A Pilgrim’s Digression

Election May Hinge On Debates (washingtonpost.com)
I always wonder at how every election is always the most negative yet, the most divisive, the most important in history; and every election always “hinges” on the debates. Part of this is the media’s need to have a dramatic horse race. Still, having experienced several of these elections now, one only feels the drama of the situation if one forgets the slogans, key words, and issues of the previous campaign.

As this article acknowledges, the debates are not strictly debates, in the formal sense. There is none, or very little, hand to hand combat between the opponents. Mostly, there are side by side “I believe …” statements about policy and priorities. Thus the things people most remember, ironically, are a candidate’s facial expression, whether they seem nervous or on edge, whether they look at their watch, as George H. W. Bush did during a debate with Bill Clinton. This is why Kerry is probably at a disadvantage in the debates coming up. His formal debating skills are absolutely worthless in an environment where voters are looking for emotional cues that help them identify with a candidate, or which disqualify the candidate from consideration. Kerry so far has not triggered much positive feeling in anyone that I know of.

Meanwhile, Iraq descends further into chaos. This will be the primary subject of the first debate this week, thus the first debate should be the best and the most relevant.

I think a lot of otherwise Conservative, hawkish Americans have doubts about the Bush policy in Iraq. It is clear to anyone with eyes that we are not fulfilling what we went to Iraq to do. Another article in the Post today describes the arrest of a General in the Iraqi National Guard for ties to insurgents. Meanwhile, attacks by terrorists in Iraq average 22 per day. Question is, do we give this up as pointless and let Iraq go its own way, or do we find a solution to this problem that does not involve an American occupation? Giving up is simplest, but would probably lead to problems down the road, since Iraq would most likely become an anti-American stronghold like Iran. But what else is there? The Iraqis clearly have no will to cooperate with us. There will come a point, as in Vietnam, where we must decide to cut our losses and withdraw.

That may seem an untenable outcome to the Bush Administration, or maybe not. Last week Robert Novak wrote an editorial in which he claimed that an unnamed, important Bush Administration official has told him that after elections in January, the President (assuming Bush is still President) will pull troops out of Iraq, too. This sounds like a mere attempt to influence the election by hints of what may happen, put on the information market by unnamed officials and a columnist of dubious reputation. However, I think there is probably a good chance that the January elections will result in significant troop reduction.

If the Bush Administration itself is considering early withdraw as Novak, a Conservative columnist, suggests, there seems even less of a difference between the two candidates running for President. It also frees Americans of their conflict between the necessity of winning the war, and claiming an uneasy peace. We can vote for either candidate without feeling we are making a right or wrong choice with respect to the War on terror and Iraq, because both men seem to endorse the same course of action. If President Bush is considering withdrawing the troops before the job is complete, then indeed that suggests that neither Bush nor Kerry see their way clear to an acceptable outcome in Iraq. And that is truly frightening and embarrassing for this country. No matter who is elected, we have only the national shame of defeat to look forward to next year. Iraq is beyond our control now.