Centerblue.org

As Republicans retreat like beaten curs in the face of their implosion last night, to lick their wounds and fret about a future under Nancy Pelosi, they would do well to reflect on what brought them to such a sorry juncture.

The Party of Lincoln was supposed to be one of limited government, fiscal prudence and a balanced budget, a belief in the power of the markets, transparent governance, and a strong and sensible foreign policy. These principles were embodied in the Republicans’ Contract with America that helped usher them into power for twelve years. Notably absent from the Contract was any mention of divisive social issues like abortion or gay rights.

Shortly after their ascension to power, and increasingly so after Bush II came into office, Republicans threw the Contract away and most of their core principles along with it, adopting instead a scorched-earth policy based on delusions of having secured a permanent majority:

• Instead of focusing on dollars and cents, they resorted to socially divisive issues like gay marriage and Terry Schiavo to rally their base while leaving the rest of America cold.
• Their “win at all costs” mentality caused them to impeach a popular sitting president over a sexual indiscretion, severely poisoning the atmosphere in Washington and nearly eliminating the possibility of bipartisanship on any issues ever since.
• After 9/11, they squandered not just the goodwill of the world in the aftermath of the attack but also the nation’s prestige and ability to lead or pressure other nations through their pig-headed and misguided determination to invade Iraq without a plan or a clear set of goals.
• They became a rubber-stamp for a President with total disregard for basic constitutional rights.
• They engaged in fear-mongering tactics to win elections, raising the specter of terrorists on every street corner just waiting to pounce on Americans should Democrats ever come to power.
• Instead of nurturing the federal surplus handed to them after the Clinton years, they wasted it all and turned the surplus into humongous deficits, spending like drunken sailors while Bush failed to use his veto pen on anything except a stem cell research bill.
• They insisted on greatly worsening the federal budget by handing out tax cuts to those who needed them the least.
• They threw transparency in government out the window, letting their votes be bought by lobbyists and operations such as the “K Street Project.”

Many of the ideas of the Revolution itself were really good. What failed was Republicans’ ability to execute on them because of their self-entitled sense of having obtained permanent hegemony and the concomitant feeling that they no longer needed to be brought to account for their actions. It became sufficient for them to keep rallying their base, keep pushing wedge issues on the public, keep painting their Democratic opponents as weak on terrorism and wanting to coddle terrorists.

The Republican Revolution came to power because of an idea. It ended when the only idea left was how to keep power. As Democrats return to enjoy their own time in the sun, they would do well not to forget that lesson.

In the latest outrageous Bush effort to transform this nation into a fascist land of gulags and Big Brothers, his administration has the temerity to tell a federal judge that terrorism suspects must be gagged and prevented from speaking in public or even to their attorneys about the conditions of their confinement and about the torture to which they have been subjected.

The government is asserting that its “interrogation methods” used on suspects in CIA prisons are closely guarded and “top secret”–although it must be the worst-kept government secret ever, since everyone knows what’s going on at the hands of the Bush regime. Nevertheless, because the government deems these methods “top secret,” they argue in a federal court case that this fact means that prisoners must be prohibited from talking about them. Of course they’re also arguing, in light of last month’s unconstitutional Military Commissions Act, that the prisoners in question do not even have the right to talk to a lawyer at all.

There is no limit to the nerve of this administration in its quest to implement its vision of a decidedly unconstitutional monarchy. It now claims for itself the power to declare any information it pleases “top secret” and thereby prevent people from talking about it. Can you imagine? No longer does the government stamp documents “top secret” and then grant access only to a privileged few, which is a proactive, positive way to keep state secrets. It now wants to declare a subject of conversation top secret and then get people to stop talking about it. What nerve.

Of course the real purpose here is to shield the Executive from embarrassment or from having to admit to the depravity it is endorsing against suspects without any regard for what it means to be an American.

In Bush’s America, nobody is safe from the baleful Eye and Hand of the Executive. You better watch what you say.

Despite the threat of sectarian bloodshed, strong majorities of Iraqis polled say that the US should pick up and get out immediately.

Recently completed polls show that between 65% and 71% of Iraqis favor immediate withdrawal. Although they fear sectarian violence, that fear is outweighed by anger of and hatred towards American soldiers–who Iraqis say have done little to nothing to prevent violence, establish authority, and rebuild essential infrastructure.

Can you really blame them? Nobody wants to live in a country occupied by a foreign power, especially one so utterly unable to secure the peace.

If the Iraqis don’t want us there, if the Iraq occupation is a “cause celebre” for jihadists that is greatly worsening terrorism rather than lessening it, then why do we remain?

When “staying the course” means running the ship into an iceberg and causing it to sink, it is time to drastically change course.

Is it really a surprise to anyone? A new National Intelligence Estimate by US intelligence officials bluntly concludes that the Iraq war is greatly increasing the potential for terrorist acts worldwide rather than decreasing them.

Why? Because Iraq is serving as a focal point for radical Islamists. It is evidence to them of the West’s attempt to conquer Islam and kill Muslims. It serves as a breeding ground for their hatred, and a testing ground to prove their mettle. Radical web sites use Iraq to paint a narrative that highlights insurgent victories and constantly drums in a strongly Anti-American message, increasing morale and spurring radicals to plan a variety of new attacks of widening scope worldwide. Radicals are being inspired to create new cells who communicate only among themselves with no connection to any central group, making them much harder to detect.

Way to go, Dubya! Can you stop lying now by telling people they’re safer when they’re not?

Despite Bush’s every effort to try having the Senate enact his autocratic version of a bill for interrogating and trying terrorist suspects–even going to Capitol Hill himself yesterday–a small group of GOP Senators (Collins, Warner, Graham, McCain) is standing firm and refusing to let the administration trample the Geneva Conventions.

The issue is simple, really. Either we obey the provisions of the Geneva Convention and the rule of law, or we do not. Bush thinks that the “war on terror” gives him license to suspend just about every right that America holds dear (habeas corpus, right to speedy trial, right to know the evidence arrayed against you, right not to be tortured). It seeks to interpret the Geneva Convention in conformity with its wishes. These Senators understand that the Conventions apply to everyone, and that our failure to observe them undermines our moral high ground in the war on terror. It would also place our troops in jeopardy since our failure to adhere will give license to other countries to also not do so.

Conservative blogs such as this one are outraged at the “turncoats,” not being able to grasp why the Geneva Conventions and the Constitution might apply to terrorists.

Let’s see if we can describe it in language easy enough for them to understand: the war on terror is either a war, or it’s not. If it’s really a war, then the Geneva Conventions apply as against prisoners of war and its human rights requirements must be followed. Terrorists want to kill us no more and no less than any nation’s soldiers at war with us would want to do so, and their being terrorists does not exempt them from basic human rights accorded all prisoners of war. Spare me the blather that they’re different because they target civilians; there’s a list of of innocent women and children a mile long in Iraq who’ve been killed by American bombs (not to mention incidents like the My Lai massacre in Vietnam). We are America, not Taliban Afghanistan; we do not maim and torture regardless of the reason or intent of our enemies.

In regards to constitutional rights, not all terrorists are foreign nationals, some of them are Americans. For those that are, the Constitution does not distinguish between Americans in its granting of basic rights. All of our rights are threatened with extinction once we start to pick and choose who among us is entitled to the Constitution’s protections and who is not. Today it’s them, tomorrow it’s us–at the whim of a Chief Executive with no checks on his power. We can streamline warrant requirements, allow for better emergency response, make things faster, allow for quicker judicial review, weigh the benefits vs. burdens of intrusions on our privacy, and adopt other measures to fight terrorism…but we cannot give the president unlimited license to interpret, grant, and remove constitutional rights as he sees fit.

This is not about appeasement, not about being soft on terrorists. It’s about not forgetting we are all Americans and there are some values that cannot be given up without surrendering who we are as a nation.

The chief of intelligence for the Marines in Iraq has filed a report that matter-of-factly states that the situation is dire in Anbar province (comprising 1/3 of Iraq), and that Americans have effectively lost the political battle there. There aren’t enough troops to maintain order, local governments have collapsed, and the central government has no authority. Worse yet, the politically dominant group emerging in the region is none other than “Al Qaeda in Iraq.”

Gee, as a result of the invasion we now have Al Qaeda controlling a part of Iraq, probably with access to substantial oil reserves. Don’t YOU feel safer from terrorists because of the invasion?

Donald Rumsfeld was clapping his yap trap today before a group of veterans, saying war critics suffer from “moral or intellectual confusion” about what it takes to defeat terrorism, and that opposing the war is akin to people who tried to appease the Nazis. Given that a majority of Americans now oppose the war, I suppose that means that most of us are unpatriotic sympathizers of terrorism.

Who is it that war critics are trying to appease? How is the war in Iraq in any way related to the war on terror, except insofar that it has CREATED terrorists by the bucketload where none existed before?

Opposition to the war in Iraq has nothing to do with being tough on terrorism. Nobody is advocating that we expose ourselves to terrorist attack, and nobody is suggesting we not aggressively fight terrorist threats. What war critics contend is that the war in Iraq was wrong and unrelated to terrorism, and in fact makes the nation more vulnerable to terrorism because of the misallocation of resources that could be better spent on security measures.

Rumsfeld’s argument relies on the continuing fallacy that September 11th and Saddam Hussein were linked, when they were not. If you admit they are not linked, as you must given the weight of the evidence, then words like Rumsfeld’s become nothing more than stupid empty rhetoric from an incompetent bureaucrat, and show that he is indeed morally and intellectually confused.

The Washington Post has a lengthy article today, written by policy wonks from Georgetown University and the Brookings Institution, that urges the United States to lift the veil from its eyes and see the Iraq problem for what it really is: a civil war. Gone are the days for the flowery rhetoric about spreading democracy and defeating terrorists. The risks are urgent and imminent, our troops are in harm’s way, and we need immediate realistic leadership.

“Much as Americans may want to believe that the United States can just walk away from Iraq should it slide into all-out civil war, the threat of spillover from such a conflict throughout the Middle East means it can’t. Instead, Washington will have to devise strategies to deal with refugees, minimize terrorist attacks emanating from Iraq, dampen the anger in neighboring populations caused by the conflict, prevent secession fever and keep Iraq’s neighbors from intervening. The odds of success are poor, but, nonetheless, we have to try.”

The article proposes the following policy solutions for the US and the rest of the world, all of which has major stakes in what’s happening in Iraq:

• Secure the non-intervention of neighbors either through economic aid or through the threatened use of punitive military strikes in response to intervention.
• Do not pick winners; the civil war must determine that for itself and will do so whether we like it or not.
• Manage the Kurds. Civil war will drive them to seek full independence, which will inflame secessionist passions of other sorts. We should provide incentives for them to at least postpone the issue of independence until civil order returns in Iraq.
• Buffer the borders by setting up refugee collection points and by preventing the movement of terrorists and weapons. Massive refugee movements to other countries can destabilize their fragile governments and increase disorder there; we should therefore strive to keep as many of them safe in Iraq as possible until violence dies down. Unfortunately this will require continued expense and some kind of troop deployment for the US.

What a depressing yet realistic formulation of the immense challenges facing the US and the rest of the world in the wake of our disastrous invasion. This will no doubt go down in history as the worst foreign policy mistake ever in the history of the United States. In the face of that disaster we have to get real, get our troops out of harm’s way as much as possible, and minimize the damage the best we can.

Maybe he thinks that if he says it enough times it will become true, or maybe he simply can’t accept he’s wrong.

Whatever the reason, a delusional President Bush simply cannot stop trying to make the case that the disaster in Iraq (and now Lebanon) is somehow related to terrorism.

He says:

“It is no coincidence that two nations that are building free societies in the heart of the Middle East - Lebanon and Iraq - are also the scenes of the most violent terrorist activity. We will defeat the terrorists by strengthening young democracies across the broader Middle East.”

Gee, dear Mr. President. Do you suppose that the presence of “violent terrorist activity” in these countries might have ANYthing whatsoever to do with the fact they were invaded pre-emptively by Israel and the US respectively for no good reason?

“We will defeat the terrorists and expand freedom across the world, we’ll protect the American homeland and work tirelessly to prevent attacks on our country. The terrorists remain determined to destroy innocent life on a massive scale, and we must be equally determined to stop them.”

He’s starting to sound a little shrill, isn’t he? Unfortunately Bush’s disastrous Iraq adventure has made America MORE vulnerable to terrorism, not less.

Joe Sestak, a Democrat running for Congress against a vulnerable GOP incumbent in Pennsylvania, made this point crystal clear by pointing out that the amount we spend in two days in Iraq would be enough to pay for screening all air cargo on passenger planes, while five days’ worth of spending would pay for screening all ship cargo at our nation’s vulnerable ports. Instead, our money and our security are being sucked into the bottomless pit of Iraq.

The game’s over, Mr. President. Americans have woken up and won’t swallow the lies anymore. But please, by all means keep repeating your mantra over and over, because the more you do the more seats Democrats will pick up in Congress in November.