Letters From Wonderland

I wasn't going to post today -- nothing in the news was really stirring up the juice, y'know? But this exchange at Andrew Sullivan was just too ludicrous to pass up. Let's do some analysis.

From one of Sullivan's readers:

In his speech yesterday Rudy Giuliani got one thing right: "The Democrats do not understand the full nature and scope of the terrorist war against us."

Well knock me down. And what did anyone expect him to say? That the Republicans have blown it? Come on -- the man is hoping to run for president against a Democrat, and he's still beating the "Democrats are soft on national security" drum. Quelle surprise!

Offhand, I'd say that the Democrats seem to understand the nature of terrorism far better than the Republicans do. As a matter of foreign policy -- and it is -- the Democrats understand very well the value of international cooperation on international problems. The Republican idea of foreign policy has come to be "Talk tough and screw your allies." This is not a "war" in any real sense of the word, unless you're talking about the kind of "dirty war" that occupied most of the last half of the last century. It's an intelligence war, not a military exercise. That much should be obvious. The "War Against Terrorism" is just another empty Bush catch phrase, like "No Child Left Behind" and "Clear Skies Initiative." Rhetoric, pure and simple.

And I cannot think of a single Democratic politician who has made a speech about the Islamist jihadist threat in-and-of-itself, unless it is to criticize Bush's response to it. What's the Democrats' big signature issue right now? Global warming. You seem to regularly underestimate the level of denial at the heart of contemporary liberalism, its need to remain comfortable with it's own fantasies. Today's Democratic Party today is not Truman's. They don't get the existential threat posed by jihadists because they don't want to get it.

This reader is obviously a raving lunatic, with a major disconnect to reality. If he/she has paid any attention to what's going on in Washington in the past few months, he would see that the Democrats are very concerned with terrorism and the war in Iraq, but Iraq right now is by far the worse crisis. Once we can get ourselves out of Iraq, we might be able to do something effective against terrorism -- if we can rebuild our international standing. The response to terrorism itself on the part of the administration has been to undercut American values in favor of a nascent police state. "Existential threat"? Yeah, we have one -- it isn't wearing a turban.

The "global warming" trope is a red herring. Global warming is just another crisis that Bush and the Republicans have ignored that has to be dealt with. This person's just bent out of shape because his favorite crisis isn't everyone's favorite crisis, that's all.

Sullivan's response is lame. I'm suprised he dignified this nonsense with a response, truth be told. His parting shot:

And we should absolutely demand positive policies for winning the war from the Dems. But after the mess Bush has made of the war thus far, I don't see why all the defensiveness should be coming from the Dems. Maybe it's telling that it still is.

I think that when the Democrats have had a chance to start fixing some of the mess that Bush has created, we'll see policies. Of course, Bush will fight them tooth and nail. His policy against terrorism is to go fight a ground war someplace else. We had fairly effective policies under Clinton. At least he didn't ignore national security briefings. (It strikes me that "policy" in this context is a misnomer. What we need is effective strategies. We don't have them. A "policy" on terrorism is a no-brainer.) Defensiveness? No, sorry. The Democrats aren't at all defensive about terrorism, any more than they are about any other partisan attack. (Which is to say, too much in general, although that's certainly ending.) It's the Republicans who are on the defensive now, because they've manage to botch the whole thing completely. You can tell by the shrillness of their attacks.

Also via Andrew Sullivan, on the whiny Democrats, this post from Kevin Drum:

So I was curious: how would the Dem candidates respond? With the usual whining? Or with something smart? Greg Sargent has today's responses from Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton over at his site and the verdict is in: more whining. Obama: "Rudy Giuliani today has taken the politics of fear to a new low blah blah blah." Clinton: "One of the great tragedies of this Administration is that the President failed to keep this country unified after 9/11 yada yada yada."

I wouldn't characterize that as whining. I'd characterize it as dodging, which is another reason I'm not enthusiastic about the Democratic front runners. I agree with Drum on one point: articulate a position on national security clearly and succinctly. Duh. (Read the comments on Drum's post -- they're pretty intelligent. Favorite:

So if we don't elect Guiliani or a Republican, we're in danger of more attacks like the one that happened in NYC when Giuliani was mayor and a Republican was president?

Makes sense to me!)

It's about the sound bites, stupid.

Update:

A reader TPM says it all:

All of the Democratic responses to Giuliani's "white flag" fear appeal were inept -- unfortunately and somewhat surprisingly, Dean's "should be ashamed of himself" was the worst. The opposite reaction would have been best. No advice on how Rudy should feel, instead simply pointing out that this is the real Giuliani, a Bush clone employing the same failed rhetoric to prop up the same disastrous ideas. Who wants another 4 years of that?

Update II:

Over at Election Central, Greg Sargent notes John Edwards' response to Giuliani, which is as close to bare knuckles as the Democrats come. He also refers to Kevin Drum's post -- intgeresting, isn't it, that Drum left Edwards' response out of his whining? (If you'll pardon the expression.) Read the whole post -- Sargent eviscerates Drum in the nicest possible way.