Posted on 03/11/2008 8:23:01 AM PDT by fweingart
In his campaign swan song, Mitt Romney, the Harvard M.B.A., used the two words you will repeatedly hear in the fall: retreat and defeat. Referring to the positions of Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama on Iraq, Romney said, "They would retreat, declare defeat and the consequence of that would be devastating."
In a 2007 column, I compared this current presidential campaign to that of 1972, when George McGovern lost 49 states to Richard Nixon. The parallels are in some ways obvious - the Vietnam War and the war in Iraq, above all. What I could not have foreseen a year ago was how much more obvious the parallels would become. Back in '72, the Democratic Party was split between doves and hawks, reformers and stogie smokers - even men and women. The result was a national convention that was boisterous, unruly and ugly to look at. It might, however, look like a tea party compared with what could happen in Denver this August.
At the moment, no one can figure how the Democrats are going to get a nominee. What the party needs is someone like George Mitchell, a senior figure of trusted wisdom who might be able to do what Howard Dean, the party chairman, clearly cannot - avoid the train wreck everyone can see coming. But barring either Mitchell or a miracle, neither Clinton nor Obama can garner sufficient delegates on their own. It might take a combination of superdelegates and a revote in Michigan and Florida - punished for holding unauthorized primaries - tocome up with a nominee. By the time that happens, the Democratic Party will be one, huge, dysfunctional family.
In that 2007 column, I did not take the surge into account. Putting an additional 30,000 troops into Iraq has indeed made a difference. It has not won the war and it has not enabled American soldiers to come home, but it has dampened the violence there - notwithstanding the carnage yesterday. Overall, civilian deaths are down. Overall, military deaths are down. To that (limited but important) extent, the surge has worked.
When I mentioned 1972 and Vietnam to an important Clinton adviser, he pointed out that Nixon initially won in 1968 by saying he had a secret plan to end the war. That nonexistent plan was still apparently unfolding four years later. In addition, Nixon made opposition to war seem unpatriotic and defeatist. He exploited the war, exacerbating cultural divisions.
John McCain lacks Nixon's raw talent for hypocrisy, so I don't think he'll go that far. But he will make his stand on the surge and it will be, for him, the functional equivalent of Nixon's secret plan. McCain's plan, he will say, is to win. The Democrats' is to surrender. The issue, if he frames it right, will not bethe wisdom of the war, but how to get out with pride.
McCain, of course, owns the surge. He advocated putting additional troops in Iraq way back when President Bush, deep into denial, was proclaiming ultimate faith in Rummy and his merry band of incompetents. McCain, in fact, oozes national security. His weakness is that he has too often advocated using - or bluffing - force (North Korea, Iran, the former Yugoslavia).
You can see it all happening again: a Republican charging that the Democrats are defeatist, soft on national security and not to be trusted with the White House. And you can see the Democratic Party heading toward Denver for yet another crackup. This time, instead of McGovern, a genuine war hero (the Distinguished Flying Cross) caricatured as a sissy, the party will put up either a candidate who has been inconsistent on the war or one with almost no foreign policy or military experience. A year ago, it looked like the party could not lose. This year, it seems determined to try.
That party is so full of nuts, homosexuals with agendas, men-hating women, socialists, communists, apes, alligators, possums, dead voters, illegal aliens, etc. etc. etc. that they are doomed.
I would like to see McCain pick Romney as his running mate.
Pretty unusual for Cohen to actually say nice things about a republican.
I don’t think the war will be the major issue. I think it’s the economy.
Yeah, they’re so doomed they’re possibly looking at veto-proof majorities in both houses, and owning the WH. In case you haven’t noticed, the pubbies are getting their clocks cleaned in the few early contests.
I think it is the PERCEIVED economy ..... and illegal immigration.
Me too.
Perhaps the enlightened American voters have seen Spain re-elect their communist masters and believe true communism will work in the USA. It hasn’t worked anyplace else, but then our clever electorate believe it’s time that it did.
I think it will be the economy too - for most Americans. However, the war is being won and by next November might be an actual positive for the GOP and a negative for the democrats.
“I would like to see McCain pick Romney as his running mate.”
It might just happen. Romney will be on H&C tonight on FOX for his first interview since dropping out. I would also be pleased if Romney is VP.
These are both issues that McCain doesn't have a leg to stand on. He's already admitted he doesn't know much about the economy and he basically agrees with the Democrats on illegal immigration.
Yep the brain dead public is led around by the nose by the MSM
He better get off that immigration band wagon along with the global warming bs or there are a lot of people going to be sitting home come election time.
Always the perceived economy. The average uneducated Joe out there, who backs the democrat can’t believe to conprehend the total prosperity that this country would experience if we lowered the coporate tax rates like they did in Ireland or put a fracton of a % or social security into our stock market.
McCain was always the weakest candidate (with the possible exception of Huckabee). McCain’s only issue is foreign policy. And without a ringing phone at 3 AM the giant stays asleep dreaming about Obamapalooza.
How he got there in the first place, I will never understand. This is sure not the time to have a weak candidate.
If the economy is still in bad shape by this Summer, McCain would be wise to pick Romney as his running mate. Romney is perceived as the best person to handle the economy while McCain is “Mr. Surge”. That sounds like a winning GOP combination.
You are right about that. The Dems lurch more and more to the left yet they are on the rise. It is very scary.
What’s even scarier is the fact that the GOP nominee has been lurching more and more to the left...
Barring some catastrophic turn of events the dems will simply declare that the war is won and is no longer an issue. They'll flood the media with their own isues and McCain will be left shouting into a dead mike in an empty hall.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.