"Can the Neocons Get Their Groove Back?" A response

In the Washington Post's Outlook section on Sunday, November 19, my friend Joshua Muravchick published an essay under the above title to which I felt compelled to respond. I have done so privately. This is part of what I said:

Having been, to a small degree, in at the birth of the neo-con movement and having shared its position on the Cold War, I agree that the movement performed a great service during that period. However, contrary to your position, I now hope that the neo-con movement is dead with a stake through its heart. It died or should have died of hubris and unwillingness to engage or even to tolerate differing opinions.

We invaded Iraq is large part because of neo-con influence and the purpose of the invasion was, I believe, never publicly stated by the Bush Administration. The invasion had nothing to do with 9/11. Evidence of a connection between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden was not just flimsy; it was laughable. Yes, everyone thought Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction but that was not the issue. The issue was whether Saddam Hussein's assumed possession of WMD constituted an imminent danger to the U.S. or whether there was time to push for more intrusive inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency and to seek aggressive sanctions against Iraq through the U.N. Security Council if Iraq failed to cooperate with the IAEA. My view is that the Bush Administration wanted to act preemptively, avoiding the diplomatic track, avoiding the need to assemble a sizable military coalition that might have complicated matters unnecessarily (from the Administration's standpoint). Finally, I don't believe that invading Iraq had anything to do with Saddam's brutality toward his own people -- and I doubt seriously that hope of establishing "democracy" in Iraq was anything but a rhetorical flourish. If anyone in the Bush Administration or in the neo-con cheering section actually believed that democracy was a realistic possibility in Iraq, then they were even less firmly anchored in reality than I thought.

The real purpose of invading Iraq was to change the dynamic in the Middle East, putting pressure on Iran and Syria, stablizing the position of the Gulf States (and preserving access to their oil supplies) and improving Israel's security. That was the concept inherent in the famous letter that Bill Krystal initiated, and I heard it articulated in October 2000, prior to the election, by someone who later played a key role in the decision to invade. The concept was so "brilliant" that no one dared speak about it publicly because Congress and the American people would have rejected it decisively as a reason to go to war. Its proponents were convinced that the outcome they wished was so much of a sure thing that independent experts on Iraq were not consulted and no one was allowed to think about, much less plan, for the day after "mission accomplished."

Chalabi and his friends were consulted, of course, but they expected to inherit the country. Outside experts, if asked, could have told anyone prepared to listen that Iraq was a fragile construct left behind by the British when they withdrew from the area and that ruthlessness and brutality were all that held the Sunnis, the Shi'as and the Kurds together against the will of both the Shi'as and the Kurds. Except that Iraq's geography and distribution of oil resources isn't very neat, Peter Galbraith's idea of dividing Iraq along national and confessional lines would be a credible solution (if there is a solution).

While I never studied comparative politics in graduate school, my perception is that the sine qua non of democracy is not elections, not even "free" elections, but a commitment to the "rule of law." Countries we all acknowledge as democracies come in many different shapes and sizes: parliamentary and presidential systems, Constitutional monarchies, presidents that function as head of state but not as head of government, two-party systems, multi-party systems, majority rule, plurality rule, so many parties that coalition governments are compulsory, etc., etc. The one thing they all share is the "rule of law" whether embodied in a Constitution enforced by an independent judiciary, an unwritten constitution established over centures of tug and haul, or fundamental laws forming a non-existent constitution that is somehow interpreted and enforced by a High Court that is regularly assailed but nevertheless obeyed. Germany and Japan became democracies under the management of occupying powers which in Germany's case revived laws and institutions which the Nazis had abolished and in Japan's case mandated a Constitution and the rule of law under a Constitutional Monarchy which the Japanese accepted because they were accustomed to following orders.

I believe that Institutions must be established and firmly grounded in basic laws before democracy can begin to develop. And in addition to the "rule of law" there must be certain identifiable "rights" which the State simply may not breach -- rights similar to, though not necessarily identical to, those embodied in the First Amendment. Iraq never had the makings of a democracy. It's not clear that it has the makings of a viable government of any description.

On the larger issue of what is feasible in the Middle East, Josh Muravchick identified several countries -- Morocco and certain of the Gulf principalities and he might have added Jordan -- in which space for public discourse has widened. (He should not have included Egypt in that list. Things have gotten worse there, not better, since the last "free election.) But space for public discourse is a tiny step, and the road to democracy is very, very long. If it becomes possible to talk about guaranteed space for public discourse and rights of individuals which are enforceable under the law, then it is possible, barely possible, that democracy can begin to develop. Not very long ago, we were congratulating ourselves on the "growth of democracy" in Latin America but events have shown how quickly democracy can be made to disappear unless undergirded by Institutions and rights that do not yet exist in most of Latin America.

As I explained to Josh, I once considered myself a neo-con or at least a "fellow traveler" of the neo-con movement. I abandoned it largely because its leading practitioners veered toward the extremes and practiced a form of debate in which even the mildest form of dissent was greeted with withering contempt. They were absolutely certain of their position down to the smallest detail. When I was in graduate school, I was led to (or might have stumbled across) a famous intellectual battle between Max Eastman and Sidney Hook which generated hundreds of pages of argument and counter-argument with nary a concession that the other guy might actually have a point worth considering. I found the debate fascinating at first and nauseating by the end. Neo-con debates remind me of Eastman versus Hook. Never admit doubt, never concede a point to the other side.

Too many of the neo-cons hold absolute convictions and are utterly unwilling to engage in the give-and-take of genuine intellectual exploration. It's been alternately amusing and disgusting to watch some of them swim furiously away from the sinking ship of Administration policies in Iraq which they helped formulate and cheered wildly until things began to go wrong. If only they'd done what I told them to do but "they" wouldn't listen.

The neo-con position began as a rejection of the McGovern movement by disillusioned Democrats -- a rejection of Democratic extremism. One of our number used to assert: "I didn't leave the Democratic Party; the Democratic Party left me." I feel the same same about neo-conservatism. The neo-cons veered toward the extreme -- as ideologues are wont to do -- and they've left me where I have been ever since I grew up, in the moderate middle.

Defeat is an orphan: Iraq

President John F. Kennedy famously said "victory has a thousand fathers but defeat is an orphan." The front page of today's Washington Post contains proof of that observation, as if any were needed. Several of the prominent neo-cons who clamored for the invasion of Iraq are now heaping scorn on the Bush Administration for the obvious failure of that enterprise.

Let's begin with some truths that are not widely understood. The invasion of Iraq was never about 9/11. It was not about creating democracy. It was not even about Saddam Hussein's assumed possession of weapons of mass destruction. (Everyone believed he did but the issue was whether they presented an "imminent danger" to the United States -- and most people, including those in Congress who voted for the war, understand that they did not.)

The invasion was always about changing the dynamic in the Middle East, eliminating Saddam Hussein, a force for instability, and replacing his rule with a friendlier government. The goal was simultaneously to put pressure on Iran and Syria, assure the safety of the Gulf States (and, of course, their oil resources) and eliminating a threat to Israel. How do I know that: because I heard it -- in October 2000, prior to George Bush's election -- from two people who subsequently became leading officials at the Defense Department.

They told a small gathering in which I happened to be present that Saddam Hussein would be ousted during George W. Bush's first term in office. The speakers had been in the administration of Bush I; and they were among many in that administration who regretted not having dismantled Saddam's dictatorship after the Iraqis were driven out of Kuwait and who were ashamed by the fact that Bush I had allowed an attempted coup to be quashed with the loss of many lives without the U.S. intervening.

They scorned what the Clinton Administration to contain Saddam Hussein by establishing "no fly" zones in the north and south. They ridiculed the International Atomic Energy Administration's efforts to locate the WMDs which they were certain existed. And they put no trust whatever in sanctions that might be imposed by the United Nations Security Council if Iraq refused to cooperate further with IAEA inspectors.

But those complaints were really beside the point. A group of intellectuals, mostly neo-Cons, had long since
called publicly for Saddam Hussein's ouster in an open letter signed by some people who became officials of the new Bush Administration -- Rumsfeld, Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, among others -- and some who never joined but formed an unofficial cheering section as war preparations got under way. It was going to be "a piece of cake" one of them (Ken Adelman, a former U.S. ambassador to the U.N.) declared when the war started. And he subsequently crowed about the accuracy of his prediction when U.S. forces "won the war" and George W. Bush claimed "mission accomplished."

None of the enthusiasts had a real understanding of Iraq, and Rumsfeld, Cheney, Wolfowitz and company never wanted to hear a single word from "experts" who might contradict their assumptions. Those experts might, for example, have told the Bush Administration stalwarts that Iraq was an artificial construct created by the British when they relinquished control of the area, that it was really three countries (at least) consisting of a Kurdish entity in the north, a Shi'a-controlled area in the south, and a Sunni minority to the west.

The ability to forge a workable government out of these conflicting elements was blithely assumed partly because that's what they were told by Iraqis in exile who expected to run the country once Saddam Hussein and the Ba'athists were deposed. It turned out to be not that simple. In fact, it has turned out not to be possible at all.

The cheerleaders were right about one thing: Saddam Hussein's ouster has certainly "changed the dynamic" in the Middle East -- all for the worse.

I'm no expert on Iraq. So I don't have a solution. But it looks to me as if the best that can be hoped for is a loose confederation in which considerable autonomy is granted to the three centers of power. And the worst -- which seems more likely -- is a continuation of sectarian violence with the Sunnis and the Shi'as continuing to take vengeance on one another, the Kurds in control of their own region thanks to their own militia, and the U.S. struggling to find a way to disengage while American casualties mount.

The people who were for the war and now heap blame on the Bush Administration national security team (and especially Rumsfeld) for botching it are half right. The Bush people certainly botched it. But the fathers of the war deserve a large share of the blame.

(Footnote: The quote that Kennedy made famous is said by the Columbia Encylopedia of quotations to have originated with an Italian fascist named Galeazzo Ciario who wrote it in his diary in 1942. There was one small difference between what he wrote and what Kennedy said. Ciario's version was "victory has a hundred fathers but defeat is an orphan.")

Grateful for private comments but please...

A number of friends have commented to me privately about this blog, and I really do appreciate that. But my purpose in starting this blog was to initiate an exchange of ideas among anyone with views to share on the subjects I've raised. I don't enjoy talking to myself -- the blogosphere is not an asylum for people with that sort of problem -- and I like being challenged by people who don't fully agree with me.

Pelosi and Her Leadership

Speaker-designate Nancy Pelosi has made serious mistakes in supporting John Murtha for majority leader and Alcee Hastings for the chairmanship of the House Intelligence Committee. The reasons are explained in detail by Ruth Marcus on the op ed page of today's Washington Post. Backing people who were stained by the Abscam scandal (in Murtha's case) and removed from a Federal court for bribery (in Hastings' case) seriously undermines Pelosi's claim to be an agent of change in the culture of corruption that unfortunately envelops the Congress. Although Ms. Pelosi has effectively distanced herself from the liberal orthodoxy that she was thought to embody, she has cast a cloud on her own reputation by opposing Steny Hoyer (D-MD) for House Majority Leader and Jane Harman (D-CA) as chairperson of the Intelligence Committee. It has been said in her defense that (a) she owed it to Murtha who managed her campaign against Hoyer for the Democratic leadership and (b) her letter was distributed after Hoyer already had the votes.
But there are other possible interpretations: (1) She holds it against Hoyer that he ran against her originally, (2) she is blind to the ethical implications (and the effect on her reputation as Speaker) of backing Murtha and Hastings, (3) she holds a personal grudge against Harman, who distinguished herself as ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, (4) she has weakened her position as Speaker by debuting in the Democratic Caucus as the backer of a losing candidate for Majority Leader.
Nancy Pelosi started off well but appears nowto be acting like a ward boss in the Baltimore political tradition of her father, Tommy D'Alessandro.

Oh, yes, the power to investigate

One power that the Democrats will certainly use beginning soon after they take command is the investigative
authority lodged with every committee and most subcommittees. That power will be used to spotlight many of
the areas that the Bush Administration successfully hid from sight and to focus public attention on abuses
by big oil, the drug companies and military contractors, often with the implicit cooperation of the Bush Administration. All those whistleblowers whom the Bush Adminstration first ignored and later fired if their findings became public will find a welcome audience on Capitol Hill and every effort will be made to assure massive media coverage. Rebuking the Executive Branch for its failures is one of the ways in which Congress has traditionally enforced its Constitutional standing, even when the White House is in friendly hands. But when the opposite party controls the White House, mercilessness is the order of the day. Tearing Bush and his Adminstration down will serve to prepare the ground for the Presidential election of 2008.

The Elections Outcome

Those expecting the Democrats elected on November 7 to revert to type by enacting a number of bills favored by the party's left wing are missing several key points in my estimation:

First, even if you assume that very liberal bills could pass both houses of Congress, they cannot be enacted without the President's signature. It's quite likely, I believe, that the minimum wage will be increased and that Bush will accept it. It's also possible that comprehensive immigration legislation incorporating major elements of last year's Senate bill can now pass the House, and Bush would sign that. But if you are expecting repeal of the Bush tax cuts, enactment of "fair trade" legislation favored by people like Sen. Byron Dorgan, forget about it. Such bills would be vetoed and the votes to override a Presidential veto are not there.

Second, the next two years will be a rehearsal for the Presidential election of 2008. The Democrats desperately want to recapture the White House, and they know that a strictly liberal social agenda is unlikely to win the support of many who voted Democratic in 2006. Nancy Pelosi may be, as her detractors claim, "a San Francisco liberal," but she's also a political realist and I expect her to be a lot more pragmatic as Speaker than she was when she was representing her San Francisco constituents.

Third, many of the freshmen Democrats in both houses are moderates, only slightly to the left of center on key issues. The new House members are already thinking about reelection in 2008. They occupy marginal districts, and they understand very well that voting for "liberal" legislation may not bring success.

Finally -- and perhaps most significantly -- despite the "100 hours" promise of the new House leadership, the central issues for the next two years are Iraq and terrorism. Democrats will need to concentrate on pursuing a strategy that will fulfill their promise to reduce the number of American troops in Iraq without undermining the credibility they have only recently won as a party that can be trusted on security issues. Similarly, they will have to show that they are just as determined to thwart the terrorist threat as George Bush and the Republicans. If Democrats want to rebalance homeland security measures with concerns about privacy and civil liberties, they will have to approach these matters with great care. Major changes in the PATRIOT Act are not in the cards. There would not be a majority for such changes in the Senate (even among Democrats), and -- though one will need to learn more about how newcomers in the House view these issues -- you can be sure that John Conyers will have difficulty assembling majority support for the kinds of changes in this and other laws that he might want to see enacted.

I do expect to see some move to ease the tax burden on the middle class, including changes in provisions of the alternative minimum tax as they currently exist. But, whatever you think about Charley Rangel, the incoming
chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, he is no bomb-thrower. He is a practical-minded politician who will build a reputation for adopting sensible pieces of legislation that can pass the House and be signed into law.

If there is to be a "liberal" or "progressive" restoration as some profoundly hope, it will not occur until after the next election and only then if the Democrats take the White House, strengthen their hold on the Senate and maintain a considerable margin in the House.

Introduction

After nearly 50 years in Washington, much of it in a firm that specialized in public policy analysis for private industry, I believe I know a fair amount about a lot of issues -- and have the research skills to find out more.
With a new Congress controlled by Democrats confronting a Republican White House, the next few years is likely to prove exceptionally challenging. Although I am a registered Democrat living in a county where the real elections take place in the Democratic primary, I am firmly in the moderate camp on most issues, not only because I believe that answers acceptable to the American people are generally found somewhere between the extremes but because I also believe that Democrats can only capture the White House in 2008 if they occupy the middle of the road, perhaps slightly left of center but certainly not from the position held by a great many Democratic Party activists.
As a political scientist by training, I have been watching elections professionally for all my adult life. That includes Presidential, Senate and House elections as well as those held in my state (Maryland) and county (Montgomery). The Blue State/Red State phenomenon described the extremes -- Republicans on the Right, Democrats on the Left -- that characterized most of the 1990's up to 2006. Bipartisanship was a dirty word in Washington, and Republicans in Congress behaved as if the Democratic Party did not exist. The nastiness that has characterized political behavior during this period was the inevitable result of the evacuation of the middle of the road by both parties. Politics, as has been said many times, is the art of persuasion -- and it has not been practiced in Washington for some time. The Republicans governed unilaterally, in part because most "moderate" Republicans disappeared for one of three reasons: Some retired, others were crowded out by conservative challengers in Republican party primaries, still others found it expedient to go along with the majorities in the Republican caucus.
This was especially true in the House after Newt Gingrich took over, to be followed by Tom DeLay (and his tame speaker, Dennis Hastert). The disappearance of comity was sudden and absolute. Eventually, some of the Class of 1994 (swept in at the time of Gingrich's "Contract with America") moved over to the Senate and they took their meanness of spirit with them. Bob Dole may not have been anyone's model of an agreeable
Majority Leader but he was a pussy cat compared to those who followed him. Rick Santorum -- whose loss this past Tuesday is widely unlamented -- was characteristic of the changed Senate demeanor.
One hopes that things will change now that the Democrats have regained control of both the House and Senate. But they must themselves refrain from "pay back," tempting as that may be. Both parties need to be part of the political process, and the opposition needs to be respected as much as the majority. As Bush & Company have amply proved, the majority does not have a monopoly on political wisdom.
I may add some more personal stuff later but this will do for a beginning.