The uselessness of Democrats, part II
They cave in under Republican pressure, says E. J. Dionne:
The neat summary of the new Republican home-front offensive was the tag line on a Republican National Committee ad: “Our country is at war. Our soldiers are watching and our enemies are too. Message to Democrats: Retreat and Defeat is not an option.” Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert helpfully explained: “The Democratic Party sides with those who wish to surrender.”
Attacks of this sort on Democrats are effective because Democrats help make them so. Democrats are so obsessed with not looking “weak” on defense that they end up making themselves look weak, period, by the way they respond to Republican attacks on their alleged weakness. Oh my gosh, many Democrats say, we can’t associate ourselves with the likes of Howard Dean or Nancy Pelosi, the House Democratic leader who recently called for a troop withdrawal within six months. Let’s knife them before Karl Rove gets around to knifing us. Talk about a recipe for retreat and defeat.
But the Democrats’ problem is not just one of political tactics. It’s also rooted in a simple reality: Democrats in both houses of Congress have been divided on this war from the very beginning. House Democrats are, on the whole, more dovish than Senate Democrats. And the party’s rank and file are, on the whole, more dovish than its congressional wing.
There is no magic solution to this problem, and Republicans will continue to exploit it. But if they do nothing else, Democrats have to stop being defensive in the face of Republican attacks. To suggest that the United States might be stronger if it found a way out from under an open-ended commitment in Iraq is neither weak nor unpatriotic. For a party to have differences over how to solve the seemingly intractable problems the Bush policy has created in Iraq is neither surprising nor feckless.