Why Kerry is losing this election
Thomas P.M. Barnett :: Weblog Oct 21/04
[Americans], to an amazing degree, ...supported the war in Iraq even as they are now deeply disconcerted and feel betrayed by the performance of our political leadership in overseeing the subsequent occupation. Why Bush will likely win this election is because Americans prefer the sense of steadfastness during difficult times, and they perceive that more in Bush than in Kerry, who insists on speaking about the "wrong enemy" and the "wrong war," when Americans are watching videos of beheadings in the Middle East and instinctively understand that-no matter how we got to this point in the war-"those people" certainly look like our enemies and our loved ones are dying in this conflict, no matter how some may judge the incorrectness of our battlefield choice.
Plus, the Republicans are waging an effective one-two punch with Bush's "mission of spreading liberty" (a bit over the top, but an appealing "happy ending" in the absence of anything else) and Cheney's constant harping about Kerry not being focused on his understanding of the threat/enemy/nature of the conflict. Kerry and his people counter badly on this, and it underlies their essential mistake in this campaign.
Terrorists attack America on 9/11 and we have three essential choices for reply: hunker down in "homeland security," go out and kill them as fast as we can, or . . . think strategically about what the terrorists seek to achieve with this form of warfare and get there first. Bush's message of "spreading the power of liberty" (see "In Bush's Vision, a Mission To Spread the Power of Liberty," by David E. Sanger, New York Times, 21 October 2004, p. A1) answers-albeit simplistically-that strategic challenge: we seek to connect the Middle East to the Core faster than the Osamas and Zarqawis can disconnect it and by doing so, set it motion a long-term movement toward individual political liberty and-more importantly-economic opportunity-that is sadly lacking there. That is a happy ending, and it's one designed to make Americans feel better about themselves and our role in history, and you know what? That's awfully damn smart of the Republicans, because you never motivate anyone to sacrifice through shame and derision.
Now if this Administration could just learn that essential lesson in how they're running the occupation in Iraq, we'd actually be getting somewhere over there.
Instead of offering the happy ending, Kerry and Co. have chosen to lead with the two alternative approaches. Yes, you can try to firewall off America a la Richard Clarke and Steven Flynn and a host of other inward-looking books that encourage Americans to seek safety through hunkering down. You can do the Chicken Little routine (which Clarke excelled at throughout his government career) of constantly crying "they're coming" and "be afraid" and "close the gate" and so on and so on. But there is no happy ending in this pathway. It's M. Night's movie "The Village" writ large and it's largely defenseless as a vision of a better world, so much so that it's so easily mocked by parties both left and right and straight down the middle of the political spectrum.
Bush and Co. did pander to our fears by creating the Department of Homeland Security, and guess what? That behemoth will largely go unattended over future years and administrations. It will be a huge budgetary sinkhole with of sound and fury and signifying almost nothing about a national grand strategy designed to win a long-term war on terror. So the outcome of that choice for Kerry in this election is that Bush got to harvest the feel-good bit many moons ago and now all the Dems get is the feel-afraid vibe for the election, without any accompanying happy ending to soften that fear-mongering message.
The second bad choice the Dems have made is to embrace this rote statement of "John Kerry will hunt down and kill these terrorists," as if that's an answer to anything, instead of just being a duh!-sort of obvious tactic anyone is going to employ when president. Bush has shown a real willingness to engage and kill the enemy, so why the Dems think having Kerry second that emotion is simply beyond me, because when that's the sound bite everyone from Sandy Burger to his daughters spit out every TV appearance they can, it essentially kills the discussion of what John Kerry's long-term strategy of defeating al Qaeda's strategic objectives should be. Instead we get "need more allies" and "fight smarter," which is fine in and of themselves, but doesn't really extend a line of logic to what should really be enunciated: Kerry's definition of the finish line in a global war on terrorism. By offering the "nuisance" argument, however reasonable it is, Kerry left it to Bush's people to fill in the blank.
So, much to my dismay, Dems have let themselves be cornered into arguing only tactics (much like Anonymous's book, another in a long list of downer volumes designed to make Americans feel bad and stupid about the world-a winning tactic in motivating the public toward sacrifice if ever there was one), while the Republicans own the market on vision and happy endings. Bush has made the better choice because his party's free trade leanings outsize those of the Dems, whose tendency to argue a go-slow approach on globalization positions them perfectly to the loyal opposition from hear on out. Don't get me wrong, the go-slow ideology is the perfect counter to the pedal-to-the-metal attitude that both Clinton and now Bush have pushed, but it's the minor theme in this melody called globalization. It's never the "yes," but always the following "but" in any construction: "Yes we must push economic connectivity and personal liberty around the world as a way to defeat transnational terrorism, but we must also be sensitive to local needs and time that advance in such a way as to allow less developed societies to join our way of life at a pace that's sustainable for both them and the planet."
Yes, I believe in that whole statement, but guess where the emotional center of gravity is found in that sentence?
I know the temptation of appealing to people's fears during difficult times. I also know of the challenge of the challenger in getting a frightened public to get rid of a powerful leader during uncertain times. But the Dems have made two fatefully bad choices in this election by choosing to focus on tactics (kill terrorists) and operations (defend America) instead of real strategy (beat the enemy to the finish line). They have selected downer subjects, where Kerry's sophisticated understanding of things actually works against him, leaving Bush to exploit the high ground, where his simplistic-yet-very-sincere delivery works like a charm.
I have said it before and I will say it again: the more optimistic candidate wins national elections, and despite the great mishandling of the Iraq occupation by this administration (yet another damning article today in the Times by Michael Gordon on page 1: "Debate Lingering on Decision To Dissolve the Iraqi Military"]), their mindless alienation of allies around the dial, and the growing sense of strategic despair both have created throughout far too much of the U.S. military, Bush and his campaign have managed to seize the high ground of both grand strategy and an optimistic vision of the future, leaving Kerry and the Dems to mutter about how "we'd do it better if we had the chance."
Arguing methodology over content when it comes to grand strategy is a loser-plain and simple. On that score Karl Rove is kicking James Carville's ass, leading me to believe that the only way the Dems will reclaim the Clintonesque ability to push a Reaganesque sense of forward-looking optimism will be to move beyond Kerry's badly managed campaign and go with the other Clinton in 2008.
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