. And yet we stood by as exactly this happened – on our watch. Unbelievable. Unforgivable.

A CONSERVATIVE GAFFE: Here’s an amazing admission:

While the Democrats have been hurling specious and unsubstantiated charges about Republicans suppressing the African-American vote, Kerry and Edwards are leading their party’s effort – on national television no less – to discourage religious and social conservatives from going to the ballot box for President Bush.

How? By mentioning the fact that Dick Cheney’s daughter is openly lesbian. Now why on earth would that fact make one less likely to vote for Bush-Cheney? The only possible reason is that these voters are bigots, and it is partly on that basis that the GOP is appealing to them. If that weren’t the case, Cesar Conda’s argument wouldn’t hold up at all. Well, at least he’s honest. So too is NRO for running the piece: we’re catering to homophobes and don’t mess with that! Just please don’t tell me that the GOP is a tolerant or inclusive party. If you depend on bigots to win elections, and you pander to them, and rev them up by demonizing minorities, don’t expect the rest of us to sympathize when you’re caught red-handed.