There are, to be sure, U.S. politicians who run on a blame-America-first, peace-at-all-cost, soak-the-rich and hug-the-trees platform, but no one actually expects, say, Ralph Nader to win in November.
But Obama is in it to win it. He’s not only intelligent, he’s smart. You can be a successful politician without an Ivy League degree; but you cannot have a political career without knowing how to win an election. Obama wants to be elected president.
After securing the support of the Democratic base during the primary season, Illinois’ junior senator now moves to the, as they say, “center” — where the vast majority of the voters are. He is running against a war hero who happens to be right about Iraq and is trusted by more voters on national security matters. Why shouldn’t Obama wear the flag pin again? What’s wrong about supporting telecom immunity for post-Sept. 11 wiretaps? Why shouldn’t he admit that, as president, his Iraq policy will not be premised on the cut-and-run plan favored by the leftists?
Since the unfortunate candidacy of Sen. George McGovern, the U.S. Democratic Party has been saddled with the dubious distinction of being the party of wimps. Yes, wimps, the party of Wilson, FDR, Truman, JFK and LBJ — World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Bay of Pigs, the Cuban missile crisis and the Vietnam War. Bill Clinton wasn’t exactly dovish either. He blasted Bush Sr. for coddling the “Butchers of Beijing” and sent two aircraft carriers to the Taiwan Strait after China fired missiles into waters near Taiwan. He ordered missile attacks on Afghanistan and Sudan in retaliation for the bombings of the U.S. embassies in Africa. Without asking for the U.N.’s permission, he rained bombs on Serbia for its genocidal policies in Kosovo. Ignoring the opposition of the U.S. Congress, he told Haiti’s military ruler to step down or face the wrath of the large American military force Clinton deployed to the unfortunate Caribbean nation. Besides outmaneuvering Gingrich’s band of revolutionaries on Capitol Hill, Clinton’s other favorite hobby was to use Iraq for target practice. He called Iran a “state sponsor of terrorism” and a “rogue state.” Then he scored with a White House intern. Pure testosterone si Bubba.
Obama, for his part, will not be McGovern — and he won’t be another Dukakis who ended up looking like McGovern even while ridiculously trying not to. Barrack’s role model (minus the philandering, of course) is JFK. Suave, charismatic, hawkish. Don’t question my patriotism, Obama said recently.
We always, in any case, want our politicians pure and noble and honest — but we don’t elect them. Or if we do, we damn them for not pandering to us and soothing us with lies. Ask Tina Sablan.
Not surprisingly, it is the apolitical that is always complaining about politics. They want it to make sense. They see no connection between human nature and the nature of politics. They believe that there was a golden age of politics. Their naiveté is almost touching.
In the American political system, says P.J. O’Rourke, the hippest sage on the planet, “you’ve only allowed to have real ideas if it’s absolutely guaranteed that you can’t win an election. Thus the only substantive political platforms belong to candidates such as Norman Thomas, Henry Wallace, George Wallace and Eugene McCarthy and — as you can see by that list — saying a candidate has real ideas is no compliment.”
But idealists have an important role to play in politics. Their function is to agitate, educate and generate new ideas. When their demands become popular enough, their ideas will be co-opted by one or both of the major parties. And then it is the despised politician who cuts a deal and get things done.
As president, Obama will still raise the taxes of the productive and the entrepreneurial rich, and appoint Supreme Court justices who are pro-abortion. But he won’t run as the liberal poster boy lefties have been dreaming about all these years.
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