Much discussion, everywhere it seems, in the past weeks and months about whether we were “misled” into war. It’s really the wrong question, the wrong issue for us to debate. And, as a purely political matter, it’s not a winner for the Democrats. Democrats who voted to authorize action by the President in Iraq are beginning to have their words handed back to them, and in some cases they sounded more alarmist at that time (Fall of 2002) than the President or Vice President. We may have been misled into war, but we were misled by many — Republicans, Democrats, intelligence analysts, some in the press, and so on. The blame is spread far and wide.
So we should stop wasting time on it. The right issue is: Given what we thought we knew then, was war the best possible option? We are, of course, benefitted by hindsight now, and so the answer to that question is much easier to give: No.
Even without the benefit of hindsight, but with the benefit of cold-minded, heartless, strategic thinking and critical analysis, it’s pretty clear going to war was the wrong thing to do. We should have known that at the time, even with our belief (now shown to be mistaken) that Saddam was building chemical and potentially nuclear weapons. We had other, better options. We failed to take them.
Why?
We need to spend more time trying to find the answer to that question, and stop bickering about who misled whom. Only then can we begin to figure out what we ought to do next.
The War
Taxes, Priorities
I’ve just filled out my California ballot, and find myself feeling like a Republican. Kind of.
The ballot included two proposals for public works projects, each of which requires additional property taxes to fund the proposal. The increments are small (about $70 a year in additional taxes for the average homeowner). It would have had no impact on me — I’m a renter.
But filling out the ballot, I instinctively understood why most American’s are drawn to the Republicans’ pitch that they won’t raise taxes, and that in fact they’ll slash them. Not an election goes by where, at the state and local levels, we’re asked to fund something. It gets tiresome.
If i could be the top strategist for the Democrats for a day, I’d do the following: declare agreement with the Republicans that taxes shouldn’t be raised and agree to a moratorium on new taxes, barring real, serious national emergencies. I’d then ask the American people to join in some sacrifices, and to engage in a discussion about our national priorities. What we can afford. What we can’t.
For thirty years, the conventional wisdom has been that voters are not receptive to this kind of pitch. If they make peace on taxes, I think the Democrats would find that most voters are in the mood for exactly this kind of discussion.
For the record, I voted no on both of the proposals.
Missing London, Tempered by Charlie
I find myself missing London right now, especially with the recent Rebecca Wade spousal abuse story. It’s the kind of story that will completely absorb the media and chattering classes for the next few days, one full of great gossip and delicious ironies. The tabloids will have great fun with it, and while I’m reading along online from afar, it just isn’t the same as being there.
I’m also missing London because tomorrow is Guy Fawkes Day, celebrating the discovery of the Gunpowder Plot, an effort of a small band of Catholics to blow up the Houses of Parliament in 1604, and the subsequent execution of Guy Fawkes (one of the leaders of the plot) and his co-conspirators, as follows:
They would be hanged until half-dead, upon which their genitals would
be cut off and burned in front of them. Still alive, their bowels and
heart would be removed. Finally they would be decapitated and
dismembered; their body parts would be publicly displayed, eaten by the
birds as they decomposed.
The celebration in modern times is a lighter affair. Great bonfires around the country (and throughout London) are lit, and effigies of Guy Fawkes thrown onto the fires. We would amble over to the communal garden adjacent to ours, which hosted a terrific bonfire, served nice mulled wine, and put on a fine fireworks show at the end. It was, in many ways, one of our favorite evenings of the year. My British friends who are Catholic, though, complain that the celebration still makes them shudder.
My hankering after London this week is tempered by the upcoming visit to our town of a high profile Englishman, the Prince of Wales, that weak-chinned, inbred flower whisperer. Some of the coverage of his visit in the American press is encouragingly hostile — I loved the New York Post headline "Frump Tower," referring to Camilla’s sense of style — but too much is fawning and submissive. Just today, in the San Francisco Chronicle, we have some Miss Manners who "cringed" as she watched the protocol gaffes in New York (real people actually deigning to shake the Hand of the Prince!) and who proceeds to give us a very proper lesson on protocol with the Royals, reminding us of the no-talking-unless-talked-to and bowing-curtsying-yes-ma’am genuflections that we are supposed to offer.
As a friend of mine here said as we departed for London almost four years ago: "If you meet the queen, don’t bow or curtsy. We fought a war over that, you know."
The Brownie Era
This pretty much captures it, the greatness of these years, the dizzying heights to which the Bush Administration has taken our country:
"Please roll up the sleeves of your shirt … all shirts. Even the President rolled his sleeves to just below the elbow.
"In this crisis and on TV you just need to look more hard-working… ROLL UP THE SLEEVES!"
An e-mail from Sharon Worthy, to Michael "Brownie" Brown, September 2, 2005.
The sad, but true, story here, PDFs of the email here.
And Peggy Noonan has the gall to wonder why were depressed.
WWLD
I just read Peggy Noonan’s piece in the WSJ today courtesy of Weinberger.
Noonan tells us that we all share "a sense that the wheels are coming off the trolley and the trolley off the tracks" and goes on to say:
Our
elites, our educated and successful professionals, are the ones who are
supposed to dig us out and lead us. I refer specifically to the elites
of journalism and politics, the elites of the Hill and at Foggy Bottom
and the agencies, the elites of our state capitals, the rich and
accomplished and successful of Washington, and elsewhere. I have a
nagging sense, and think I have accurately observed, that many of these
people have made a separate peace. That they’re living their lives and
taking their pleasures and pursuing their agendas; that they’re going
forward each day with the knowledge, which they hold more securely and
with greater reason than nonelites, that the wheels are off the trolley
and the trolley’s off the tracks, and with a conviction, a certainty,
that there is nothing they can do about it.
Rich, that.
Rich, because the current state of affairs owes much to the fact that
the Republicans — her party — won, and have controlled our nation’s
public affairs for most of the past 35 years, and achieved so many of
their ambitions during that time. Achieved ambitions that have produced the results she now bemoans: the total disdain for governance and government, the active rejection of the idea that any good could come from any communal action, the complete belief in individualism and the power of greed for good, the willingness to use politics of division and personal attack to win power.
Rich because her party, the Republicans, have so effectively cultivated a hatred for the very "elites" Ms. Noonan now summons among many working class, and middle income voters, in order to wage a permanent campaign of insurgency, even as the incumbents.
Rich, ultimately, because it almost seems like she is outlining the next chapter in the "blame the liberals and the media" playbook that Noonan and her cohorts have been running for thirty years now. And now that it has become clear what her party’s regime has wrought, now it’s the fault of these so-called "elites" — for not stepping up and keeping things from going to hell in a handbasket.
If it wasn’t all so sad, it would be funny.
NB: Oh, and the "WWLD" title? A plaintive cry to the Original Republican — What Would Lincoln Do?
