There is a certain freedom afforded to the loyal opposition. The opposition can stay on the attack and constantly criticize incumbents without the need to be consistent or even responsible for the consequences of an action proposed. There is nothing new about this phenomenon. Politicians from Thomas Jefferson, to Benjamin Disraeli to Richard Nixon would not want history to judge them based on their behavior during the time when they were ascending to power.
Moreover, a negative position is always easier to sell than positive change. Lobbyists will charge their clients much more to push legislation through, than to defeat a bill.
Nevertheless, the day of reckoning comes when the minority party seizes the reins of power. That day has arrived for President Obama. A case in point is the consternation brewing within the Democratic Party over the so-called torture issue. This appeared to be a perfect issue for the Democrats. They were claiming the moral high ground when they protested that prisoners were not being treated humanely. Because the military intelligence apparatus operate in secrecy, their defenders would not reveal what was actually going on. Therefore the Democrats could conjecture and make accusations of all sorts of misconduct and the military would not fully respond. It was not a fair fight.
President Obama is now charged with carrying out his promises to get rid of torture, to abolish Guantanamo, to try those charged with crimes in American courts applying our constitutional principles, or to send some of the accused terrorists to other countries for trials governed by their laws. He is discovering that reform is not quite so simple either as a matter of policy or practicality. Other countries are refusing to bail him out by accepting these hot potato inmates. (Their politicians want to be reelected.) Senators are willing to authorize trials in our courts but not in their state. (They want to be reelected, too.) He is learning that the maligned military tribunals serve a useful purpose, so he is replacing them with a newly reformed tribunal. I suspect that the principal reform is that he will give them a new name. His first attempt at transparency was to renege on his agreement to release pictures of torture.
The sad part is that the torture issue was somewhat mooted even before the 2008 campaign, for the simple reason that most of the work had already been done in the Bush Administration. It now appears that the Bush administration had gone a long way to eliminate the worst abuses. I understand that the last water boarding occurred in 2003, and none is contemplated in the future. There was no need for the Democrats to engage in this debate on that technique other than to preserve an issue for the 2008 political campaigns.
Moreover, I suspect that the Democrats are learning that public support for so-called torture is broader that they realized. I cannot remember an instance where a suit against law enforcement officers for violation of civil rights of persons in custody was sustained by a jury. In one prominent instance, a federal jury in Birmingham refused to award damages against police officers who allegedly used electric cattle prods on the prisoners. I thought that perhaps the strong pro law enforcement sentiment is limited to the conservative South. But when a California jury ruled in favor of the police officer defendants who were caught on tape beating a Rodney King while he was lying on the ground, I decided that jury unwillingness to hamper law enforcement efforts, even when violent and abusive, reflects a national rather than regional attitude among middle class voters. (Democrats are politicians, and they want to be reelected.)
What conclusion is to be drawn from all of this? If you are not an Obama fan, I am sure you can enjoy watching him squirm. I believe, however, that there is a more important message coming out of this mess. It is simply that our President is willing to back off when he sees that a former course is going awry. To me, his actions of implicit retraction are signs of strength. It is better to be strong in the face of criticism from his own party, even if he is called a coward, than to be cowardly in order to appear to be strong.
Showing posts with label Bush. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bush. Show all posts
Monday, May 25, 2009
Thursday, January 8, 2009
The Legacy of W as President
It is time to reflect on the legacy of George W. Bush. He originally promised to reach across the aisle to all parties to work for the common good. If unity was to be the mantra of his administration, he failed miserably. The brief consensus after 9/11 was permanently erased by the Iraq war. Now his legacy will be defined by the ultimate consequences of the war he started.
W certainly made some monumental mistakes. His sabre rattling “axis of evil” State of the Union speech in January 2002 irretrievably placed the US in a hostile, almost warlike, stance against Iraq, Iran, and Korea. This country had neither the resources nor the political will take on those three regimes simultaneously in addition to much unfinished business in Afghanistan. In the end he chose to invade Iraq, which proved to be all this country was prepared to handle. Reagan’s strength was his ability to use power. Every one knew that when he made a threat, he was prepared to carry it out. Even the most powerful country in the world is weakened when it expends much of its energy and resources on a war that does not produce the expected results.
Second, he, or at least Cheney, claimed that the Iraqis would welcome the US in open arms because of the tyranny of Sadam. W should have talked to his father who made the same mistake in Somalia. The fact is that people fight with unrestrained determination on their own soil . I know of no example where a foreign power sought to dislodge a domestic government and did not meet the fierce resistance of the people. There may be some, but I cannot recall.
Third, he thought he could turn Iraq into a western style democracy, reversing thousands of years of nomadic culture which operate under paradigms quite opposed to democracy. Other colonial powers had tried and failed to westernize the Middle East. He thought he could do better, and he fought a war with an unrealistic goal.
All that being said, do we conclude that W was the worst president in American History, as Senator Harry Reed proudly declares? Not so fast. Opponents of the War blandly seem to assume that the Middle East would somehow have muddled along quite nicely without the American intervention. W should be measured by a comparison of where we are with where we would have been if the Iraq War had never happened. This involves a lot of speculation, but there are clues worth looking at.
In the first place, if America had known the day after 9/11 that there would be no further terrorist attacks on its soil for the next seven years, we would have been inclined to canonize W. Now that this has been accomplished, the feat is pooh poohed. With all the bumbling, W put the terrorists on the defensive, and at least they are trying to infiltrate Iraq rather than New Jersey.
Moreover, W has turned over to Obama a vastly improved military and intelligence community adept in combating terrorism. With all the talk about how W is disliked in Europe, I get the impression that the European military and intelligence communities work very closely with us to repel terrorist threats. and that the coordinated efforts of the western democracies is a formidable force that has been highly deterrent against the terrorists.
Furthermore, we can assume that Sadam would still be alive doing his thing. He obviously had imperialistic ambitions. He had already engaged in a bloody eight year war with Iran and invaded Kuwait. He had an aggressive missile development program, which evidenced a desire to dominate the Middle East militarily. His destabilization potential was immense.
I do not believe that history will fully excuse W from some of his mistakes. Nevertheless, there is a good possibility that when future generations will that his administration responded well to the changes in military goals and strategies needed to counteract terrorism. If so, many of his miscues will not loom as large as being characterized by his contemporary critics.
W certainly made some monumental mistakes. His sabre rattling “axis of evil” State of the Union speech in January 2002 irretrievably placed the US in a hostile, almost warlike, stance against Iraq, Iran, and Korea. This country had neither the resources nor the political will take on those three regimes simultaneously in addition to much unfinished business in Afghanistan. In the end he chose to invade Iraq, which proved to be all this country was prepared to handle. Reagan’s strength was his ability to use power. Every one knew that when he made a threat, he was prepared to carry it out. Even the most powerful country in the world is weakened when it expends much of its energy and resources on a war that does not produce the expected results.
Second, he, or at least Cheney, claimed that the Iraqis would welcome the US in open arms because of the tyranny of Sadam. W should have talked to his father who made the same mistake in Somalia. The fact is that people fight with unrestrained determination on their own soil . I know of no example where a foreign power sought to dislodge a domestic government and did not meet the fierce resistance of the people. There may be some, but I cannot recall.
Third, he thought he could turn Iraq into a western style democracy, reversing thousands of years of nomadic culture which operate under paradigms quite opposed to democracy. Other colonial powers had tried and failed to westernize the Middle East. He thought he could do better, and he fought a war with an unrealistic goal.
All that being said, do we conclude that W was the worst president in American History, as Senator Harry Reed proudly declares? Not so fast. Opponents of the War blandly seem to assume that the Middle East would somehow have muddled along quite nicely without the American intervention. W should be measured by a comparison of where we are with where we would have been if the Iraq War had never happened. This involves a lot of speculation, but there are clues worth looking at.
In the first place, if America had known the day after 9/11 that there would be no further terrorist attacks on its soil for the next seven years, we would have been inclined to canonize W. Now that this has been accomplished, the feat is pooh poohed. With all the bumbling, W put the terrorists on the defensive, and at least they are trying to infiltrate Iraq rather than New Jersey.
Moreover, W has turned over to Obama a vastly improved military and intelligence community adept in combating terrorism. With all the talk about how W is disliked in Europe, I get the impression that the European military and intelligence communities work very closely with us to repel terrorist threats. and that the coordinated efforts of the western democracies is a formidable force that has been highly deterrent against the terrorists.
Furthermore, we can assume that Sadam would still be alive doing his thing. He obviously had imperialistic ambitions. He had already engaged in a bloody eight year war with Iran and invaded Kuwait. He had an aggressive missile development program, which evidenced a desire to dominate the Middle East militarily. His destabilization potential was immense.
I do not believe that history will fully excuse W from some of his mistakes. Nevertheless, there is a good possibility that when future generations will that his administration responded well to the changes in military goals and strategies needed to counteract terrorism. If so, many of his miscues will not loom as large as being characterized by his contemporary critics.
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