I don't always agree with "Kos," aka Markos Moulitsas Z?niga of DailyKos fame, but I've got to say that his latest post truly kicks butt. Entitled, "The War Pragmatists", Kos basically lays out a case for a Democratic Party of FIGHTERS. That's right, as strange as it may sound to some people, the Democrats historically have been - and can and must be once again! -- a party of people willing to fight for what they believe in. Today, more than ever, we need Democratic leaders like Franklin Roosevelt, who saw us through the Great Depression and World War II. Or Harry Truman, who "gave 'em hell" and made sure that "the buck stopped here!" Or JFK, who inspired us to "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country," and declared, "We shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and success of liberty."
Today, nearly four years after 9/11, America yearns for great Democratic leaders like those Presidents once again. America yearns, in this age of anxiety and terror, for leaders who will fight against injustice, against poverty, against bigotry - AND against those who would attack our great nation. Or, to put it more positively, Americans today yearn for Democratic leaders who will fight FOR economic justice, FOR education for our children, FOR a healthy environment, FOR the middle class, FOR our constitution, FOR Democracy, FOR women's rights and equal rights for all.
That's why it's important to point out that, although most Americans now oppose the Iraq war-of-choice, particularly as it has been botched and bungled by the Bush bunch of chest-thumping chickenhawk, Democrats like Kos (and me) do not oppose fighting as a matter of principle. In fact, many of us strongly support fighting when it's necessary, such as after 9/11 or to stop a genocide (e.g., Rwanda, Bosnia). The problem is, the people we should have been fighting after 9/11 were the Taliban and Osama bin Laden's terrorist network, not Saddam Hussein and his pitiful army. And I say this as someone who strongly supported George H.W. Bush in beating back the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1991. After 9/11, however, I felt strongly -- as I believe the vast majority of Americans did - that the #1 priority was to fight the motherf****ers that attacked us (including a plane that struck just 2 miles from where I was working), not run off on some wild goose chase in Iraq. As Kos writes:
I opposed Iraq because it forced the U.S. to take the eyes off the real threat -- the Al Qaida assholes that attacked the United States and many of our allies around the world. That was a rightous, honorable campaign. Yet we took the eyes off the ball to go after an impotent, contained, powerless regime that posed nary a threat to its neighbors, much less the U.S.It's a war that never should've been fought, it's a war that's been negligently managed, and it's a war that we can't win. All the military might in the world can't convert fantastical wishful thinking into reality.
I oppose Iraq not because I'm anti-war. I'll have nothing to do with any of the anti-war rallies planned in the near term (and the crazy cast of characters that seek to inject their unrelated own pet causes into the proceedings).
I oppose the Iraq War because I'm a War Pragmatist.
In other words, in contrast to the Republican Party of chickenhawks, neo-con nincompoops and armchair generals (safe behind lines, of course), it's time for a Democratic Party of pragmatic fighters. On this one, I couldn't agree more with Kos.