Here.
RIP Milton Friedman
It seems as though it must have been an awfully good life: a long one filled with accomplishments, a happy marriage, and countless friends. Milton Friedman, who died today, was the economist nearly everyone’s heard of, the architect of libertarian economic theories followed by Reagan and Thatcher, predictor of the inflationary problems of the 70s (“stagflation”), and hero of former Communist nations struggling to become capitalist.
Friedman believed that government should interfere as little as possible in the economy except for taking a hand in controlling the supply of money. His ideas were revolutionary at the time, since Keynes held sway, but they harked back to earlier thinkers such as Adam Smith.
I’m interested, as usual, in what factors about Friedman’s life may have formed him. The shaping of a human being is always, at heart, a mystery, but here are a few clues:
Mr. Friedman’s father died in his son’s senior year at Rahway High School. Young Milton later waited on tables and clerked in stores to supplement a scholarship he had earned at Rutgers University. He entered Rutgers in 1929, the year the stock market crashed and the Depression began.
Mr. Friedman attributed his success to “accidents”: the immigration of his teenage parents from Czechoslovakia, enabling him to be an American and not the citizen of a Soviet-bloc state; the skill of a high-school geometry teacher who showed him a connection between Keats’s “Ode to a Grecian Urn” and the Pythagorean theorem, allowing him to see the beauty in the mathematical truth that the square of the sides of a right triangle equals the square of the hypotenuse; the receipt of a scholarship that enabled him to attend Rutgers and there have Arthur F. Burns and Homer Jones as teachers…
In his first economic-theory class at Chicago, he was the beneficiary of another accident ”” the fact that his last name began with an “F.” The class was seated alphabetically, and he was placed next to Rose Director, a master’s-degree candidate from Portland, Ore. That seating arrangement shaped his whole life, he said. He married Ms. Director six years later. And she, after becoming an important economist in her own right, helped Mr. Friedman form his ideas and maintain his intellectual rigor.
After he became something of a celebrity, Mr. Friedman said, many people became reluctant to challenge him directly. “They can’t come right out and say something stinks,” he said. “Rose can.”
In 1998, he and his wife published a memoir, “Two Lucky People” (University of Chicago Press.
His wife survives him…
Lucky people, indeed–but not blind luck. Friedman was obviously brilliant, but with a creative mind able to synthesize, some experience with the school of hard knocks as well as academia, and a heart that recognized a good potential spouse when he saw one plus the good sense to stick with her for what must have been something like seventy years.
Friedman had the ability to earn the grudging respect even of his opponents, and sometimes even their reluctant acquiescence in the end. That’s the mark of a formidable thinker, one whose theories had predictive value. It’s also the mark of an honest and open-minded opponent:
Mr. Samuelson…of M.I.T., [who often disagreed with Friedman], who was not above wisecracking himself, had a standard line in his economics classes that always brought down the house: “Just because Milton Friedman says it doesn’t mean that it’s necessarily untrue.”
But Professor Samuelson said he never joked in class unless he was serious ”” that his friend and intellectual opponent was, in fact, often right when at first he sounded wrong.
Mr. Friedman’s opposition to rent control after World War II, for example, incurred the wrath of many colleagues. They took it as an unpatriotic criticism of economic policies that had been successful in helping the nation mobilize for war. Later, Mr. Sameulson said, “probably 98 percent of them would agree that he was right.”
Friedman’s major achievement, the one for which he received the Nobel prize, was linking rising unemployment to rising inflation. He also suggested a remedy, one that’s generally been followed: to have the Federal Reserve keep the money supply growing steadily.
Here are some visuals for the imagination (I’ve seen Galbraith in person, by the way, and though far be it from me to doubt the veracity of the Times, he appeared even taller than this, if possible):
In forums [Friedman] would spar over the role of government with his more liberal adversaries, including John Kenneth Galbraith, who was also a longtime friend (and who died in May 2006). The two would often share a stage, presenting a study in contrasts as much visual as intellectual: Mr. Friedman stood 5 feet 3; Mr. Galbraith, 6 feet 8.
But–in a metaphor that’s almost inescapable–Friedman was a giant of a man.
[NOTE: Liberals and leftists have criticized Friedman for giving economic advice to the government of Pinochet in Chile. I wouldn’t doubt it if some commenters here feel like doing the same (criticizing him, that is, not giving advice to Pinochet). Friedman’s pragmatic answer was this:
…if he could help reestablish a free market in Chile, political freedom would eventually triumph there as well.
For a fuller explanation by Friedman, see this as well.]
And now for some good news: repealing sharia rape law in Pakistan
Pakistan has taken a step forward after taking several steps backward. Yesterday Pakistan’s legislature voted to end the sway of sharia in dealing with the crime of rape.
Ah, sharia. That famous Muslim legal system, steeped in a religion that’s so very respectful of women and human rights. But it’s not, you say? Ah, but we need to respect a different culture, as the British imperialist warmongers so famously did not regarding the quaint and ancient Hindu practice of suttee:
When General George Napier was governor of Sind province in India in the 1840s, he vigorously enforced the ban on suttee, the practice of throwing a Hindu widow on to the funeral pyre of her husband. A delegation of Brahmins came to him to explain that he must not prohibit the practice at the funeral of a particular maharaja, as it was an important cultural custom.
“If it is your custom to burn a widow alive, please go on,” Napier responded.
“We have a custom in our country that whoever burns a person alive shall be hanged. While you prepare the funeral pyre, my carpenters will be making the gallows to hang all of you. Let us all act according to our customs” The Brahmins thought better of it, and the widow lived.
Old-fashioned imperialism is dead–at least, of the Western variety–despite leftist claims that we are the worst imperialists ever. So Napier’s solution is not available to us.
But even Leftists and feminists ought to be privately rejoicing in their publicly multi-cultural hearts at the news from Pakistan. No longer does a raped woman require the corroborative testimony of four Muslim men to confirm her account of a sexual assault. And, praise be, judges are now able to consider forensic and circumstantial evidence of rape, as well. Not only that, but flogging and stoning to death will no longer be on the books for consensual sex outside marriage.
But all is not well in Pakistan for those who want to mess around; far from it. All extramarital sex is still punishable by five years in prison and fines. And we only got a tongue-lashing from our parents, and fear of pregnancy (although I seem to recall that, when I was in college, the crime of fornication was still on the books in several states).
Members of Parliament from Islamist parties boycotted the vote, but it still passed. And President Musharraf, who has pushed for this change for years but always backed off in the past when Islamist groups threatened protests, seems to have gotten his way this time.
Why success now? Perhaps the key was international embarrassment:
Pakistan’s rape laws came under international scrutiny when last year when a high court overturned the convictions of five men accused of gang-raping villager Mukhtar Mai, as a form of punishment for an adulterous act by her brother and another woman. She had to flee the country because of the backlash against her.
I’m not sure whether pressures like that would work in a country less Westernized than Pakistan. It’s also interesting to note that sharia has not held sway there for very long; these laws were part of a legal “reform” movement that was introduced in 1979. It was a very good year–for turning back the clock to a medieval version of civil rights: 1979 was also, of course, the year of the Iranian revolution.
Post-election blues? Try the Sanity Squad
For those of you with post-election letdown (and everyone else, as well) here’s a dose of the Sanity Squad. It may not be the talking cure, but it sure is a lot of talking.
Government lies, press lies: finding the truthtellers on that island
Since last week’s election, I’ve been thinking about Vietnam. Again.
Back in earlier installments of my “A mind is a difficult thing to change” series (and no, readers, I’ve not given up on composing new installments; they’re just so lengthy that I have to find a huge chunk of free time in which to tackle them), I wrote at least four pieces on the subject: here, here, here, and especially here.
A deja vu feeling engendered by this post-election week harks back to the early seventies, the time of Vietnamization and the phased withdrawal of US troops, and then the final pulling of the financial plug on the South Vietnamese in 1975. That war ended, for most Americans, not with a bang but a whimper, as well as a sigh of relief.
Back then, my thoughts about Vietnam–and therefore many of my opinions and feelings–were formed mainly by reading what we now call the MSM but what at the time was simply the press, the newspapers, the papers of record, all the news fit to print. Part of my revisiting of the Vietnam story has been to re-evaluate some of the information and impressions I and many others swallowed at the time, and to look at them in the harsh light of a new day.
There’s nothing easy about that process. How does one evaluate what is truth, what is lies, and what is the bias and subtle shading in between? On the island of the truth tellers and the liars, how can you tell the difference, when knowing the answer could be a matter of life and death?
One way, of course, is to look at the track record for accuracy and the known biases of the presenter of such “truths” Another, and my favorite, is to read on both sides and then try to decide. But in the end, the reader is faced with the fact that truth is an elusive beast to stalk.
But it’s not a unicorn. I’m not one to throw up my hands in despair and decide that all truths are equally equal and equally unknowable, so why bother. I believe we can–and must–try to learn history as best we can, or be condemned to repeat it. Sometimes I fear that even if we do learn it, we’ll still be condemned to repeat it, simply because human nature doesn’t change.
Which brings us (in laborious fashion; I know, I know!) back to Vietnam.
One of the constant themes of many critics of the US role in Vietnam was that our government lied. There’s no question this was a watershed experience for many Americans who lived through it; for them, ever afterwards, a deep and bitter skepticism towards our government replaced an earlier too-naive trust. For many such people, there was a concomitant attitude change towards members of the press, who were now seen as heroic giant-slayers and (pardon the word) crusaders, bravely exposing those government lies.
I was never one who saw it in such very stark terms. But yes, early on, it became evident that Vietnam was one of the most complex endeavors in American history, one in which the government did appear to lie (or at least bend the truth) about some key issues, such as, for example, the possibilities of actually ever “winning” the conflict. But it’s also become clear that the press also had a horse in that race, and wasn’t averse to some shady doings of its own.
Anyone who’s read my “change” series knows that a goodly part of my post-9/11 thinking has been a process of evaluating press lies, truth-shadings, and biases. One reason the press can get away with this so easily is because of human laziness: how many people are going to make it their business to become the MSM’s fact-checkers? That would be far more than a full time job, although it’s become a bit easier with advent of the internet.
Take the Pentagon Papers. We all know the drill: fearless Daniel Ellsberg, at the risk of prosecution, spirits away classified information (not in his pants a la Sandy Berger–the Papers were originally 7,000 pages long, and Ellsberg was a skinny guy) and gives it to the press, who publish it in brave defiance of government efforts and a Supreme Court case trying to enjoin them from doing so. But Ellsberg’s–and the Times and Post‘s–devotion to truth won out, the American people were informed of the government’s deceptions, and we finally disengaged from an unwinnable battle.
We can forever debate the Vietnam war itself–its morality, justification, execution, and results; I’m trying not to do that in this post. This is about the sorting through of information.
So, what about the press lies about the government lies? Who will tell that story, and who has the patience to listen? It’s a marathon, not a sprint; to tell it requires a laborious wade through a mind-numbing number of documents, and to even read about it requires a bit of work, as well, and a troubling rethinking of old perceptions.
For example, just for the Pentagon Papers alone, the task of evaluation would require actually reading the original Papers, and then reading all the major press stories about them, sorting through the excerpts from the Papers that were published in newspapers at the time, and seeing how they compare to the Papers as a whole. It’s something I must confess I’ve never done, and probably never will do. But others have, and they report some curious goings-on.
A fascinating piece on the subject of war coverage by the MSM–both then and now–was written by James Q. Wilson and appeared recently in the Wall Street Journal. Take a look at this, on the Papers:
Journalist Edward Jay Epstein has shown that in crucial respects, the Times coverage was at odds with what the documents actually said. The lead of the Times story was that in 1964 the Johnson administration reached a consensus to bomb North Vietnam at a time when the president was publicly saying that he would not bomb the north. In fact, the Pentagon papers actually said that, in 1964, the White House had rejected the idea of bombing the north. The Times went on to assert that American forces had deliberately provoked the alleged attacks on its ships in the Gulf of Tonkin to justify a congressional resolution supporting our war efforts. In fact, the Pentagon papers said the opposite: there was no evidence that we had provoked whatever attacks may have occurred.
In short, a key newspaper said that politicians had manipulated us into a war by means of deception. This claim, wrong as it was, was part of a chain of reporting and editorializing that helped convince upper-middle-class Americans that the government could not be trusted.
We’re not on that island of the truth-tellers and the liars, where a single cleverly-worded question can discern the truth. Would that we were; our task would be a great deal easier. But it’s plain that there were enough lies to go around, and that the MSM’s lies must lead every thinking person to question the earlier version of history that was learned back when events were happening, and when newspaper and television coverage combined to give us our primary perception of the blooming buzzing confusion around us.
In writing this post, I went back and read a few of the comments to my earlier Vietnam essays. I happened across this one, that deals with the very subject at hand: media coverage of the Pentagon Papers:
The NYT and WaPo reporters (Neil Sheehan, et al) who provided a highly abridged (paraphrased and quoted) version [of the Pentagon Papers] to the public of that era (’71) distorted the originals in sundry and fundamental ways in order to imply or more directly state that Pres. Johnson and others employed deceptions at critical junctures in the conflict when in fact (as stated in the original document as well as the scaled down version) they did not. A specific example (and a critical one in that era) taken from Michael Lind’s Vietnam: The Necessary War:
The June 14, ’71 NYT edition of their edited version of the Pentagon Papers indicates Pres. Johnson had virtually concluded his decision to initiate a bombing campaign against the North by Nov. 3, 1964. (If true this would have made Johnson out to be deceitful toward the American public at an early and critical stage in the conflict.) However the Pentagon Papers itself states: “… the President was not ready to approve a program of air strikes against North Vietnam, at least until the available alternatives could be carefully and thoroughly re-examined.” That quote, reflecting November, 1964 circumstances, can be located via a search in this section of the Pentagon Papers.
This single distortion may not appear to be dramatic in and of itself, but there were other overt and more subtle distortions in the NYT’s and WaPo’s paraphrased versions of this document. In sum they always and consistently distorted the picture in a manner which eroded Pres. Johnson’s (and others) reputation, broadly characterizing him as being willfully deceitful; that general mischaracterization is what proved to be critical at the time rather than any single aspect of the paraphrased report.
I’m not trying to absolve Johnson of all wrongdoing; there’s enough blame to go around. And some of it most definitely goes to our old friends, those dragon slayers in the MSM.
Homeward bound
She sits on her bed in a room empty of all else save a modest suitcase and a wicker nightstand with a note taped to it that reads, “Give to Paula the hairdresser.” The bed’s going to Pam, one of her caregivers.
In the closet rests a single pair of empty sneakers, for tomorrow; a few stark wire hangers dangle above. The living room holds another suitcase, larger, next to a wheelchair and two walkers instead of the usual sofa. Otherwise, just an expanse of wall-to-wall beige carpet, holes in the walls where the pictures used to hang, and the large windows that gave her a view of the trees in all seasons.
My mother’s going home. What can “home” mean, at the age of nearly nine-three?
Not the home where she grew up as an only child surrounded by four adults, the large Victorian by the harbor with the rose garden that her grandfather lovingly tended. They dressed every evening for dinner there; he wore spats on his shoes and a carnation in his buttonhole.
Not the home she lived in for forty years while she raised her children and had parties where thirty sharply-dressed couples danced in the basement, and where she was widowed still young enough to be vigorous and healthy.
Not the apartment where she lived for eight happy years with my stepfather, whom she’d met when she was eighty and he eighty-five. He’d taken one look at her at a Florida party and said, “That’s for me,” and they were together till shortly before he died a few weeks after 9/11.
Nor is it the home she’s lived in for the last five years, an independent living facility for the elderly in this New England town where I reside. It’s far away from the New York City borough where her family settled a hundred and sixty years ago, and where she’d lived her whole life prior to coming here. No, this place has never been—could never be—home to her, despite its familiarity and elegant comfort.
This town isn’t even home to me, although I thought it might become one when I moved here six years ago during one of those “times of transition” (translated: upheaval and heartbreak) in life. I thought it would most likely be a resting place for some small time before I’d move on. But instead my stepfather died, my mother couldn’t live alone, and there was no place that suited her needs close to home.
So she came here, and I became the person who saw to it that things went relatively smoothly; who found the doctors for her (although she kept switching them without telling me), who took her out for dinner every Sunday night (her residence didn’t serve dinner on Sundays), who raced over in a crisis and tried to make things better.
A year and a half ago my mother had a stroke, a crisis beyond my power to soothe. And though she’s made all sorts of “progress” since then, she’s reached a shaky equilibrium where she still needs a certain amount of help, and still has a great deal of fear.
Two months ago a friend of hers from New York told her that an assisted living facility was being built in the community where my mother had lived most of her life. My mother made inquiries, my brother visited the model room and talked to the management, and a few weeks later she announced that in early November, when the place opened, she was moving.
And now that day has come, and my nephew is driving her down to her new room in a new building filled (or soon to be filled) with new people. She’s anxious; that much is clear. But a powerful urge to go home is driving her, as well.
At ninety-two, even though she once knew thousands of people, a far greater number of them are now dead than are alive. But since she knew so very many, there’s still a surprising number left. They’re not necessarily the people she would have chosen if she’d had her pick; but she didn’t, and none of us do. The survivors are a random bunch, but they call her on the phone and they swear they’ll come visit her now that she’ll be nearby. I hope they remember their promises.
I place her pills in plastic compartments as I talk to her. I could almost do this in my sleep by now: the beta blockers in the ones marked “morning” and “evening,” the coated aspirin in the “lunch” slots, the vitamins everywhere, the Lipitor and the this and the that in their allotted places. I’ve got enough containers for one month’s worth; after that a nurse or nurse’s aide will be doing this.
She already relies on the kindness (and competence) of strangers. In her new place there’ll be a new bunch of strangers who will become, if not friends, at least trusted and familiar helpers. She’s said goodbye to the crew who’ve been taking care of her for the past year and a half, wonderful women all. She’s said goodbye to her fellow residents, too, but she never made good friends here and is focused on the ones to whom she’ll soon be saying hello.
And I? It may be time for me to move on, as well. If she hadn’t been here, tying me to this place, I might have moved years ago. Probably to a larger city, one with more action and more choices—or the illusion of more action and more choices. Soon I’ll be writing more about this, and maybe have some sort of contest, with a list of desired characteristics: choose the perfect city for neo.
But that’s another post for another time. Right now I’m thinking about my mother, hoping she finds what she’s looking for in her new place—if she doesn’t, I imagine I’ll hear about it soon enough.
But in one way she’s blessed: she knows where home is. How many of us can say that, any more?
Garden, late fall
Those of you who follow this blog know that when I bought my house I bought the responsibility of gardening, and I’ve tried to step up to the plate and do right by it.
I’ve posted photos of the garden bed in the front, the sunny one–in spring, in summer (can’t find those, so no link), and in fall. It’s always beautiful.
And here it is now, in very late fall, before being cut down and put to sleep for the winter. Although you might say it’s dead, it’s really not; it’s just resting.
Even in this brown and faded state, it seems quite beautiful nonetheless, in a sad and subtle way. At least, I think so. And strangely enough, the roses are still in bloom.
Last year I published this same poem around this same time. It’s Robert Frost’s “Reluctance,” very appropriate to the season:
Out through the fields and the woods
And over the walls I have wended;
I have climbed the hills of view
And looked at the world, and descended;
I have come by the highway home,
And lo, it is ended.
The leaves are all dead on the ground,
Save those that the oak is keeping
To ravel them one by one
And let them go scraping and creeping
Out over the crusted snow,
When others are sleeping.
And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
No longer blown hither and thither;
The last lone aster is gone;
The flowers of the witch-hazel wither;
The heart is still aching to seek,
But the feet question ”˜Whither?’
Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?
Recommended reading: Bill Whittle
I just got around to the new Bill Whittle essay, and all I can say is: read it.
Well, that’s not all I can say. Whittle is one of those thinkers rather than linkers, and he publishes very seldom, so when he does it’s an event. And it’s looong.
So I won’t add too much to it, except to say that Whittle has a way of getting to the heart of a number of matters (chickenhawks, US imperialism, “no blood for oil,” Bush’s intelligence or lack thereof, pacifism, and the “Bush lied” meme, to name just a few). Plus a colorful way of writing that keeps it all interesting.
In case you’re not up to The Whole Thing–and I sincerely hope you are–here are a couple of excerpts that don’t even begin to do justice to Whittle’s opus:
Doves think the choice is between fighting or not fighting. Hawks think the choice is between fighting now or fighting later.
If you understand this, you understand everything that follows. You don’t need to think the other side is insane, or evil. Both hawks and doves are convinced they are doing the right thing. But it seems to me there is a choice between peace at any price and a peace worth having.
We cannot undo the invasion and compare that timeline to the one we have. The only data we can use to compare these philosophies is embedded in the pages of history. What does history show?
I cannot think of a single example where appeasement ”“ giving in to an aggressive adversary in the hope that it will convince them to become peaceful themselves ”“ has provided any lasting peace or security. I can say in complete honesty that I look forward to hearing of any historical example that shows it does….
So, contrary to doomsayers throughout history, the destruction of the Barbary Pirates did not result in the recruitment of more Pirates. The destruction of the Barbary Pirates resulted in the destruction of the Barbary Pirates.
And it is just so with terrorism. When the results of terrorism do the terrorist more harm than good, terrorism will go away.
On withdrawal from Iraq: heed the Law of Thirds
Here’s another demonstration of the Law of Thirds (via Pajamas Media)
It’s a post by Bill Roggio that analyzes what the midterm election might mean in terms of future policy on the Iraq War. He cites STRATFOR analyst Fred Burton, who mentions polls suggesting that, whereas two-thirds of US citizens “disapprove” of the war in Iraq, only one-third seems to favor a full withdrawal of troops.
Polls are polls, of course, and subject to all sorts of criticism. In my training and experience as a social science researcher, I learned just how easy it is to find flaws in all such studies. However, I’ve also noticed–over and over–the Law of Thirds operating. And here it is again; only a third seem to advocate the most radical solution, while two-thirds are more moderate. Which group will be heeded by our new Congress?
For myself, I can’t quite imagine answering “approve” to a question about the war. One can agree with the decision to go to war given the facts we had at our disposal and the alternatives. One can think things are going better there than the MSM regularly reports. I fall into both these categories, and yet even I would not have answered “approve” if polled–war is too terrible, and there are too many ways in which the war could have been executed better (or at least we think so, with the benefits of 50/50 hindsight and the knowledge that, since we have no authority to implement our suggestions, our thoughts on the matter will never be subjected to the harsh light of reality. )
Like most of the two-thirds who answered “disapprove” to that poll, I’ve had quarrels with the conduct of the aftermath. It started with a terrible disquiet I felt at the outset, when widespread looting occurred and was allowed to continue. It set a tone of anarchy and lawlessness when a crackdown would have sent a different message. Yes, I understand the troops were busy fighting a war and wanted to ingratiate themselves with a population that they thought was only giving vent to anger at Saddam. Yes, they wanted to avoid the appearance of an occupation. But it seemed to give the wrong message, which was that anything goes.
As I’ve said many times before, I never expected this war to be easy or short. Actually, I fully expected it to be much worse than it has been; both in terms of initial casualties, and the subsequent battle. Whether you want to call that subsequent battle an insurgency, guerilla war, civil war, or terrorist war, I expected it to go on for a long time and to cause a great deal of suffering, as all such conflicts do.
As for mistakes in planning, failure to anticipate future events, and whether the administration expected the war and its aftermath to be easy or difficult, I’ve written at some length, here and here, about these questions, including the “cakewalk” issue. Please read both pieces; I have no wish to reiterate what I said then. Suffice to say that it’s impossible to anticipate these things fully, and of course the administration did not.
What I never expected, however (and should have expected) was the way the media–and some Democrats and Republicans, just to be bipartisan–demonstrated a lack of knowledge of the nature of war and wars. We’ve been spoiled, both by our ideals (who doesn’t want a cleaner war, one in which hardly anyone gets hurt? Count me in on that one) and our recent history (the Gulf War as the template, rather than World War II).
There is no question that if we expect perfection and give up if the going gets hard, we will become unable to fight any war. Some would say that’s wonderful. If we give up on war, all will be peace and light. I say: tell it to the jihadis.
In a piece found at The Corner, a reader sounds a warning:
It seems to me that Americans believe wars end when we say they end. Whether we win (WWII), lose (Vietnam), or draw (Korea), our wars have ended when we said they ended. The defeated Germans, victorious North Vietnamese, or stalemated North Koreans never came after America when hostilities ended. But the jihadists are coming, no matter what happens in Iraq. Make no mistake..
Have we lost the will for any fight that’s difficult or at all uncertain, that takes longer than a few weeks, that involves ambiguities and unknowns? I think we have. I hope we have not.
I hope the words of David Warren aren’t true:
…in trying to build a secular democracy over the ruin of Saddam’s regime, the Americans tried something they had not the stomach for. From the outset, they imposed upon themselves restrictions that would make that fight unwinnable. As in Vietnam, they adopted a purely defensive posture.
So far as President Bush can be blamed, it should be for showing insufficient ruthlessness in a task that could not be accomplished by half-measures. Alternatively, for failing to grasp that America was psychologically unprepared for real war, not only by the memory of Vietnam, but by the grim advance of “liberal” decadence in domestic life over the generation since.
Read the whole thing. Read the whole thing. And then read it again. And then hope and pray that Warren is a lousy prognosticator:
If Iraq is abandoned, the credibility of America and the West is lost. Iran’s hopes of regional hegemony are assured. The Americans will have cut and run after enduring less than one-twentieth of the casualties they suffered in Vietnam; and from a battle more consequential, for it is against an Islamist enemy that is rising, instead of a Communist enemy in decline…
…the consequences of abandoning Iraq will come home to the United States and the West, in a way Vietnam never touched us.
[ADDENDUM: I don’t mean to imply that decisions in war ought to be made by reading polls. However, since the majority of Americans don’t appear to want an immediate withdrawal from Iraq, if the Democratic leadership thinks they do and acts on that supposition, they may find themselves out of office next time round.
Many people (even among those who don’t want an immediate pullout) seem to have lost touch with the difficulties and uncertainties, as well as the inevitable mistakes, that are part and parcel of any war, and demand that wars be easier and faster than they ever are. This means that many wars–and the Iraq war is among them–are fought with half measures, and with the knowledge that public opinion is fickle and that people don’t have the stamina for the long haul. This can lead to decisions that are not strategically sound, because of knowledge of the impatience of the public. And our enemies know that, and count on it, and act accordingly.]
Bolton: the people’s ambassador? Pass the hat
Here’s an interesting suggestion from a reader:
I’m just an ordinary middleaged housewife who is very upset that our country might lose John Bolton’s service at the UN because of partisan politics. I read that if Pres. Bush went the recess appt. routine again, then Bolton would have to work in a capacity were he does not receive an official salary. Well, it occurred to me that if 2000 citizens made only a $100 contribution, we could cover a year’s compensation. I really think this is doable for those of us in the blogosphere and I am writing to my regularly read bloggers to see if they would add their voice to this idea.
Bush: playing politics
I found this via Pajamas Media today, with the following tagline: Question: “If President Bush had [fired Rumsfeld] two, three, four months ago would [the midterms] have been different?” (RCP)
I clicked on the link, hoping to find a discussion that might be a jumping-off place for a post of my own about the subject. But all I saw there was a single sentence, an echo of the question.
So I’ll take up the gauntlet and give a nice, hedgy answer: maybe.
I don’t think things would have been substantially different. Despite the sound bite of “this was all about the war,” it really wasn’t. It was about the war and the people’s perceptions of it, to be sure. But it was about a lot of other things as well, including corruption in Congress and inadequate handling of it (so, what else is new?), conservative disgruntlement with the current administration and Congress, the usual historical change of Congress during a President’s second term, relentless media spin, and Britney Spears’s impending divorce (oops, I guess that didn’t get announced till after the election. My bad.)
But if Bush had canned Rumsfeld earlier, it might have made a partial difference, and that might have been enough to change the outcome of a few close races here and there.
I don’t think it’s because of Rumsfeld himself, either, although he certainly had become a highly criticized and polarizing figure. I think it was more the perception given by Bush’s retention of Rumsfeld–and I believe it’s a correct perception–which is that Bush is one stubborn and unresponsive fellow.
That’s not just a perception; it appears to be the truth, a truth that’s been known for a long time. Bush digs in, he is very loyal to people and doesn’t switch horses easily, and of course he’s not the great communicator. That stubbornness of his is a double-edged sword; it makes him resolute but inflexible. He is the antithesis of someone like Clinton, for example, who almost never met a principle he couldn’t change if the polls indicated it might be politically expedient for him.
Bush’s natural tendency towards stubbornness and decisiveness–not a bad thing in a leader, unless it’s carried to extremes, as it has been at times in his case–may also be a reaction to Clinton, and reflect Bush’s deep desire to be the Un-Clinton. That he is, but it’s an overcorrection. And almost nowhere is that fact in greater evidence than in his handling of the timing of the actual Rumsfeld firing.
Not only did Bush not do what would have been politically expedient, which is to have gotten rid of Rumsfeld at least three or four months ago (to go back to RCP’s question), but he didn’t even let the press and the people know that Rumsfeld was on his way out even after it actually had been decided, which was apparently before this election.
This is, if you believe Bush’s story; I’m sure many don’t. I do, because it’s consistent with his personality. It tells you that Bush was willing to shoot himself (and his fellow Republicans) in the foot in order to demonstrate both loyalty and his un-Clintonian, non-pandering-to-politics, bona fides. That sort of behavior has cost him votes, approval ratings, the epithet “nonresponsive,” and the ire of fellow Republicans.
Now that the other shoe has dropped and the Democrats are in charge of Congress, Bush seems to have changed his tune a bit. So has the media, in a subtle but noticeable way. Now that they have gotten what they wanted–a Democratic victory–they can afford to be ever so slightly magnanimous towards Bush, who’s seen as mortally wounded. At least, that’s what I discern in articles such as this one form today’s San Francisco Chronicle, entitled, “An immediate and dramatic change in Bush’s tone.” The article states:
In words and tone, Bush conveyed an unfamiliar flexibility and rare willingness to work with his political adversaries Wednesday on his war strategy.
It goes on:
On Wednesday, [Bush] lamented that “somehow it seeped into (people’s) conscience that, you know, my attitude was just simply stay the course.”
It could be because Bush himself used the phrase “stay the course” dozens of times to explain his administration’s steadfast determination not to abandon the mission in the face of catastrophic circumstances in Iraq.
These two sentences sum up the problem between Bush and the people, and between the media and Bush. It’s true that it did seep into people’s conscience (sic: consciousnesses?) that Bush was inflexible. The problem wasn’t so much his oft-repeated desire to stay the course, but the perception that he couldn’t (or wouldn’t) adjust the details of that course in order to find a more effective way of getting from point A to point B. The media had a role in getting that perception across, but Bush didn’t do anywhere near enough to counter it.
And then there’s the phrase “catastrophic circumstances in Iraq.” The Chronicle takes it as a given that the situation in Iraq warrants that particular adjective rather than one a bit less–well, less catastrophic. I’d hate to have seen how the current-day writers and editors of a paper such as the Chronicle would have dealt with the early years of World War II, or the Civil War, or any number of other conflicts. Fortunately, they weren’t around then.
Not our first rodeo
I caught the second half of Bush’s post-election press conference today.
Say what you like about politicians, but one thing they almost always display is an uncommon ability to pick themselves up and dust themselves off, and to do it on what must be almost no sleep at all. Oh, and to at least mouth words, post-election, that make it sound as though working together will be possible, no matter what foul mud has been slung beforehand.
In addition to that, Bush seemed especially–and I know some of you might find this word odd in relationship to that particular person–but especially articulate and focused. His speech pattern, for example, was much more rapid than usual. Virtually gone was the strange hesitation that often ties and muddles his tongue. He spoke rapidly and forcefully, somewhat impatiently, mostly very graciously, and decisively. I heard more off-the-cuff humor than I usually do when he speaks.
Sometimes when bad blows finally come after a period of trying to avoid them, there’s a calm that sets in. It’s over; now move on. And this election must have been a pretty bad blow, although not a totally unexpected one (in a phrase that is sure to be trumpeted by the MSM, he called it a “thumping” despite the closeness of many of the races).
As most of you know, the focus of my support for Bush is his general approach to the war on Islamic jihadi totalitarianism. I have some quarrels with his domestic agenda, and some disagreements with details of how the aforementioned war has been handled. So I was heartened by two things: one was the resignation (and the acceptance thereof) of Secretary Rumsfeld, who’s become a lightning rod for criticism. The other is that Bush is determined not to become a Gerald Ford.
Why the reference to Ford? He presided over the pulling of the plug in funding Vietnam, although “presided” is hardly what he did in terms of leadership. He abdicated, barely making any effort to stop Congress from cutting off all support from the South Vietnamese when a little (relatively speaking) might have gone a long way.
That’s the only Vietnam analogy I tried to make here. I’m aware of vast differences between Vietnam and Iraq, and the bottom line is that Iraq is far more strategically important. I don’t have quotes from Bush’s press conference, but he made it clear that he is dedicated to staying the course in Iraq with a different approach. What a different approach means remains to be seen, and what Congress will do about it is unclear, but there’s no question a course correction is needed.
Bush indicated we’ve been correcting our course right along. That’s true, but we need more visible success. It’s also true that the milblogs have been trumpeting our successes there right along, but most of America doesn’t read milblogs (or blogs at all, for that matter). The nature of the beast is that people need something more visible to counter the body daily count, some measure of success that they can perceive and understand.
My biggest fear with this election has been that the Democrats in the “cut and run” camp will dominate. I’m hoping much of that was just campaign rhetoric, and that more sober minds will prevail now that the Democrats have won. After all, as Bush himself said when asked whether he could work with people like Pelosi who’ve dissed him previously in such vicious terms: that’s politics; this isn’t “my first rodeo.”
A rodeo’s a tough game. But it’s a game. Politics may appear to be a game, and it’s a rather nasty one at that. But it influences affairs of state and global events, which are more than a game. And after the rough and wild rodeo of a political campaign, the cowboys who have been thrown by the bucking broncos, as well as the ones who haven’t, have to get up and get to work.
[ADDENDUM: Austin Bay makes some interesting points about what the change at Defense might signify. And I agree with this that Rumsfeld’s “resignation” would have been more strategicially sound had it been accomplished before the election rather than after. It’s been a while since much of anyone has been a Rumsfeld supporter–except for Bush, it seems, and the latter’s loyalty to him in the face of bipartisan opposition has caused bipartisan resentment.]