Next Stop: A Strategy
The Senate Democrats have compiled a neat little national security index -- a damning list of facts and figures that indicates how far astray we've gone in our approach to the world. That said, one thing that's become clear attending the America's Purpose conference, which brought together a huge number of eminent persons who are broadly critical of administration foreign policy, is how very far the opposition is from reaching anything resembling a consensus on anything more ambitious than a laundry list of this sort. Beyond the obvious divide about various facets of the Iraq question, there's simply a huge multiplicitly of views on any number of important topics.
My thinking is that, for the moment, that's all well and good. The impulse during the 2004 election to try to paper over disagreements and try to sort things out once John Kerry was in office had a certain logic to it, but didn't work out very well in the end. The best thing to do, at this moment so far from a presidential election, is to try and have these debates in an honest and respectful manner. Simultaneously, exercizes like the index are both politically useful and also remind people that, at some level, there really is a lot of agreement on certain things.
Dog bites man.
Democrats agree Republicans doing lousy job, disagree what should be done instead.
Sun comes up this morning.
September 7, 2005 8:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for the National Security Index. It is good to know somebody is tracking all of this. Every democratic candidate needs to use this as their 'national securities for dummys' cheat sheet to point out the recklessness of the Republican party.
This will also be a useful tool in beginning to develop a set of both strategic and tactical plans to address our needs as a nation. The devil is always in the detail of those plans, but at least if we can all agree on a set of facts, from which we can begin developing our plans, we have a great starting point. The National Security Index provides that starting point.
September 7, 2005 8:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
I keep hearing about this "debate" that the party is having about the correct response to Iraq. My question is: Who is participating in this debate, and for whose benefit? I've seen a lot of people extolling their visions, but little to no engagement with others' ideas.
September 7, 2005 9:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks to Matthew for pointing out that Democrat National Security Index! I was very interested to see how Democrats measured our national security - what metrics they used, and so forth.
So I was scanning the Index with respect to Iraq. So, by which of these metrics do Democrats think we should be measuring our progress in Iraq, according to the Index?
(a) the number of Iraqis who voted in January's election
(b) total amount of disbursements from the Iraq relief and reconstruction fund
(c) daily electricity load served
(d) the number of movies in Halliburton's employee movie library
And, the answer, to Democrats, is? You get ONE GUESS!
Yeah, if you guessed (d), you're right!
I can't think of a better example of the Democrats' utter unseriousness with respect to national security than this Index. Again, thanks to Matthew for pointing it out.
September 7, 2005 9:55 AM | Reply | Permalink
At the risk of taking your comment seriously, Al, I thought I'd point out that the report gives the number of movies in the Halliburton library in order to note that $152 million of US taxpayer money was used to pay for them! For comparisons's sake, that's equivalent to the annual budget of National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Our current debt to the United Nations, meanwhile? $600 million.
September 7, 2005 11:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
I can't think of a better example of the Democrats' utter unseriousness with respect to national security
Compared to the Republicans, who: let Osama go in Tora Bora, still haven't found him, diverted troops to Iraq, lied about WMD, outed a CIA agent, didn't arm our troops, didn't guard RDX now being used on our troops, lost 8 BILLION in Iraq, let the Iraqi Army run loose, created a training ground for terrorists, lost major allies, have not secured ports, have not secured chemical plants, have not secured water reservoirs, haven't improved airline security, can't secure our borders, let North Korea get nukes, let Iran get nukes, can't provide disaster relief, installed a Horse Judge as head of FEMA and....
have NEVER taken responsibility for any of it.
Yeah, I guess you're right. Those adults in the White House really showed us a thing or two about national security.
September 7, 2005 11:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
1, 454 and counting. Four years since 9/11 this coming Sunday and we're still paying more respect to BushCo than we are the anti-war, anti-corruption anti-torture base.
It's great that Dorgan keeps these statistics. I only wish he had the fortitude to do something about them.
September 7, 2005 12:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, Gfunk. The point, though, that both Matthew and I are making is that all the Democrats have come up with is a list of neener-neeners (large and small).
Matthew acknowledges this, and thinks its fine. He thinks that a little political point scoring is all the Democrats really need right now. Everything else, they can work on.
Seems to me that the oppopsite conclusion is to be drawn - that a political party that has nothing to offer on national security save a list of neener-neeners is pretty unserious.
September 7, 2005 12:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
So the unserious party is the ones who point out that the US Gov spent 152 million dollars buying movies for Haliburton and not the party that actually spent that money?
September 7, 2005 1:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
No, the unserious party is the one that believes that it is so important as to have a place on its "Weekly National Security Index", while things that are not important enough to meet that threshhold include the number of Iraqis who voted in January's election, the total amount of disbursements from the Iraq relief and reconstruction fund, and the daily electricity load served in Iraq.
September 7, 2005 2:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
In my mind the number of people who voted in January's election is completely irrelevent to our national security. You might think that voter turnout in the elections has some predictive value, but I would say that you are wrong.
September 7, 2005 3:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
This conference includes both Democrats and Republicans, so this really isn't the forum to sort out the official Democratic position on foreign policy, but it is the perfect forum to figure out the correct foreign policy.
Personally, I hope the Democrats choose to go with the correct policy, regardless of politics.
September 7, 2005 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Then your hero comes and he's a fucking idiot that can't string a sentence together. You have to pretend he's not though. You aren't stupid. Goddamn elitists and their ability to talk. He's honest. Except he keeps lying about everything. You have to resort to solipsism on stilts to try and pretend that it's true. You have to absolutely doublethink on a whole range of subjects. You have to ignore the fact that you are part of a machine that includes the stupidest, most suspicious, coarse sort of idiots in this country (that's usually where libertarians come in, they have enough exposure to the world not to want to be a bunch of ignorant hicks but can't quite get over the fact that daddy voted republican and mommy voted republican, etc..).
Now the country looks about dead in the damn water. A failed occupation that at best seems at this point to leave behind the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in control carrying out massive extra-judicial murder in pursuit of a Sharia state. An American city sitting about ten feet in feces and alligators. Throw ten bucks in your gas tank and you don't move the needle off the E. All of that getting ready to get passed down from the trucker to you. Makes Carter look pretty damn good in comparison.
For fuck sake, how emotionally vested do you have to be in a position before you just burn the opportunity costs and start over.
September 7, 2005 5:48 PM | Reply | Permalink