What is a fringe position in one party is mainstream in the other
Betsy's Page
Jeff Jacoby ponders Ron Paul's positions on foreign affairs and notes that Paul is essentially a hopeless fringe candidate whose views that the U.S. provoked the 9/11 attacks by our presence in the Middle East are rightly regarded as insultingly nutball by Republicans. But, alas, such positions wouldn't be regarded as fringe in the Democratic party.
<<< Paul helps illustrate what may be the most significant difference between the two major parties today: Republicans who don't take the threat of radical Islam seriously are marginalized. Democrats who don't do so constitute their party's mainstream.
At the Democratic debate on April 26, moderator Brian Williams asked the eight candidates: "Show-of-hands question: Do you believe there is such a thing as a global war on terror?" Only four -- Hillary Clinton, Bill Richardson, Christopher Dodd, and a noticeably hesitant Barack Obama -- raised their hands. Kucinich, John Edwards, Joe Biden, and Mike Gravel did not. Unlike Ron Paul, who holds no important position in the GOP, Biden is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Edwards was his party's vice presidential nominee in 2004. The man who headed the ticket that year, Senator John Kerry, insisted that Islamist terror is merely "a nuisance" that "we're never going to end," like gambling and prostitution. >>>
Jacoby wonders why Democrats don't take the threat of Islamic terrorism as seriously as Republicans. Some may regard such groups as noble indigenous fighters against western imperialism. And others may just reflexively take whatever position that opposes George Bush.
<<< But to a large extent, the Democrats' lack of seriousness about the war we are in can only be explained by Bush Derangement Syndrome. The term was coined by commentator Charles Krauthammer, a former psychiatrist, who defines it as "the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency -- nay, the very existence of George W. Bush."
What if not derangement can explain such fever-swamp nuttiness as the findings of a new Rasmussen poll, which asked whether Bush knew about the 9/11 attacks in advance? Among Democrats, 35 percent believe he did know and another 26 percent weren't sure. Only 39 percent said he didn't. In other words, nearly two out of three Democrats are unwilling to say that Bush wasn't tipped off to 9/11 in advance.
In another poll recently, respondents were asked whether they personally wanted Bush's new security strategy in Iraq to succeed -- not whether they expected it to, but whether they wanted it to. Among Democrats, a stunning 49 percent either hoped that the US plan would fail or couldn't make up their minds.
As long as the 43d president remains in office, a significant number of Americans will be so consumed with Bush-hatred that they will be unable to acknowledge -- let alone defeat -- the real evil that confronts us all. Will they come to their senses after Jan. 20, 2009? And even if they do, will it be too late? >>>
What if a Democrat gets elected in 2008 and on January 20, after being sworn in, is given the daily press briefings that show how many attempts are being made all the time around the world to kill Americans or our allies? Then will these Democrats start believing that we're in a global fight. And, if they do, what will they plan to do differently to protect Americans from jihadis emboldened by their propaganda successes in Iraq? And how will the new administration protect a fragile democracy like Iraq from descending into a Sudan-like state of genocide and alliances with the very terrorists who are working to destroy all hope of a peaceful Middle East?
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