The Dish

The liberal interventionist, Paul Berman, expresses my view entirely about the rationale for the war against Saddam, even accounting for the WMD embarrassment:

What was the reason for the war in Iraq? Sept. 11 was the reason. At least to my mind it was. Sept. 11 showed that totalitarianism in its modern Muslim version was not going to stop at slaughtering millions of Muslims, and hundreds of Israelis, and attacking the Indian government, and blowing up American embassies. The totalitarian manias were rising, and the United States itself was now in danger. A lot of people wanted to respond, as any mayor would do, by rounding up a single Bad Guy, Osama.
But Sept. 11 did not come from a single Bad Guy – it was a product of the larger totalitarian wave, and the only proper response was to comprehend the size and depth of that larger wave, and find ways to begin rolling it back, militarily and otherwise – mostly otherwise. To roll it back for our own sake, and everyone else’s sake, Muslims’ especially. Iraq, with its somewhat antique variation of the Muslim totalitarian idea, was merely a place to begin, after Afghanistan, with its more modern variation.

For me, September 11 told us we faced a huge problem – one that would annihilate our civilization if we did not confront it. Confronting it meant engaging the Arab Musim world and finding a way to bring it into modernity. Only dangerous, time-consuming, casualty-incurring involvement would achieve this. Iraq is the very beginning, not the end game. My fundamental concern with the Dean candidacy is that he doesn’t recognize this. He doesn’t see the bigger picture: that the terror we face is not a function of mere criminality but of ideology. But unless we have leaders who understand the depth of the problem and the threat, we are doomed not just to defeat but to catastrophe.

What to make of the former Treasury secretary’s complaints? The paranoia about planning for war against Saddam early on is silly: of course, there were plans. Regime change had been national policy under late Clinton. Less easy to dismiss are O’Neill’s complaints that fit with John DiIulio’s, when he quit. To wit: This White House is all about politics. Yes, and banks are full of money. But with this White House, there is a level of politicization that’s striking. When challenged on the important question of whether stockpiles of Saddam’s WMDs have been found in contrast to mere infrastructure, plans, and scientists, the president told Diane Sawyer, “What’s the difference?” The glibness of that response still rankles. There was no difference to the president as long as the politics worked out okay, and, in general, he made the right decision. But someone who cannot anguish over his own mistakes may be doomed to repeat them. Integrity means the ability to question yourself. It does not mean the peremptory dismissal of all criticism.

POLITICAL BUSH: The supremacy of politics over everything accounts, of course, for some spectacular coups – like the immigration proposal – and some hideous errors – like the steel tariffs. But it remains one of the most illuminating prisms through which to understand this administration. The second criticism is one I’ve also seen close-up: an absolute refusal even to contemplate that they have a spending or deficit problem. Josh Bolten’s response is to ignore actual spending totals and focus on what the administration intended to disburse. Mankiw cannot defend the deficits and when he does, it’s painful. Rove abruptly dismisses any discussion of deficits – on the grounds (surprise!) that they don’t swing votes in a growing economy. So what? They destroy economies in the long run. Money O’Neill quote from Time:

In an economic meeting in the Vice President’s office, O’Neill started pitching, describing how the numbers showed that growing budget deficits threatened the economy. Cheney cut him off. “Reagan proved deficits don’t matter,” he said. O’Neill was too dumbfounded to respond. Cheney continued: “We won the midterms. This is our due.”

That rings true to me. There is, within this administration, a deep antipathy to questioning certain shibboleths. I wonder who has dared to tell the president that his space program ideas cannot be funded responsibly and so should not be funded. I bet no one. The same kind of blank refusal to consider alternative views can be seen in the fact that, despite enormous (and good) research from within the administration on how to prepare very carefully for the post-war in Iraq, much of it was ignored. Some of this blindness can help a president be decisive and drive events. Some leads into disaster. Much of the O’Neill stuff can be dismissed as sour grapes. But there are some worrying themes about the way this administration runs itself that rightly endure. The only sure bet is that the administration will ignore them.

Is Howard Dean the only one popping off bizarre accusations against the Bush administration? I’ve written before that Wesley Clark is arguably far more loopy than Dean, more prone to paranoia, weird conspiracy theories, and reversals of opinion that are dizzying in scope. Chris Suellentrop has been on the trail and discovering more. My favorites: “[the president] is continuing to associate Saddam, Iraq, and the problem of terrorism. Yet the only terrorists that are in Iraq are the people that have come there to attack us.” Yeah, right. Abu Nidal was on a vacation in Baghdad. “Newsweek magazine says [Osama bin Laden] is in the mountains of western Pakistan. And I guess if Newsweek could find him there, we could, too, if we wanted to.” Sure, the president wouldn’t want to find bin Laden in an election year. Why would he want to do that?

THE SELF-ESTEEM OF BULLIES: They have plenty of it. But we knew that, didn’t we? “They don’t show any signs whatsoever of depression, loneliness or anxiety,” Dr Juvonen said. “They look even healthier than the socially adjusted kids who are not involved in the bullying.” Duh. They’re mainly boys; they have testosterone; their social cachet comes from becoming Alpha Male. The last thing you need to do is psychoanalyze them: they have to be disciplined. Like dictators.

An amazing op-ed in Kentucky from a Pentecostalist lays out the extraordinary double standards on marriage from the Christian right:

Even in the conservative Christian community, divorce is rampant. As the only lawyer in my church (a very conservative Pentecostal congregation), I frequently receive telephone calls from fellow church members requesting assistance on child custody matters, property division and other divorce-related questions.
I have fielded so many questions about divorce that I am sometimes surprised when I encounter middle-aged congregants who have not been previously married. The gay community could not treat their marriage vows any worse than many Christians treat their own.

What matters, in other words, is what virtues marriage contains, not what people it excludes. Jesus was not interested in drawing bright lines about groups of people and barring them from full inclusion in society. He was interested in how all of us live our lives. It’s the content of our lives, not the label society places on us that matters. But the current Christian right is far more concerned about keeping gay people out than in the true meaning of marriage. The op-ed continues:

In the days, weeks and months to come, we can expect to hear many conservative commentators decry the continuing decay of our culture. In the debate that follows – and as accusations of intolerance and immorality fly between left and right – remember that Christians and conservatives long ago met the real enemy of the sacred institution of marriage – and we are that enemy.

Ouch.

EMAIL OF THE DAY: “First, a little about me. 30, media professional, married with a young son, Brooklynite, registered Democrat, long-time TNR subscriber, pro-Iraq war, great fan or yours.
Now that we’ve established the basics, here’s my plight. I am horrified by my own party, and have been for quite some time. Al Sharpton as our moral arbiter? Check. Continued obeisance to the failed domestic and foreign policies of a bygone age? Check. Failure to learn the lessons of history? Check. Movement away from the Party’s few voices of reason (read: Lieberman)? Check.
So I guess we’ve settled it: can’t stick with this mangy dog. Which leads me to the other guys…
Abandonment of fiscal sanity? Check. Hateful, close-minded bedfellows? Check. Unchecked rapacity? Check. And that’s just Cheney. Bush, by all accounts, is the least curious-intellectually, or otherwise-President in modern history. Guess they’re out, too.
So what is a reasonable, patriotic, inclusive, urban professional to do? My peers are closet socialists who want to present Bush’s head to Kofi Annan as a peace offering. On the other hand, I’m not ready to make my peace with a party that still counts on the religious right to mobilize the vote. It’s as if I’m caught in vortex, between the two parties, but seemingly light-years from either. My secret fear, of course, is that I and my ilk do not represent an underserved silent majority, but we, in fact, are just a tiny, sane minority standing between the radical fringes on either side. Sadly, I do not see the situation improving anytime soon. Any words of encouragement for a man without a party?” – from a beleaguered reader. You read my mind, sir. Too depressing for words.

“And, Tim, you can hear the advertisements now; so can I. We saw what they did to challenge the patriotism of Max Cleland, a triple amputee, a man who left three of his limbs on the ground in Vietnam. They challenged his patriotism. His regret is he didn’t stand up and fight back.” – John Kerry, Meet The Press.

What’s this document that former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill claims he found showing elaborate post-Iraq war planning prior to 9/11? Could it be something else entirely?

Ramesh Ponnuru ducks the central question in National Review’s endorsement of a Constitutional Amendment to ban gay marriage. If NR wants to preserve marriage as an institution, why is it happy to see states create a competing marriage-lite institution, civil unions, for heterosexuals? If the point of social policy is to protect marriage and to increase incentives for marriage (except, of course, for homosexuals), why acquiesce in an institution that will undermine it far more deeply and far more comprehensively than gay marriage ever could? The answer is that this kind of “anyone-can-apply-they-don’t-have-to-have sex” civil union keeps the government from any position condoning or acknowledging gay relationships. That is the bedrock position of NR. Anything but acknowledgment of the dignity and civil equality of gay couples. In NR’s eyes, gay couples are not the civil, moral or spiritual equivalent of straight couples. Britney and Jason are always the moral superiors to a lesbian couple caring for each other for years. You listening, Mary Cheney? That’s what they think of us. So the gay relationship is relegated to the 1950s status of room-mates – where the social right feels more comfortable. This is the fundamental difference. It is motivated entirely by animus for gay couples. You think the religious right was interested in providing civil benefits to straight room-mates before the issue of same-sex marriage came along? You think they were thinking of passing a constitutional amendment to strengthen marriage before the threat of gay equality? The bottom line is that NR’s editors consider gay relationships inferior as a civil matter to straight ones. They think that the most honorable and profound gay relationship is worth less than Britney’s 55 hour marriage. Why cannot they say this? My relationship wth my boyfriend will never be as good as Britney’s to Jason – and it’s worth amending the very constitution to affirm that for ever. Ponnuru may not like conceding this. But it’s true. The fight is between privilege and equality. NR, not for the first time, backs privilege. That’s why gay people and their families will fight this amendment to the very end. Because it’s about writing us out of the meaning of America – for ever.

A fascinating and disturbing interview with controversial Israeli historian, Benny Morris, is worth reading in Ha’aretz. The most common criticism of Morris is that he has both exposed some of the original sins of the state of Israel, while remaining a Zionist. Morris embraces both positions in this interview. Money quote:

Ha’aretz: Ben-Gurion was a “transferist”?

Morris: “Of course. Ben-Gurion was a transferist. He understood that there could be no Jewish state with a large and hostile Arab minority in its midst. There would be no such state. It would not be able to exist.”

Ha’aretz: I don’t hear you condemning him.

Morris: “Ben-Gurion was right. If he had not done what he did, a state would not have come into being. That has to be clear. It is impossible to evade it. Without the uprooting of the Palestinians, a Jewish state would not have arisen here.”

Read the whole thing.

I wonder what Mickey Kaus thought of the Democratic Iowa “Black and Brown” debate – in itself an example of the kind of special interest group pandering that has now returned to dominate the Democratic Party. There wasn’t a nano-second in which any candidate said anything to suggest that minorities can do anything to benefit themselves without more government help, more money and more white condescension. The crowd lapped it up. Joe Lieberman couldn’t even bring himself to oppose reparations. Not affirmative action. Reparations! You’ve come a long way, Joe. Long gone is the Clintonian art of giving a damn about race without resorting to paleo notions that all whites are at fault and all blacks are victims. In that kind of context, it’s no accident that Al Sharpton becomes the moral arbiter. His use of the race-card against Dean had me bolt upright, and was an indication of what could happen if Dean gets the nomination. There’s no guarantee that Sharpton will support the nominee, or won’t demand embarrassing, election-losing concessions from the platform if he does. He’ll also get a big speaking slot at the convention – or use the negotiations as more street theater. It truly is back to 1988 – as farce. But unlike 1988, the Democratic nominee will not be able to shun Sharpton. The Dems are now dependent on massive black support just to be competitive in many states – which gives Sharpton more leverage than even Jesse Jackson once had. One thing we have learned from this campaign is that the Clinton policy make-over of the Democrats now has only one standard-bearer: his wife. For the rest, it’s that ’70s Show, with post-industrial populism thrown in.

QUOTE OF THE DAY: “Mr. Clinton was doing well. The party lost. Gingrich killed us in ’94. ’96, under Clinton, we didn’t regain the Congress … in ’98. We didn’t regain it in 2000, we lost it all in 2002 when we were demolished. We lost everything as a party. Bill Clinton won the party, and Bill Clinton may not have won it had it not been for Perot. That is my point. Centrism killed this party. People are saying, well, Sharpton and progressives killed the party. The party is dead. I come to help start the resurrection.” – Al Sharpton, on WUSA in Washington. On this, at least, Sharpton agrees with Rush Limbaugh.

Who do you think wrote the following sentences:

The kaleidoscope of Mideast power relations has just gone through one of its periodic shifting of shapes. Saddam Hussein is a prisoner of war, Iran is accepting intrusive inspection of its nuclear sites, Khadafy is dismantling his weapons of mass destruction programs in order to have sanctions on Libya lifted, and Assad’s impoverished minority regime may look upon a negotiated peace with Israel as its best chance to prolong its existence.

Some nefarious neocon? Nah. Just the passionately anti-war Boston Globe, delicately avoiding why it might be that things have improved a mite in the Middle East recently. (Of course the only reason they are optimistic is in order to call for Israel to make more concessions. But sometimes you have to take epiphanies where you can find them.) A less surprising round-up of success is in Safire today.)

BUSH-IS-HITLER WATCH: The sicko left now takes on the troops. This image had me boiling mad.

MEET THE BLOGS: Tim Russert just discussed the intersection of the web and politics. Jeff Jarvis is way more interesting than the transcript. But the transcript has a picture of John Kerry that – even without words – sent me into a near-coma.