I want to share why John Kerry, and hence the Democrats, scare me when it comes to the larger war on Islamic radicalism, and why, therefore, I cannot vote for them this election season.
I am tempted to offer a hundred caveats just to show how balanced I am– things like how I think our post invasion policy in Iraq was terrible, how I wonder if Islamic countries can really be democratized, how I think Donald Rumsfeld should have been replaced, how I don’t like the Republican environmental policies, etc. But I won’t. :)
OK, so Kerry’s comments were stupid and inappropriate. I think about everybody agrees with that. I personally know people in Iraq with multiple college degrees, and I don’t know that many people there.
But what bothers me about Kerry is the very thing that should give him credibility, and that is his war record. I don’t think Kerry, and many if not most of his generation, are able to get over Vietnam. It seems that that during their formative years they developed a fundamentally anti-military, perhaps anti interventionist attitude, and a view that if we are involved in something militarily it must be bad, unjust, and evil. (Where, O where, are the Scoop Jackson Democrats? Are there any left?)
When you add to those suffering from Vietnam-induced arrested political development all the general-pacifistic-give-peace-a-chance-beatniks still lurking all around the Democratic party, I just plain don’t think that they can prosecute any war right now.
And prosecute a war we must do, make no mistake about that. Radical Islam would take over the world if it could. It would strike and kill innocent men, women, and children wherever it could until it either gets its way or runs out of the ability to kill. This war is not going to go away. It will not stop if suddenly, tomorrow, we’re all pacifistic and nice. We’ll just have more people dead, not fewer.
Tolkien comes to mind here, from the Two Towers, movie version:
Théoden: "So much death. What can men do against such reckless hate?"
Aragorn: "Ride out and meet them."
Radical Islam hates us. It hates our secular constitution. It hates the freedom we give to women. It hates the freedom of people to convert from Islam to something else, even though the reverse is happening in greater number. It hates the infidel. We are the infidel. We must die.
And I don’t think John Kerry and Howard Dean and Nancy Pelosi and Brad Miller and the rest have what it takes to prosecute this war. And that scares me. And that is the main reason I cannot vote for them.
(I can almost imagine Hillary prosecuting it, if she gets sufficiently pissed, but that’s another story)
I was too young to go to Vietnam. Barely. I think the way we handled the Vietnam draft was a travesty. I don’t think the idea of that war was wrong, because I think we also were engaged in a serious worldwide war then as well, but the way we handled it was terrible, and the unjust manner in which we sent people there was unconscionable. I don’t think Bob Kerry and his gang can get over it. And that is not good for the present.
That is why I hope, for now, that Bob Kerry (edit - meant John Kerry, thanks Jim) et al remain the minority party.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
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10 comments:
Yes, they scare me too because they so hate everything and everyone republican that it skews their vision. Makes them unable to see the larger picture.
Which makes it doubly important that they don't win. I just hope the religious right get out and vote. Not voting is equivalent to "cutting their nose... etc."
Sometimes its best to vote for the lesser of the 2 evils, rather than not vote at all.
Blessings.
Are democrats capable of prosecuting the was in Afghanistan? Your statement that democrats are incapable of prosecuting any war, echoed by many, is up there as the most infuriating to me, a liberal.
Support for the war in Afghanistan was and is universal, across the aisle. The division came with the invasion of Iraq. Saddam Hussein did not fit the description Radical Islam and was defeated when he attempted to expand. Kerry's problems are mainly due to his wavering attitude towards the war, and wavering the wrong way. If I were a senator, I would not have authorized the use of force, but would have voted for every other funding bill since, and would not even have imagined making reconstruction aid to Iraq loan-based.
The decision now is not what to do with Iraq, but with NK & Iran. War should be a last resort, because it is the most difficult to get right, and always involves doing harm. Iraq was a best-case scenario for where the US would fight a war, and it was a war we had plans for since '91.
People bring up Vietnam, my dad did recently, and often state that, "I don’t think the idea of that war was wrong", and then say we didn't fight aggressively enough. I read one of Nixon's speeches from when he was president and he said that defeat in Vietnam would harm America. After we left Vietnam, what harm did a communist Vietnam cause America? Did the dominoes fall?
If democrats are incapable, what actions have the republicans taken to show they are more capable? Simply deciding to invade Iraq?
BTW, Bob Kerrey is a different person than John Kerry, although they are both Democrats. Anyone with the medal of honor should be deemed capable of defending America.
Jim,
Saying Bob instead of John Kerry was boneheaded on my part. That was a mental flop.
Sometimes the things that are the most true are the most infuriating.
I only wish we could prosecute the war on terrorism as Sherman did to South Carolina.
That'll teach em!
I shouldn't take the criticism of Kerry personally, but it seems that Kerry and liberal are considered synonymous. However, I don't think that "sometimes the truth hurts" is a fair response to my comment.
Would you say someone like Jim Webb is capable of defending America? If not, what else would you want from him?
Anything specific that Brad Miller has done that disqualifies him, or just his association with Kerry?
Anonymous,
So, did you have to bring up Sherman and MY HOME TOWN! OK yes, hate to say it, we have to do it like that.
Jim, OK, maybe that was not fair. I don't think, though I'd have to go back and read it, that I targeted liberals per se. What concerns me is the present seeming dominant force within the Democratic party which I perceive as overly pacifistic, anti military, anti interventionist, overly pro UN, and generally just too much like John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, and Howard Dean. I think they have taken over the party. When I have heard Brad Miller he just sounds like the rest of them, but I don't know him that well. I don't think it is inherent to being a liberal or being a Democrat that one be like John Kerry. But I see his mindset and attitude all over the place right now, and I think a lot of that is generational, and rooted in his, and their, deep seated attitudes formed in the sixties and seventies. And when I think of my children and their future it scares me. About Afganistan, I think there is a difference between voting for an action and prosecuting an action.
"And when I think of my children and their future it scares me."
Have you encouraged your children to join the miliary to fight the wars you think are necessary? Does their decision not to do so dissapoint you or are you content to let their peers put their lives on the line?
Roch,
I am and would be very open to my one or more of my five daughters joining the military, and yes, I have encouraged their consideration of it. They are not yet through college so it is a little early to tell what they will do or not do. It would be fine with me. I think everyone must share the load and pay part of the price, even if that price could possibly be one's own child. But I understand myself to be the recipient of One who has given his one and only son for the sake of me, so I don't believe I can be stingy in return.
In fact, one daughter is presently being recruited by West Point and I hope it works out, though the chances are against it. She wants to work for the FBI. I would also be fine with me joining. In fact, a recruiter called one time for a daughter who was not home, and I asked them if they would take me. They asked me how old I was. So I told them. There was a long pause...."I'm sorry sir."
Do also realize that I have a Canadian wife! She thinks about the miltary kind of like the folks I have written about in this blog, God bless her. I keep reminding her that thanks to the US military she didn't grow up in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Canada, but that never really goes over very well!
But the answer to your question is, yes,
I'm not a member of the peace at any price crowd, but the choice to use military force is the most important responsibility of the CiC. I know who you're talking about though. I was at an Ani DiFranco concert (wife is a fan) and she ranted about the unjust wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. I bit my tongue, one for the animosity shown, and two for lumping the two actions together. One was immediately necessary, the other was rushed.
Intervention is something that needs to be done right, look at somewhere like Somalia. I was an interventionist when it was unpopular - in the 90's or even 2000! Bush made it a point to state that he was not-for "nation building".
We screwed up our intervention in Afghanistan in the 80's, and can't afford to make the same mistake again. How we execute those operations is critically important.
Jim,
I agree.
Joel
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