The Absurd Report

Kevin Drum after watching the Democrats debate in Hollywood the other night:

Another thing the debate brought home to me is something Matt Yglesias complains about frequently. Both candidates claimed that Democrats understand national security and terrorism issues better than Republicans (“Democrats have a much better grasp of the reality of the situation,” as Hillary put it), and both agreed that a successful Democratic candidate would need to be able to make that case to the public. Obama thought he could make that case better because he opposed the Iraq war from the beginning, while Clinton thought she could make the case better because she’s better prepared. But neither of them actually made that case. Both Obama and Clinton had a national stage where they had more time than usual to explain the liberal position on how to combat terrorism and make the world safer, and neither of them did it. They just said they needed to do it.

And they’re right. They do need to do that. So why didn’t they start last night?

Democrats “understand” national security issues better than Republicans but the cat’s got their tongue when trying to explain why?

Let’s buy into that dubious formulation and try to ease Kevin’s perplexity. First of all, both Clinton and Obama are hamstrung by one, overriding, overarching reality; they can’t support any policy, strategy, or proposal that has been implemented, offered by, or hinted at by the Bush Administration.

This is the baseline for any policy formulated by the candidates. The deranged nature of their base when it comes to anything Bush precludes the advocacy of some Administration policies that actually may have merit while other Bush policies regarding the use of pre-emptive force and the struggle against Islamic extremism have become an anathema to the entire Democrat Party.

That leaves each candidate trying to show how much more accommodating they would be to the cutthroats of the world than Bush – a prospect that no doubt has the Iranians, Syrians, Hamas, and others wishing devoutly for a Democratic triumph at the polls next November but that may leave large segments of the American electorate cold.

Hence, the attempts by both candidates to obscure the truth by mouthing platitudes and offering generalities in lieu of specific ways to deal with the threats that we will face over the next decade.

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Tags: Global War on Terrorism, National Security

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