Mearshimer & Walt: The Questions They Never Asked

Everybody's favorite academic realists turned anti-Israel polemicists are back. Mearshimer and Walt's book-length expansion of their infamous "Israel Lobby" hits the stores next week. As a result, we will soon see, both in print and in the blogosphere, a rehash of the original debates that surrounded the publication of the article along with a phony debate over whether the book "fixes" the various flaws exposed by M&W's critics.

The initial reports are, with the exception of addressing the gaping hole that resulted from the near total absence of Christian Zionism in the original , the book essential duplicates the original argument. And while the various factual inaccuracies that have been pointed out help clarify that M&W had long left the province of rigorous academic thought, it is the fundamental flaws in the structure of the argument itself that exposed the original for the fraud that it was. Which means that for the book to indeed "fix" what was wrong in the original, it has a massive reconstruction project that M&W based on their post-article martyr tour have no intention of undertaking.

M&W's original article had essentially three elements. First, M&W asserted that there is a disconnect between US policy towards Israel and more broadly in the Middle East and the US's strategic interests. Second, M&W argued that this disconnect is due to the power and influence of the "Israel Lobby." Third, M&W purports to describe how the "Lobby" effects the disconnect between US interests and policies.

M&W gave their paper all the trapping of legitimate scholarship - a myriad of footnotes and a dry, dispassionate tone. What they did not provide, however, was rigor. If M&W were truly interested in examining the issues they posed in their paper, rather than backfilling an argument to a conclusion they had already reached, they would have had to have asked and answered the following questions:

(1) Is there in fact a disconnect between US policy towards Israel and the Middle East & US strategic interests?

This is of course the question that M&W seem best qualified to address given their past scholarship and credentials. Whatever one thinks of the merits of a rigorous Realist analysis, one would expect M&W to construct one, providing a detailed and nuanced cost-benefit analysis from a realist perspective of the American-Israeli "special relationship."

Instead, M&W treat the foundation stone of their argument as self-evident. They make a cursory argument regarding the diminution of Israel's value after the Cold War. However, the rest of this section, which discusses the liabilities that the US-Israel partnership imposes on the US's relationships with the other regimes in the region, relies mainly on a recitation of self-serving statements of Arab political elites without further analysis.

The reason M&W view the cost-benefit analysis of the current US-Israel relationship to be so self-evidently negative is that included at the heart of this analysis is an assumption that the large cost of the Iraq war should be attributed to the US- Israel relationship. Most of the criticism of the claim that the Israel Lobby led ths US into Iraq has focused on the conspiratorial and latently anti-Semitic aspects of it. But the dubiousness of the Israel-Iraq link is equally damning to M&W's substantive analysis. If the true costs of the US-Israeli relationship are limited to lucrative aid packages and peeved oil barons, then it is impossible to construct a Realist analysis that results in these costs overwhelming the benefits provided by the strategic US-Israeli partnership.

(2) Are there other reasons (besides the Israel Lobby) that explain this disconnect?

The obvious factors to look at here overlap but are essentially ideological and political - the moral claims of the Israeli position and the cultural affinity of the two nations. (The very idea that moral concerns lay outside our strategic interests is itself problematic, but at least consistent with "realist" doctrine.) These factors could either move elite or public opinion towards Israel and away from the "correct" policy that would result from a "dispassionate" Realist analysis.

In an odd move for a pair of Realists, the only attention given to this question is lengthy, scatter-shot attempt to rebut the moral case for Israel. This consists mainly of stringing together various tropes of anti-Israel propaganda and concluding that any tension between strategic necessity and moral principle is illusory. This entire exercise is a fraud, because M&W would reject the notion that even if the moral scorecard came out differently the result should be different.

What M&W do not however shed any light on the critical factor of public opinion. They do not answer the question of whether US's Israel policy is out of line not only with how American's should see US interests (if we were fortunate enough to be ruled by an American Bismarck), but how Americans actually view US interests.

Moving onto the M&W section on how the Israel Lobby purportedly functions, you would expect an analysis of the following:

(3) How do foreign policy lobbies function?

A scholarly article would properly set the Israel Lobby in context. How effective are foreign policy lobbies, domestic and foreign, at shifting U.S. policies? Does this salience of the issue reduce the impact of lobbies? For example, the anti-Castro Cuban emigrant lobby has traditionally had a stranglehold over our Cuba policy, an issue that most Americans are wholly indiffirent towards. M&W are proposing that the Israel Lobby is strong enough not only to steer low profile military aid packages Israel's direction, but to drag America into full-scale armed conflict. It would help in evaluating the feasibility of this claim if there is any historical precedent supporting it.

(4) Are there other foreign policy lobbies shaping our policy towards Israel and Middle East?

Similarly, a scholarly article would address the various other interests that compete to shape American Middle East policy - military contractors, domestic oil companies, trans-national corporations, the Saudis and other oil exporters, etc. M&W show absolutely no interest in these countervailing factors. To some extent, M&W avoid this area because it is far outside their realm of expertise. But another reason for the absence is that these lobbies all reinforce the Hamiltonian Realist agenda, which sees securing strategic resources and promoting American corporate interests as twin pillars of American foreign policy goals.

(5) What are the Israel Lobby's goals? What have been its greatest successes and failures?

You would think that this question would be at the heart of any genuine analysis of the "Israel Lobby's" power and influence. M&W have a unfocused discussion about the goals of securing the West Bank and preserving Israeli military hegemony. Additionally, M&W make much out of AIPAC's influence in a handful of Congressional elections. Yet, amazingly M&W do not even begin to touch on the high-profile showdowns between U.S. administrations and Israel during the past 30 years, or the success or failure of pro-Israel advocates in shifting American policy. There is absolutely no analysis of the First Lebanon war, the AWACS sale to Saudi Arabia, the Bush/Baker-Shamir showdown over settlement expansion or the Clinton administration's hands-on supervision of the Oslo process.

(6) Who is the Israel Lobby? What is the relationship between the Israel Lobby and American Jews?

M&W's failure to examine what the Israel Lobby has and has not achieved is connected intimately with their failure to clearly define exactly who the "Israel Lobby" is. On the one hand, it is relatively straightforward challenge to document AIPAC's successes and failures. On the other hand, once the "Israel Lobby" is expanded to an amorphous group that includes all American Jews with warm feelings towards Israel, any honest analysis would expose the competing jumble of contradictory viewpoints and agendas of such a group.

M&W appear to be trapped by the backfilling nature of their argument, which is designed to ultimately reach the Iraq war. However, neither AIPAC nor Israel were at the front of the line beating the drums for war with Iraq. The case for blaming Israel for the Iraq debacle requires tabbing various neocons in the Bush administration as agents of the Israel Lobby. But putting aside the quite laughable assertion that Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld were less powerful than Feith, Perle and Wolfowitz, there is the serious problem that the neocon agenda frequently differed from that of the formal pro-Israel Lobbies, let alone that of the Zionist liberals who had previously embraced the Oslo process.

Mearshimer and Walt thus fail to seriously ask let alone answer any of the questions that would need in order to undertake a serious academic study of the impact of pro-Israel lobbies on American foreign policy. The result was an article that relied on innuendo, conspiracy and polemic to fill in its gaping logical and analytic holes. A mere tweaking or expansion of the article (e.g. sprinkling in a chapter on Christian Zionism or expanding the polemic to US-Syrian relations) can't possibly salvage the book as a serious work of scholarship. Unfortunately, these "fixes" will be enough to sell many copies to an audience that either doesn't know what scholarly analysis looks like or doesn't care.

Rays of Light for Darfur

Just in time for the Yom HaShoah season, President Bush has rediscovered the ongoing genocide in Darfur. Bush threated to apply additional sanctions on the Sudanese government should they fail to take action to stop the violence. Bush's speech should be applauded, for no other reason than the possibility that positive reinforcement might spur him into serious action. However, in order to be worthy of anything louder than a golf clap or two, Bush needs to translate his strong, if sporadic rhetoric into concrete action. It is long past time that discussions of establishing a no-fly moved from the realm of the hypothetical.

Two other recent developments give cause for more hope than the recent stirrings from the White House. The first is the recent discussions between the various rebel militia groups and representatives of Darfur Arab tribes about forming a common front against the Sudanese government. While there is something unseemly about the whole process (especially given the leading role the Arab tribes of Darfur have had in committing the janjaweed massacres), a radical change in the political order of Darfur would likely stem the tide of the genocide. The rule of thugs who do not commit genocide is surely preferable to the rule of thugs that do commit genocide.

Even more promising however, is the first sign of the Chinese government's reevaluating its position of providing diplomatic cover for the Sudanese regime.

A senior Chinese official, Zhai Jun, traveled to Sudan to push the Sudanese government to accept a United Nations peacekeeping force. Mr. Zhai even went all the way to Darfur and toured three refugee camps, a rare event for a high-ranking official from China, which has extensive business and oil ties to Sudan and generally avoids telling other countries how to conduct their internal affairs.

So what gives? Credit goes to Hollywood — Mia Farrow and Steven Spielberg in particular. Just when it seemed safe to buy a plane ticket to Beijing for the 2008 Olympic Games, nongovernmental organizations and other groups appear to have scored a surprising success in an effort to link the Olympics, which the Chinese government holds very dear, to the killings in Darfur, which, until recently, Beijing had not seemed too concerned about.

In an op-ed in the WSJ, Farrow had warned Spielberg, who is a serving as an advisor to China for the games, that he could "go down in history Leni Riefenstahl of the Beijing Games." Spielberg immediately noted his concerns to the Chinese government, who in turn dispatched Zhai to Sudan to pass along the word that China was no longer agnostic about genocide.

If the Chinese are indeed serious about removing their political cover for their Sudanese clients, the idea of international diplomatic pressure actually impacting Sudanese policy is no longer farcical. Genocide for the Sudanese regime is a counter-insurgency tactic, not a theological commitment. Real pressure very well may result in real results. If so, we should thank the courage of Mia Farrow, and the anonymous Chinese official who fondly recalled watching their first pirated video of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

Democrats Options In the National Security Debate

Karl Rove has pretty much set out what the GOP strategy for 2006 will be - a replay of 2002,

In essence, the GOP has a three pronged approach


(1) Since 9/11, the most pressing issue facing America is protection from terror. Democrats are mired in a "pre-9/11" mindset.

(2) Bush is an effective leader in the War on Terror, willing to make the tough choice necessary to keep America safe.

(3) A GOP Congress is necessary to assist Bush in fighting the War on Terror. Democrats would get in the way of Bush's efforts to keep America safe.


As of now, the Democrats do not appear to have anything resembling a coherent response to this plan. As I see it, these are the following responses they could take, but the party may be too fractured to adopt any of them.

(1) Try to Change the Subject to Domestic Issues

(2) Attack from the Left - Bush and the Right have overhyped the threat of a post 9/11 attack, overreached in Iraq, and are a danger to our civil liberties, etc...

(3) Flank from the Right - Bush has been too timid on Iran and in pursuit of Bin Laden in Pakistan, etc..

(4) The Sensible Center - This is the default wonky Democrat "good policy is good politics approach" - Democrats will be tough on Iran (but sure to consult with our allies) will look to reduce the U.S. footprint in Iraq (but will be responsible about not withdrawing too quickly).

(5) Redefine the Issue - Bush has made us less safe through incompetence and cronyism in the Department of Homeland Security. FEMA is a mess, chemical plants are exposed, the recommendations of the 9/11 commission haven't been implemented.

The Dems tried the Change the Subject approach in 2002 - it didn't work so well. Kerry's approach in 2004 resembled the Sensible Center, but his nuanced positions elicited yawns and were unable to compete with Bush's more simplistic, clearer message. Despite this, to the extent any national security message is delivered from the Dem establishment, it resembles this approach.

The netroots desperately wants the party to employ a full frontal Attack from the Left. While this approach at least provides clarity and theoretically could shift the terms of the debate somewhat, it reality it plays right into Rove's playbook. The netroots dramatically misreads that the average swing voter is far more concerned about preventing the next terror attack than warrantless wiretapping.

The much-maligned hawks would ideally like to employ the Flank from the Right strategy, but whatever the political upsides, it will likely lead to an internal mutiny from the party's core.

That's why I endorse the fifth approach - Redefining or Reframing the issue. While Democrats are not going to succesfully convince swing voters that the "War on Terror" is overhyped bunk, the GOP is vulnerable on the other two points - Bush's leadership and whether a GOP Congress is needed to support Bush

By reframing the issue around what Bush has failed to do since 9/11, the Democrats (1) plug into doubts about Bush's ability of a leader in the War on Terror that have been raised by Iraq and Katrina, (2) highlights the downside of a lacky GOP Congress unwilling to keep Bush honest;

For the approach to be as effective as positive, Democrats need to link the failure of Bush and the GOP Congress to act to the culture of corruption and cronyism that is rampant both in the Bush White House and Congress. Its obvious, for example, how GOP corruption has sabotaged efforts for reducing dependance on foreign oil - considering that oil lobbyists wrote the energy bill. Other examples of how lobbyist money has translated into GOP inertia on the 9/11 commission recommendations need to be unearthed and placed front and center in the fall.

Truman Democrats to the Rescue

I have been caught up in the excitement of the new Talking Points Memo Cafe, and have therefore have been spending my limited blog-time "commenting." One of the many interesting discussions I found there involved the newly-formed Truman Democrats. whose mission is to develop a credible Democratic national security alternative to the GOP.


Michael Signer, a Principal of the Project, outlined six principles of Truman Democrats in a recent post on Democracy Arsenal.

At least six values grounded our discussion, and showed how Truman Democrats improve on both the left and the right. Our first three values share some similarity to principles currently claimed by neoconservatives:

1) American exceptionalism: Like the neoconservatives, we believe that America is the greatest country the world has known. We are historically, morally, and intellectually unique. Unlike the necons, however, we believe we must constantly earn our exceptionalism through our moral conduct. Our uniqueness stems from our values, and so we bear a unique responsibility for living up to those values in shaping and influencing the world.

2) The use of force: Like the neocons, we're comfortable with the use of force for morally good ends. Unlike the neocons, as a general matter, we believe force shouldn't be the default choice for achieving our ends. We're neither reflexive doves nor pacifists; rather, we're pragmatists on the use of force.

3) American hegemony: Like the neocons, we want America to retain its supremacy as the military, political , and economic leader of the world in order that we can maintain our own security, help strengthen the world's safety and stability, and accomplish morally right goals. We are and should be a unipolar power. Unlike the neocons, however, we believe we must constantly earn and affirm the right to exercise that power.

But Truman Democrats also add three new principles of their own:

1) The world community. The traditionally conservative (rather than neocon, but still threaded through the current Administration's foreign policy) viewpoint borrows heavily from libertarian principles. As a matter of right and obligation, conservatives often believe people are and should be fundamentally selfish and individualistic, and that collective action is wrong. Truman Democrats believe, on the other hand, that the world is a community. America can lead that community -- but, to paraphrase John Donne, we are not an island, and any death diminishes us, because we are involved in mankind. To switch to a more prosaic metaphor, America is like a quarterback for the world. Although he's the most critical member of the team, the quarterback can't win alone; he needs the confidence and loyalty of his teammates, which he earns through leadership.

2) Liberal-mindedness: Neoconservatives believe that the discovery of ideas is basically finished. That's why they constantly return to the ancient theorists and ancient values in search of some lost nobility and greatness. Truman Democrats believe instead that knowledge is constantly expanding, and that to conclude that we have finished knowing, or that ideas are presumptively wrong because of where they come from, is both arrogant and dangerous. We believe in a resilient, flexible national mind, avoiding the calcification of ideology. We believe in learning from events and fitting our thinking to facts, not the other way around. This is why democracy (which encourages the growth of knowledge) is our political system of choice.

3) Helping the least well-off: Conservatives and realpolitikers have generally believed that wealth and power should be the key determinants to foreign policy decisions regarding other countries. Following philosophers like John Rawls, Truman Democrats believe we should instead help the least well-off before we help the most well-off. So building up the economies in many developing nations, or addressing the AIDS crisis, is not only a matter of stability -- it's a matter of moral right. Moreover, helping the least well-off also helps us. Being the only wealthy house in a poor neighborhood makes us the target. Helping the whole neighborhood become richer makes us a leader.

The following is my commentary on Signer's points, which I posted atTPM Cafe :

While I share the aims of the Truman Democrats, I think that the 6 points listed are inartfully drafted.

Truman Democrats share the following values with the neocons:

1) The central goal of American foreign policy should be the promotion of liberal (individual rights, rule of law) and democratic values. These should not be subordinated to the competing values of stability or material interests.

2) America has been and will continue to be the indispensible nation for the furthering of liberal and democratic values. America (for the most part has not) and should not seek to use its power solely in a narrow national self-interest like past great powers. [What Signer calls "Exceptionalism"]

3) America should use its political, economic and military supremacy to promote liberal and democratic values [What Signer calls "Use of Force"]

4) Because America is uniquely committed to the promotion of liberal and democratic values, it is essential for it to maintain its
military, political and economic supremacy. [What the Signer calls "Hegemony"]

Truman Democrats are distinguishable from neocons in the following ways:

1) Committment to the expansion of a liberal international order outside of the economic sphere. America needs to work with its liberal, democratic allies to create functional institutions to combat global security and environmental problems. [What Signer calls "global community.]

2) The values of social justice and "soft" power. America must show moral leadership by assiting the world's most vulnerable. Such leadership is just as powerful as military, political or economic leadership. [This is what Signer calls "helping those least well-off"]

3) Pragmatism and Professionalism. American foreign policy must use pragmatic means in achieving idealistic ends. There are realistic limits to the capacity of America to change the world overnight, and the correct ideological position cannot substitute for technical and professional expertise and fully thought out plans. [corresponds to Signers "liberal-mindedness."]

It should be very clear that the Bush Administration, both its neocon and Jacksonian camps, do not support the last three values. Truman Democrats therefore would present an idealist, muscular foreign policy that is anything but neocon-lite, but instead truly promotes America's national interests by adhereing to America's core values.

Note: I found it interesting that when I came across the articulation of Truman Democrat values on their site, that it was closer to what I had articulated.


The Truman Democrats list the following 8 core values:

1. Promoting democracy and freedom protects American national security.
   
   
2. Protecting American national security requires us to promote consistently our deepest values of freedom and liberty – with actions as well as words.
   
   
3. Robust military and intelligence capabilities protect American national security.
   
   
4. Strong alliances protect American national security.
   
   
5. Legitimate international behavior protects American national security.
   
6. Free trade protects American national security.
   
   
7. Promoting development abroad protects American national security.
   
   
8. Comprehensive policy coordination protects American national security.
   
   

It should be even more clear from this articulation that Truman Democrats are not neo-con lite but rather offer a clear Wilsonian alternative to the radical unilateralist idealism of the neocons, the Jeffersonian neo-isolationism of the pacifist grass-roots left, and the competing visions of Hamiltonian realism and utopianist globralism of the foreign policy establishment.

HOW STRONG ARE A CEDAR'S ROOTS?

Something potentially momentous is happening right now in Lebanon. Peaceful demonstrations in response to the assassination of Rafik Hariri have toppled the Syrian-backed puppet regime and are threatening to kick the last Baathist tyranny out of their nation. So far the anti-Syrian movement has unite the various factions - Christian, Sunni, Shiite and Druze. There appears to be a real hope that Lebanon can finally rise from the ashes, and end its 30 year nightmare of civil war and foreign domination. If so, the potential possible repurcussions of a thriving, pluralistic, democratic and free Lebanon for the Arab world are enormous. The collapse of Lebanon into sectarian strife and chaos in the 1970s deprived the Arab World of its haven for progressives, artists, free-thinkers. The consensus had been that while Lebanon could physically rebuild what was torn down in the war (and of that succesful rebuilding, Hariri was the symbol), it could never reclaim its other losses. The present outpouring of non-violent popular action, however, suggests that the roots of Lebanon's civil society may go much deeper than suspected.


Lebanon is by no means out of the woods. The desire of the majority of Lebanese to put their past behind them is not shared by all, especially Hezbollah, who represent the interests of their pay-masters in Tehran far more than Lebanon's Shiites. Hezbollah seeks total war against Israel, despite its exit from Lebanese terrirtory (in fact, there is little doubt that its fingerprints were found on the recent massacre in Tel Aviv - otherwise Israel would have not directed its fury at Syria and given Abbas a temporary pass). However, in a free Lebanon Hezbollah will no longer be able to have it both ways - maintaining its domestic ambitions and its foreign terrorist agenda. The Lebanese people have had enough of war. They have had enough of tyranny. May the cedar bloom again, soon.

WHY "TERROR AND LIBERALISM" IS RELEVANT AFTER ALL

I recently read Paul Berman's medidation on the current conflict, "Terror and Liberalism." Before reaching the merits of Berman's argument, one has to get past the problem that the book simply mistitled. Berman's central thesis is how the "War on Terror" is simply a continuation of liberalism's struggle against totalitarianism. More specifically, Berman sketches out an argument for why our disparate enemies in the Islamic world - Irqai Baathism (which represented the last, deadliest version of pan-Arab fascism) and Islamism in both its Sunni and Shiite forms are the intellectual heirs of western totalitarian thought. Therefore, they pose a similar threat to Liberal societies, and demand a similar struggle (as was provided against facism and communism) by liberals. Thus, in a book that seeks to clarfify the stakes and rationale for liberals in this conflict, the very title of Berman's book confuses the struggle against Islamic variants of totalitarianism with its principal tactic of terror.


Putting this non-trivial semantic failing to the side, I otherwise enjoyed "Terror and Liberalism." I was not surprised, given my ideological leanings to find myself agreeing with Berman's call to arms to liberals, but I found his writing lucid and his more specific argument (about the close connection from western totalitarian thought to Islamic totalitarian thought) tightly reasoned if at times oversold. What I found particularly enlightening were Berman's explanations of the fundamental similarity of superficially distinct forms of totalitarianism and some of the reasons for liberals failure to respond adequately to the totalitarian threats. But on the whole, I wondered if Berman's book wasn't in some sense superfluous. After all, isn't it obvious that Islamic totalitarianism (at least in its Islamist form) is a threat to liberalism, isn't it self-evident that liberal societies (and the United States in particular)have a duty to struggle against this force until it no longer poses a threat to liberal and free societies? Could any sober-minded liberal take a contrary view?


Berman's publisher, if not Berman should rest easy. The relevance of "Terror and Liberalism" has been made all too plain by the response to Peter Beinart's TNR piece challenging Liberals to place a struggle against Islamic totalitarianism at the center of their politics. In particular, for anyone who wants to comprehend why so many liberals reject the liberal hawks' views about the threat of Islamism, Berman's chapters on liberal rationalization and denial in the face of totalitarian irrationality are required reading.


I'll expand on this in further posts, but in the mean time, read the response to Beinart of Kevin Drum of the Washington Monthly, his comment posters, or John Judis, author of the Not Ever to Be Emerging (If It Follows the Foreign Policy Prescriptions of Its Authors) Democratic Majority on TNR Online. All of the pathologies catalogued by Berman - the claims of exagerration, the projection of rational, appeasable objectives, the blaming of victims for the anger fomented against them - are on display. And the truly scary fact, is that this is the case barely 3 years after 9/11. How deep must the pathologies in American liberalism run for this monumental event to have faded so quickly? And can it be healed in time before Islamism abroad and corporate-evangelical Bushism at home wreck irreperable damage?

NOT TO BE REDUCTIONIST...

But the more numbers-cruching of exit polls and analysis of vote totals I read (for example those at the Not Quite Emergerging Democratic Majority site), its more and more apparent the number one reason the Dems lost was national security. Its the best explanation for the dramatic decline among white, working-class women (maybe the security mom existed after all), its the best explanation for Bush's gains among secular voters (have you run into any rabidly homophobic atheists recently?), and its best explanation for Bush's surprising gains in Blue America (especially in New Jersey) that were essential to his winning the popular vote.


The good news for Democrats is that there is really no need to sacrifice any core principles on economic, social or cultural issues. The bad news - the Dems will need to get as tough on terror as they were on Communism during the Cold War, a move that will met with stiff resistance by much of the party's activist base (Hollywood, hard-line civil libertarians, Jeffersonian peaceniks). And even worse news for the Dems, it is by no means certain that the hawks will win.

KERRY WOULDN'T HAVE LIBERATED IRAQ, BUT THAT'S BESIDES THE POINT

By the way, as a side point, I haven't undergone any great conversion to Jeffersonian principles in my endorsement of Kerry over Bush. I am still quite queasy about Kerry's willingness to err too much against the use of military force in the war on terror. But I am getting a bit tired of reading pundits who seek to define this election as fundamental clash of ideas with respect to the War on Terror. If it were that simple, I'd be voting for Bush, whose abstract positions on the use of military force and the role of democratization in combatting terror I agree with far more than those of Kerry. But an election is not simply a referendum on a competing set of ideas - it is also about the people who are charged with executing their visions. And after 4 years it is obvious that Bush and the people around are both disingenuous about many the values they advocate, incompetant in translating these values into productive policy on the ground or both.


So the question isn't is the world safer without Saddam in power, which noone seriously disputes. Nor is the question either is the world safer with Saddam no longer in power through Bush's war in which the candidates vigorously disagree about. The real question is who is going to manage the mess we're in at the present for the next for years? The answer for me is Kerry. Kerry may not advance the strategy of defeating terror through expanding freedom in the Islamic world - but at least he won't like Bush has, through his strong embrace and weak execution of these ideas - discredit it.

BUSH & KERRY ON IRAQ: BEYOND RECKLESS vs. FECKLESS



Recent presidential campaigns have demonstrated that you can count on the mainstream media for two things. The first, is that it will happily glom on to whatever substance-free issue comes its way to avoid any discussion of actual substantive issues. The second is that to the extent substance is discussed, it is transmitted through an uncritically accepted conceptual framework. Thus, once the motif of Stupid But Sincere Bush against Smart but Calculating Gore was established, anything that played against it (such as blatant lying by Bush on his tax plan) was downplayed, while anything that played to it (any repositioning on any issue no matter how slight by Gore)emphasized.
With respect to this campaign, on Iraq, the conventional wisdom is Bush is reckless while Kerry is feckless. And any inconvenient facts that may suggest either pragmatism/wobbling from Bush or resolution/rigidity from Kerry are ignored.


Kerry: Mostly Feckless


As liberal pundits have noted, Kerry's position on the war is not as inconsistent as the simplistic version of it offered in the media. Kerry saw his as vote as empowering Bush to bargain from a position of strength, and use force only after diplomacy failed. Thus, by only going through the motions diplomatic, Bush did things "the wrong way" and Kerry is not inconsistent in opposing the war that Bush actually fought.


However, consistency and coherency are two different things, and Kerry's proceduarlist critique is maddeningly vague. At no point does Kerry answer the relevant questions his position begs to be answered: how much time should the weapons inspections been given to verify the state of the Iraqi WMD production? How much abuse of the inspections process would he have tolerated before deciding to use force? Should a tightened sanctions regime have been the alternate in the event that the inspectors found no smoking guns, but did no received total cooperation from the Hussein regime? How should a president have handled differences of opinion with other nations as to these questions - especially from the French and others who were not negotiating themselves in good faith? Will Kerry ever answer these questions before November? Will he even be ASKED these questions? Highly doubtful.)


Bush: From Reckless to Feckless


Whatever problems the media has with accurately portraying Kerry's position on Iraq pales in comparison to its reporting on what the Bush administration has actually done there. Both liberal and conservative pundits alike portray the Bush administration as holding a unilateralist, idealist course throughout the whole Iraq process. Thus liberals decry Bush as reckless, ideologically radical (wedded to the vision of the Neocons), and completely unable to admit, let alone adapt to unanticipated circumstances. Conservatives portray Bush as dynamic, decisive, steadfast and morally grounded in holding the course he set out in 2002. What's fascinating is that both the standard attack and defense of Bush's Iraq policy has become so fixed, so ritualized that they pretty much ignore anything the administration has done over the past 12 months.


The reality is that since May 2003, while the Bush Administration's neocon/Wilsonian rhetoric has stayed the same, on the ground it has reversed itself in numerous areas, subordinating the goal of producing a functioning Iraqi democracy to the goal of shortening the occupation to a politically palatable level. In order to carry out this fundamentally Jacksonian policy, the Administration turned to the Hamiltonian experts at State and elsewhere to facilitate it.


The appointment of Bremer in May 2003 marked the beginning of this shift, but Bremer himself was responsible for disbanding of the Iraqi army in the name of de-Baathification. The real change came in October, with the reorganization of Iraq policy. Unilateral idealism was out, multilateral pragmatism was in, for better or worse. Opposition to U.N. involvement melted, transfer of sovereignty to a Iraqi government was pushed ahead of elections, anti-democratic militias in Falluja and Najaf were left intact to preserve short-term stability, Ahmed Chalabi went from ally to target. Were some of these new policies prudent? Perhaps. Cautious? Definitely. Reckless? Definitely not. A reckless crusader for democracy would have doubled down, sent in more troops and rode out the short-term criticism to present a better environment for Iraq's first elections. A purist, ideologue would have not handed over the government to a former Baathist strongman.

Both liberal and conservative pundits however would rather peddle the convenient myth of neocon consistency. For liberals, now enamored with realism, doing so would force them to admit that Bush has adopted much of their platform over the past year, and for them to face the consequences of what they advocated. For conservative idealists, facing Bush's last year squarely forces them to face just how far they have fallen, and the very real weaknesses of their hero. But the truth is Bush has been reckless & feckless. And Iraqis and Americans alike will be paying in the future just as much for the "solutions" offered by realist wise-men as they will for the problems created by neocon hubris.

NO WILSONIAN CONSENSUS


It is tempting as a Wilsonian, to make the claim that in contrast to the Realist views of the foreign policy establishment, the American public is decidedly Wilsonian. This is how OxBlogger Patrick Belton optimistically reads
a recent PEW/Council of Foreign Relations poll on the American public's view of foreign policy.

Interestingly, it also shows the American public is solidly Wilsonian, with 72 percent believing the top priority for American foreign policy is to follow moral principles

As Daniel Drezner (another Wilsonian) notes, this finding doesn't quite jibe with the rankings on actual foreign policy issues, which place promoting democracy & improving living standards in poor nations dead last on a list of 19 priorities.

These results bolster a thesis that I've been cogitating on for the past few months: despite claims by international relations theorists -- including most realists -- that the overwhelming majority of Americans hold liberal policy preferences, it just ain't so. Even if those beliefs are extolled in the abstract, when asked to prioritize among different foreign policy tasks, the realist position wins.

I agree, somewhat. However, there is still the question of how to explain the 72% "moral principle" figure? First, I think this poll is a perfect example of where setting out a Wilsonian (as a proxy for idealist)/realist dichotomy breaks down, and once again it is preferential to use Walter Russell Mead's categorization of the four American foreign policy traditions.


The mere advocacy of a "moral" foreign policy does not make somebody a Wilsonian. There also needs to be a commitment to American promotion of universal values such as democracy and human rights (the means - unilateral or multilateral is what Wilsonians can disagree about). Thus, the size of the American public who can be fairly characterized as having principally a Wilsonian view of foreign policy correlates with the 24% who place democracy-promotion as a top priority (which by the way matches up roughly with the 25% who value idealism).


In addition to Wilsonians, the 72% figure also encompasses Jeffersonians, who also believe in a "moral" foreign policy. The difference is that they believe America acts morally when it does not utilize its military against weaker nations, is respectful of cultural difference, and does not provide aid to "immoral" regimes. No doubt the 72% also includes a number of Jacksonians who believe America has a "moral" obligation to defend its friends, and to exact vengeance upon its enemies. Finally the number includes those who can be said to have any principle foreign policy orientation.


So in order to get a better sense of the relative strengths of the different orientations, I repeated Drezner's exercise with the list of concrete foreign policy objectives, but instead using Mead's classification(Wilsonian-Wil;Hamiltoninan-Ham;Jeffersonian-Jef;Jacksonian-Jax).

Protect against terrorist attacks -- 88 (all)
Protect jobs of American workers -- 84 (Jax;Jef)
Reduce spread of AIDS & other diseases -- 72 (Wil)
Stop spread of weapons of mass destruction -- 71 (Ham;Jax;Wil)
Insure adequate energy supplies -- 70 (Ham;Jax)
Reduce dependence on foreign oil -- 63 (Jef;Jax)
Combat international drug trafficking -- 63 (Jef;Ham)
Distribute costs of maintaining world order -- 58 (Ham;Jax)
Improve relationships with allies -- 54 (Ham;Jef)
Deal with problem of world hunger -- 50 (Wil)
Strengthen the United Nations -- 48 (Ham;Wil)
Protect groups threatened with genocide -- 47 (Wil)
Deal with global warming -- 36 (Jef)
Reduce U.S. military commitments -- 35 (Jef)
Promote U.S. business interests abroad -- 35 (Ham)
Promote human rights abroad -- 33 (Wil;Jef)
Solve Israeli/ Palestinian conflict -- 28 (Ham;Wil)
Promote democracy abroad -- 24 (Wil)
Improve living standards in poor nations -- 23 (Wil)

Obviously, some of my assignments are open to debate, and most Americans do not neatly fall into any one category. But it seems to me that a plurality of the American public holds primarily Jacksonian views, which explains why there has been so much pandering in that direction by both candidates. Although there is a clear difference here, in that while Bush has actually conducted an especially Jacksonian foreign policy (with its tough rhetoric and disdain for world opinion), Kerry, who would conduct a foreign policy that was anything but Jacksonian, has to rely on symbolic appeals based on his military record).


The other three groups, at least with respect to those who hold these views as primary appear to be roughly equivalent. However, the appeal of issues such as the global AIDS crisis and global hunger suggests that there is a large amount of secondary, soft support for Wilsonian ideas that is not present for the other two groups. I believe it is this combination - the breadth of support for Wilsonian ideas combined by the softness of that support - that explains why advocates for a more ambitious Wilsonian agenda believe they have widespread support, only to find that support to be fickle and fleeting.

I DIDN'T SERVE WITH JOHN KERRY IN VIETNAM SO YOU SHOULD PROBABLY JUST TUNE ME OUT

Here are my thoughts on the whole Kerry Swiftboat nonsense

1) If you were voting for John Kerry because he won 3 people hearts in Vietnam, you're a moron
2) If you are no longer voting for John Kerry because you believe the attack ads against his Vietnam record, you're a gullible moron
3) If you produced the attack ads against John Kerry's Vietnam record, you're a sleazebag.
4) If you are making the argument that the real issue is John Kerry's veracity and therefore this inquiry into possibly exagerrated claims in his war record is really is a salient issue, you are either a soulless GOP shill, an easy mark for GOP shills, or fundamentally unserious about politics.

Look, I find the whole Kerry war-hero schtick highly problematic. First, because as it has indicated all along, the Democratic Party views national security primarily through the lens of politics, as if it were akin to gay marriage or some other cultural wedge issue that Republicans like to play whenever they are afraid working-class voters might actually realize how badly their policies screw them. So Kerry was chosen precisely with the current strategy he is now employing in mind.

The way Kerry baldly uses his personal heroism to deflect any concerns about his Jeffersonian foreign policy vision that he has consistently espoused (except when prompted by poltical necessity) for his entire public life should be fair game. But not the heroism itself. It is not only a cynical degredation of the public debate, but it exposes the very real fact that the Bushies aren't confident that they can win the national security debate substantively. When you consider the staggering record of incompetence left behind by Bush's four years, its not surprising that Rove has already turned to character assasination. After all, Kerry may not take the country where we need to go to defeat Islamist fundamentalism, but at least he'll get it wherever he's going in one piece.

John Kerry - He won't win the war on terror, but at least he won't lose it. Or something like that.

ON THE OTHER HAND, IF THE U.N. HAD BEEN PLACED OF CHARGED OF ABU GHRAIB, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN TURNED INTO A BROTHEL


It is not surprising that one response to Abu Ghraib would be to conclude that this is what happens when unilateralism takes peace-keeping out of the hands of the powder-blue-helmeted professionals and into those of ill-trained American reservists. The problem with this argument, as Marc Steyn points out, is that the UN's track record is not exactly sparkling when it comes to the human rights abuses of their peacekeepers.

Is the UN good? Well, I'm not sure I'd even say that. But if you object to what's going on in those Abu Ghraib pictures – the sexual humiliation of prisoners and their conscription as a vast army of extras in their guards' porno fantasies – then you might want to think twice about handing over Iraq to the UN.

In Eritrea, the government recently accused the UN mission of, among other offences, pedophilia. In Cambodia, UN troops fueled an explosion of child prostitutes and AIDS. Amnesty International reports that the UN mission in Kosovo has presided over a massive expansion of the sex trade, with girls as young as 11 being lured from Moldova and Bulgaria to service international peacekeepers.

In Bosnia, where the sex-slave trade barely existed before the UN showed up in 1995, there are now hundreds of brothels with underage girls living as captives. The 2002 Save the Children report on the UN's cover-up of the sex-for-food scandal in West Africa provides grim details of peacekeepers' demanding sexual favors from children as young as four in exchange for biscuits and cake powder. "What is particularly shocking and appalling is that those people who ought to be there protecting the local population have actually become perpetrators," said Steve Crawshaw, the director of Human Rights Watch.

Unfortunately, the disfunction of the U.N. is treated as a debating point - used by unilateralists to score points, and ignored by multilateralists as inconvenient. Neither of these positions, which Bush and Kerry have stuck to with depressing regularity offer much hope for a world desperately in need of competent nation-builders.

COLD WAR REDUX


As the "few bad apples" defense of the Bushies on the Iraqi Prison Scandal continues to crumble, it becomes more and more apparent that both sides, Left and Right are set on repeating all the mistakes of the Cold War. The Left-wing has already given us the knee-jerk anti-Americanism and apologetics for tyranny. With Abu Ghraib we see have a War on Terror version of Right-wing justification for slipping towards the moral abyss of the enemy. Moral purity in this battle is a luxury we cannot afford - the notion that terrorists like the late Shiek Yassin or bin Laden should be dealt with in a court of law is absurd. But to indiscriminately apply techniques that at best are justified in "ticking time bomb" situations to Iraq - which despite the presence of al Qaeda and ex-Baathists remained a more traditional counter-insurgency environment - demonstrates the same lack of judgment and moral backbone that led past administrations to sully America's name by partnering with "anti-Communist" despots. To win this war, the center must hold - which means we can neither afford a right-wing whitewash of the atrocities at Abu Ghraib no a left-wing backlash against using the force we need to win this war. If, as alleged, the roots of Abu Ghraib can be traced to the Pentagon, it is particularly ironic that the very
architects of the surgical attack plan that so scrupulously aimed to minimize collateral damage to civilians would be responsible for frittering away that moral and political accomplishment with such an indiscriminate approach to defending the country once taken.

PLAYING POLITICS WITH 9/11


I confess to not being as fully on top of the 9/11 Commission hearings as I'd like to be, but most of what I've read has been filtered through the lens of partisan inanity. The basic myths of each side have not really changed in the past two and half years. The GOP myth is that 8 years of the Clinton administrations passive, piecemeal approach to counterrorism opened the door to 9/11, and that when the Bushies came into power, they were able to turn the tide with a proactive, comprehensive approach. The Democratic myth is that the pragmatic Clinton Administration had counterterrorism as a high priority and well in hand until the Bushies came along, and that counterterror dropped from the radar screen because it wasn't accorded a high priority for the ideological Bush team.


It is through these lens that the Bush Administration and its opponents have reacted to Richard Clarke's new book and testiomy. Without a doubt, Clarke's version is the most comprehensive support for the Dem myth so far. Not surprisingly, he has been embraced a courageous whistleblower by Dems and exorciated as a bitter self-promoter by the Bushies. Lost in this mess is the fact that despite all the claims of Richard Clarke or Condeleeza Rice to the contrary, neither myth holds up very well under scrutiny - because of the glaring fact that both adminstrations dropped the ball on terror. Thus, the Bushies have no real answer to Clarke's searing indictment of the failure to act against al Qaeda in the first seven months of the Bush Administration. Any honest assesment of that period shows that China, Iraq and missle defense were clearly greater priorities coming in than counter-terror. The effort to go to Clarke's 2002 spin on behalf of the Bushies when he still worked for them is not a real defense, any more than quoting Dick Cheney would be today. Nor, despite the best spinning efforts of Sandy Berger, Madeleine Albright, can it be said that the Clinton Admiistration placed counterterrorism as its highest priority for national security and foreign policy. It was clear that for most of the Clinton years, prority one was shepherding the Olso agreement forward - which as interpreted by the Clintonites, was clearly inconsistent with a zero-tolerance policy towards terror.


The most important question, in my view that Clarke's testimony and the attention it has focused on the 9/11 Commission hopefully raises is how have the Bushies addressed the various flaws in American counterterrorism policy demonstrated by 9/11? The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq have demonstrated a clear break with the passive, reactive approach abroad of the Clintonites, and despite howling by opponents of the Iraq war, on the whole have been a tremendous improvement. But what about the rest of counterrorism? the nuts and bolts of domestic security that were so badly overlooked by both administrations, such as visa tracking, port security, intelligence sharing? In the Iraq-centric debate on the terror issue, none of these things has gotten sufficient scrutiny. It look past time they did, and if the partisan sniping over what wasn't done before 9/11 leads to a greater examination of what has and has not been fixed since then, it will prove beneficial after all.

STUMBLING TOWARDS DEMOCRACY


So, now Iraq has an interim constitution, continuing its stumbling progress towards democracy. For most of the post-war period, I have heard liberals state with certainty that Iraq is an unmitigated disaster. But despite all of the mistakes made, all of the corners cut, all of the zigging and zagging and the best efforts of ex-Baathists and jihadis alike, the project keeps moving forward.


In the months leading up to the war, one of the most popular books among hawks in the Bush Administration was John Dower's Embracing Defeat, which tells the story of the U.S. occupation of Japan. When this fact was reported, Dower himself wrote to emphatically state that the postwar Japan was not analagous to Iraq - and that both context and culture would make a U.S. imposed democratization of Iraq far more difficult to accomplish.


I must respectfully disagree with Dower about the implications of his work (an admittedly hubristic act.) As told in Embracing Defeat, the democratization of post-war Japan was despite its success, extraordinarily messy. Policies were designed by idealogues with little knowledge of Japaneese history or culture. Amnesty policy varied radically over the time. The occupation authorites were often contradictory in their policies. And yet, despite all the mistakes made - the project suceeded. The underlying commitment and vision of American policy-makers, combined with the fundamental desire for democracy that existed even among the supposedly collectivist Japaneese people prevailed.


In Iraq as well, one can see the universal thirst for democracy and freedom and the force of the policy-makers vision pushing the project forward. The pitfalls are great, and the collective weight of all of the errors made may eventually cause the project to collapse - but so far it has not. And so, when I hear the war's skeptics profess that this or that tragic event shows that Iraqi democracy is doomed, I am skeptical of the skeptics - that is to say, still hopeful for success in this noble endeavor.

JOHN EDWARDS'S FOREIGN POLICY DILEMMA


I didn't get to see last night's debate, but from accounts of the debate and from the transcript it appeared to be a Kerry victory.


Not surpisingly, the area with tripped Edwards up was foreign policy. On Haiti, Kerry demonstrated he knew far more about the issue than his rival. But the real damage came on the question Edwards knew to expect - his support for the war in Iraq. In reponse, Edwards produced an answer that had Kerry-like clarity without the substance (and giving Kerry an opening to repay Edwards for his zinger following Kerry's long-winded answer on the question in Wisconsin.


The muffed Iraq question, however, is symbolic of Edwards' larger problems on foreign policy. By and large, Edwards has pretty much taken the same blurry stances on foreign policy issues as Kerry. The difference is that Edwards' vagueness on issues comes from a lack of familiarity with these issues, while Kerry's comes in a sense from an overfamiliarty - the continuing tension between his Jeffersonian conviction and his political survival instincts. The result is a discussion that plays to Kerry advantages - he gets to demonstrate his superior experience and knowledge of details, without being pressed to defend the contradictions and shifts in his positions.


The only way for Edwards to counter this problem is to shift the debate from details to principles - by taking firm stances on issues that distinguishes him from Kerry. The dilemma facing Edwards is that he can't take a firmer dovish stance than Kerry: (1) it doesn't fit with his vote on the war, (2) there is little room to maneuver to the left of Kerry on current Iraq policy short of joining Kucinich, and (3) it would be a disaster for the general election - as he lacks Kerry's military aura that permits Kerry to appeal to voters far more hawkish than he is. On the other hand, while there is ample room to position himself as a more hawkish than Kerry, the biggest pool of voters up for grabs in the primaries are the uber-dovish Deaniacs. Considering this, its not surprinsing that Edwards will keep trying to shift the discussion back to the issues he can beat Kerry on: just about everything else.

JOHN KERRY AND THE DEMS VIETNAM COMPLEX


David Brooks' analysis of the Dems' current internal struggles on foreign policy gets the politics right even if he misunderstands the underlying foreign policy debate.

Now, in the midst of the war against Islamic totalitarianism, the crucial question is this: Is the Democratic Party truly set to reclaim the legacy of Truman and Kennedy, or is it still living in the shadow of Vietnam?

If you talk to Democratic foreign policy elites in Washington and New York, you come away convinced that the party has recovered from Vietnam, and is ready to assert power, albeit in multilateral guises. If, on the other hand, you attend Democratic primary rallies, you come away convinced that the party is still, at its base, the Jimmy Carter party when it comes to global affairs.

And if you listen to John Kerry, you come away not knowing what to think. He seems like a man betwixt and between, unable to issue a clear statement about America's role in the world, and hence floating toward whatever is expedient at the moment.

If Kerry can speak the language of Truman and Kennedy, and stick with it, he will cross a basic threshold, and Americans will consider trusting him with their security. If he does not cross that threshold, all the personal heroism in the world will not be enough to get him elected.

As usual, things are more complicated than Brooks's pithy summarization. While it is true that the Dems grassroots is still firmly in the grasp of the Jeffersonians, its foreign policy elite is not necessarily on board with the War on Terror. Rather than being representing the party of Kennedy, the Dem foreign policy elite represents the party of Clinton - ranging from the Hamiltonians who reject the entire neocon "Democracy by Any Means Necessary" project to Wilsonians who support the ends but condemn what they feel are inconsistent support for nation-building and excessive reliance on unilateralism, with Globalists holding intermediate views still dominant. Thus, while the Dem elite is not hostile to the use of American force (unlike much of the Dem base), it is still, especially in a unilateral context, ambivalent. Which is why the muddled contradictions of John Kerry might all-too-well reflect where the Democratic Party really is today on national security.

THE REAL KERRY ON IRAQ


The real John Kerry was in classic form in Sunday night's Wisconsin debate. On the question of whether, in light of his vote authorizing the war he "felt any degree of responsibility for the war and its costs and casulties," Kerry uncorked a verbose response that went on for paragraphs (and required a follow-up that repeated the question) before finally hiding behind the statement that "The president had the authority to do what he was going to do without the vote of the United States Congress." And as usual, absent from his entire "there was a right way to do it and a wrong way to do it" shpiel was a clear statement of what Kerry would have done differently if he were president. For more, check out Andrew Sullivan's flaying of this and other Kerry double-speak at the debate.

A CAUSE OR A CAMPAIGN ?


Lieberman's 5th place finish, in a primary in which half the voters were Independents demonstrates that he is not going to win the nomination. But as Lieberman noted in his non-concession speech tonight, he is not just running a campaign, but is leading a cause. As Joe characterizes it, his cause is "for a Democratic party that fights as hard to defend our nation’s security as it does to does to advance the causes of social justice and equal rights." I would phrase this point somewhat differently - that only Lieberman stands for a Democatic party that pursues social justice both at home and abroad. It is however the same point - because only through the pursuit of justice for those living in the Islamic world can we defend out nation's security from Islamic terror. So, as long as Joe is able he should make his case to the Democratic party, and hopefully rack up enough delegates to force a platform fight at the convention.


However much I am behind Joe in his cause, however, there is still the matter of this campaign. And the way things currently stand the Democrats are running headlong towards nominating John Kerry on the "rich veteran who'll stand up for the poor and give peace a chance" platform. And it is irresponsible to stand by and let that happen while waiting for the Dem voters to have an epiphany and finally embrace Liebermanism (if not Liberman himself). Ruling out Dean (who at least is honest, genuine and a creative thinker) because of his irresponsible embrace of the party's Jeffersonian pacifists, that leaves me with two candidates, Edwards and Clark, that emerge from NH with limited momentum.


Clark is an enigmatic mess of a candidate, but in his more sober moments he is the only Dem other than Lieberman that has anything useful to say on foreign policy. I'll save the premature autopsy of the Clark campaign for some other point, but to needless to say I believe that Clark's "dovish general" routine is not going to get any traction against Kerry's revitalized "dovish veteran" schtick.


That leaves Edwards, the candidate with the best political skills, sharpest message and most thorough domestic agenda. I have serious doubts about Edwards on foreign policy. (His couplet on the "2 Americas" in the world is the weakness part of his stump speech). However, his lack of a track record is an improvement over Kerry's clear dovish vision. Can Edwards stay alive long enough to overtake Kerry? We'll find out next week in South Carolina. Anyone who wishes to see the Dems regain the White House should be rooting for an Edwards victory. I know I will.

WHAT THE DEMS MUST UNDERSTAND TO CHALLENGE BUSH ON FOREIGN POLICY"


Thomas Friedman has provided a useful service to the Democratic party by setting up the ground rules for what the Dems must understand in order to effectively critique Bush on foreign policy.

Without a serious Democratic critique of the war ? and I define "serious" as one that connects with the gut middle-American feeling that the Islamist threat had to be confronted, but one that lays out a smarter approach than the Bush team's ? Mr. Bush has gotten away with being sloppy and unprepared for postwar Iraq.

...To be successful, Democrats will need a candidate who understands three things...:

First, this notion, put forward by Mr. Dean and Al Gore, that the war in Iraq has diverted us from the real war on "terrorists" is just wrong. There is no war on "terrorism" that does not address the misgovernance and pervasive sense of humiliation in the Muslim world. Sure, Al Qaeda and Saddam pose different threats, Mr. Marshall notes, "but they emerge from the same pathology of widespread repression, economic stagnation and fear of cultural decline." Building a decent Iraq is very much part of the war on terrorism.

Second, sometimes smashing someone in the face is necessary to signal others that they will be held accountable for the intolerance they incubate. Removing the Taliban and Saddam sent that message to every government in the area.

Third, the Iraq war may have created more hatred of the U.S., but it has also triggered a hugely important dialogue among Arabs and Muslims about the necessity of reform.

However, Friedman crosses over into wishful thinking when we he claims that only Dean doesn't get these principles, while "Kerry, Lieberman, Clark and Edwards do." The grimmer reality is that the mainstream Dem opinion is precisely the other way on all three points, and only Lieberman (who barring a miracle comeback in NH seems on his way out of this race) has clearly expressed views that line up with Friedman's principles.

Clark's central critique of Bush's Iraq policy is the very "diversion" nonsense that Lieberman takes Gore & Dean to task for. Kerry, who opposed the 1st Gulf War, is not exactly an ardent supporter of the 2nd principle. And the #1 concern I have about Edwards is precisely that he hasn't said anything that demonstrates he's onboard with these principles either (his brief references to foreign policy in his stump speech suggest otherwise).


It's true that in rejecting Dean for Kerry, the average Dem is making the point that it doesn't object to the use of force per se; but contrary to Friedman's (and my own) hopes this does not signify that they have shifted from opposing Bush's Wilsonian goals to focusing solely on Bush's flawed policies that undermine these goals.

THE DEMS FOREIGN POLICY MYTHS


If want a snapshot into the myths that underlie the Dem's incohernet foreign policy, here is a key snippet of Pelosi's response to Bush's foreign policy.

Instead of alienating our allies, let us work with them and international institutions so that together we can prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and keep them out of the hands of terrorists.

Myth#1: The alienated ally (which one are we talking about here anyway - the French who went out the way to spring Saddam from sanctions, or the Saudis who were real helpful before the Iraq invasion). The only evidence we have of "alienated" allies is that the same countries who didn't want to deal with the Iraq problem before the war didn't want to help out afterwards.


Myth#2: That we have international institutions capable of address WMD proliferation. A serious critique is that Bush is doing nothing to build such institutions. To say he should have counted on the IAEA to handle Iraq is nonsense.

Instead of billions of dollars in no-bid contracts for politically connected firms like Halliburton, and an insistence on American dominance in Iraq, let us share the burden and responsibility with others, so that together we can end the sense of American occupation and bring troops home safely when their mission is completed.

Myth#3: The U.S. insists on American dominance in Iraq to funnel money to Bush's cronies. First, Bush would love to end "the sense of American occupation," but wants to ensure that the building of Iraqi democracy is actually done right. Speeding along towards elections before the other essential institutions are in place is madness. And up until now, the rest of the world is pushing for just that. (The fact that Bush can dole out a little pork to his cronies is a side benefit).


Myth#4: There are somehow additional foreign troops willing to serve in Iraq if we just asked nicely, and once we do, we can bring the troops home quickly. Not even Chris Lehane believes this one.

Instead of the diplomatic disengagement that almost destroyed the Middle East peace process and aggravated the danger posed by North Korea, let us seek to forge agreements and coalitions; so that, together with others, we can address challenges before they threaten the security of the world.

Myth#5: Bush's disengagement destroyed the Middle East peace process. This is the most dangerous myth being trotted out by the Democrats. It is dangerous because it fails to recognize that 1) the process was destroyed by Arafat before Clinton ever left office, and that 2) All of Clinton's engagement at the end of the day left the parties worse off than before. The fact is that Bush's engagement (the Road Map) has been better than his non-engagement, but both were better than the Clinton's photo-op driven diplomacy.


Truth#1: Bush has screwed up pretty royally in North Korea, mostly because he his policy has been stalled by ongoing Neocon-Hamiltonian turf wars. Which of course leads to the best critique never made of Bush - that he has time and time again failed to step in when his "wise men" (and Condi) don't agree on the right course of action.

BUSH'S NATIONAL SECURITY AGENDA


While the rambling second half of the SOTU drifted off into election-year pandering and incoherence, in the first half Bush painted a clear picture of his national security policy.


Continuing to turn to Aschcroft, not Ridge: On the domestic front we got a plug for a renewed Patriot Act, and not much else. Considering the continued gaps in domestic security funding (and the political way that funding is doled out - shafting NYC isn't going to cost Bush the election), it appears Bush will continue to rely on the Justice Department to catch and hold (idefinitely) the right people.


Speak Loudly and Carry a Big Stick: Line of the night most misunderstood by liberals was the following: "for diplomacy to be effective, words must be credible..." Liberals immediately linked the term credible to the Iraq WMD debate on which the Bushies have a serious credibility problem. But that's not what Bush was talking about at all. He meant credibility as to whether or not America would back up its threats with the use of military force. On that point, the toppling of the Saddam regime speaks for itself, and as Bush rightly noted, spoke quite loudly to Gaddafi.

Islamic Terrorism is a Military, not a Legal Problem Yes, some Democrats actually do want to "serve our enemies with legal papers" (The latest example being General Clark's latest comment on Saddam Hussein). I'm not sure what it is precisely that attracts liberals to approach terrorism from the same perspective as narcotics control, but two guesses are (1) the unwillingness to accept the ideological aspect to the conflict - that the violence is not in the name of profit, but power; and (2) the standard globalist fallacy of confusing the relative decline of state actors in an increasingly global world with their irrelevance.


Rejection of Multilateralism for Its Own Sake: The "permission quip" while cute was a bit of unfair caricature of the Dems actual position. Unfortunately, in their anit-Bush zealousness, the Dems are moving steadily towards such a ideological embrace of multilateralism. This is particularly ironic in that the central critique of Bush is that he embraces ideologically-driven unilateralism. However, for better or worse, the pragamatism of the Powell Hamiltonians has tempered the passion of the Neocons & Jacksonians. Bush is right therefore to trumpet working through the U.N. on America's terms over working through the U.N. on France and Germany's terms.


Democratization:
Bush rightly placed democratization of the Islamic World as a centerpiece of anti-terrorism strategy. The silence of the Democrats (outside of Lieberman) on this issue is deafening.



So, there we have it. Bush will fight Islamic terror by coercing the direct sponsors by force or the threat of force to cease their support, and by drying up its roots by promoting democracy in the region. Given that much of the international community does not see Islamic terror as an ideological issue (but rather as a law-and-order concern), the U.S. has not and will not wait to get everyone on board before acting. So far this strategy has kept the enemy off-balance and unable to strike. Bush is clearly counting on that to continue, because the Patriot Act and color-coded signs isn't exactly a comprehensive back-up plan.

THE CLEAR CONSCIENCES OF LIBERAL HAWKS


Slate is currently running a roundtable discussion by a group of eminent liberal hawks on reassessing their support for the Iraq war, with the benefit of the experience of the past year. In particular, we now know that: 1) all of the evidence found so far indicates that Iraq's WMD program was signficantly less developed then thought; 2) that the Bush administration was deliberately misleading in its selling of the war, 3) our relations with Europe and other allies remain strained; and 4) the rosiet post-war scenarios have not come to pass.


So far, its been interesting to note the gap between the Wilsonian idealists (Friedman, Berman, and Hitchens) who supported the war primarily as a strategic response to the challenges of Islamic terror (and linked moral response to the tyranny of Hussein) and those of more Hamiltonian/globalist bent (Pollack, Packer, and Fred Kaplan) for whom the more concrete, direct threats posed by Hussein's regime took precedence.


For the first group, whom I happen to belong to, there are no regrets. None of the errors made by the Bushies in their pre-war diplomacy or blinkered post-war planning, nor the dishonesty evidenced in their selling of the war, changes the fundamental correctness of the decision to liberate Iraq. For the second group, it is a more difficult question. Some like Kaplan (and Joshua Micah Marshall who is not included in this dicussion) dropped their support for the war when it became clear how the Bushies were going to conduct it. For others, like Packer and Pollard, it is a harder assessment, given that the immediate threat of WMD was not the only justification for the war.


The issues raised in this discussion are important ones. For the Wilsonians that believe that Bush's macro-policy on the war on terror is right, can the manipulative selling of the war to the American public be dismissed? For the liberal Hamiltonians that saw Iraq primarily as an issue of rogue states and WMD, what is was and is their alternative plan to pop as Friedman calls it, the "terror" bubble? Certaintly they have something more in mind than a manhunt in the mountains of the Pakistani-Afghani border.


Unfortunately, you won't be hearing these issues discussed any time soon in the most important of liberal circles, the Democratic primaries. Instead you'll hear and endless stream of arguments from Dean and Clark on why the voters should replace an administration that gets the big picture right and mismanages the details with one that promises to get the details right but hasn't got a clue about the big picture.

THE FOUR AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY TRADITIONS TODAY


As soon as I have a significant bloc of free time, I plan on writing a full-length essay utilizing the competing traditions of American Foreign Policy framework developed by Walter Russel Mead in Special Providence to analyze the current policy disputes and their impact on partisan politics. However, because I consider these terms indispensible in understanding issues such as the Dems inability to shake the wimp label (as addressed in particularly unoriginal NY Times Magazine cover article this weekend), I will lay the four traditions out in shorthand for future reference.


Hamiltonian. The Hamiltonian tradition is named after Alexander Hamilton's vision of America as a great power of international commerce. The Hamiltonian school is multilateralist in that it believes in the forging of strategic alliances to craft a global order that is conducive to America's national interests. It is realist in that it views America's national interest largely through a material lens (access to national resources, free trade) and advocate pragmatic means at achieving this. The Hamiltonian tradition is the most aligned with international foreign policy traditions and the dominant tradition among the bipartisan foreign policy elite.

Jeffersonian: The Jeffersonian tradition is named after Thomas Jefferson's vision of America as an ideal (yeoman farmers, small government, social equality) democracy. It is isolationist in that it believes that foreign interventions are corrupting (alliances with un-democratic governments) and are impediments to America's domestic goals (through the buildup of a large military etc.). Jeffersonians are idealist in that they believe that America's foreign policy means should be consistent with America's liberal and democratic values. Jeffersonians tend to advocate a minimalist/humble approach to American foreign policy.

Wilsonian. The Wilsonian tradition is named after Woodrow Wilson's vision of America as the global champion for liberty and democracy. Wilsonians are idealist and interventionist in that they believe that the central tenet of American foreign policy should be the promotion of democracy. Wilsonians are the most likely to advocate for interventions based on moralistic, as opposed to traditional national interest, jusitifications.

Jacksonian. The Jacksonian tradition is named after Andrew Jackson's frontier populism, and code of martial honor. Jacksonians are unilateralists who embrace views of American exceptionalism (inclduing notions of America as the true bastion of liberty) and are opposed to any long-term international commitments. Jacksonians are realists to the extent that they do not believe in limiting the use of force (or other policy measures) necessary to promote America's interests.


There are obvious divisions within each group, and certain policy-makers straddle the lines between traditions. In the context of current American foreign policy, two such groups are particularly important.



Neocons The Neocons straddle the Wilsonian and Jacksonian traditions. As Wilsonians, Neocons are committed to promotion of the American ideals of liberty and democracy as the central principle of American foreign policy. As Jacksonians, the Neocons are hostile towards international institutions and multilateral policy solutions, believing that they act to unduly constrain American power in favor of the status-quo



Globalists Globalists straddle the Hamiltonian and Wilsonian traditions. As Hamiltonians, Globalists are committed to the expansion and strenghtening of global security and trade organizations. As Wilsonians, Globalists seek to promote human rights through alliances and international institutions.




The political problem for the Dems, is that Jeffersonians make up a major part of their base, while the far more numerous Jacksonians not only make up a major part of the GOP base, but also predominate among swing voters in the South and parts up the Midwest. Dean, despite all efforts to demonstrate that he is in fact a mainstream Hamiltonian/Globalist Dem, has surged to his front-runner status by playing off Jeffersonian anger at the war in Iraq. The odds of him successfully pivoting in the general election to erase the first impression of him as a Jeffersonian dove (a la McGovern) are slim. Meanwhile, as the NY Times article notes, with the exception of Lieberman (and to some extent Gephardt), the rest of the candidates, Clark included, have drifted towards the path Dean has blazed.


The policy problem for the Dems is more disconcerting, however. In an effort to distance themselves from the hated Neocons without adopting the knee-jerk pacifism of their Jeffersonian grass roots, the Dem foreign policy elite has latched on to the Hamiltonian critique of Bush's Iraq policy: the lack of international consensus, and the absence of a "real" national interest" implicated in the mission. In doing so, the globalist Dems (Albright, Clark, etc.) who fought so bravely for humanitarian intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo are standing shoulder to shoulder with those missions harshest critics and parroting the same lines. The failure to support the uprooting of a genocidal tyrant who did pose at least a medium-term security problem with his WMD aspirations will not only cost the Dems votes by appearing soft in swing states with Jacksonians, it will cost the Dems their Wilsonian heritage, leaving that vision to be rashly pursued by Neocons, or not at all. If that is the final result of the Dems response to Iraq, they will have lost not just an election, but in terms of foreign policy, their soul.