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Subject: NYTimes.com Article: Dancing Alone
Date: Thu, 13 May 2004 20:31:23 -0400 (EDT)
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Dancing Alone
May 13, 2004
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN
It is time to ask this question: Do we have any chance of
succeeding at regime change in Iraq without regime change
here at home?
"Hey, Friedman, why are you bringing politics into this all
of a sudden? You're the guy who always said that producing
a decent outcome in Iraq was of such overriding importance
to the country that it had to be kept above politics."
Yes, that's true. I still believe that. My mistake was
thinking that the Bush team believed it, too. I thought the
administration would have to do the right things in Iraq -
from prewar planning and putting in enough troops to
dismissing the secretary of defense for incompetence -
because surely this was the most important thing for the
president and the country. But I was wrong. There is
something even more important to the Bush crowd than
getting Iraq right, and that's getting re-elected and
staying loyal to the conservative base to do so. It has
always been more important for the Bush folks to defeat
liberals at home than Baathists abroad. That's why they
spent more time studying U.S. polls than Iraqi history.
That is why, I'll bet, Karl Rove has had more sway over
this war than Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern
Affairs Bill Burns. Mr. Burns knew only what would play in
the Middle East. Mr. Rove knew what would play in the
Middle West.
I admit, I'm a little slow. Because I tried to think about
something as deadly serious as Iraq, and the post- 9/11
world, in a nonpartisan fashion - as Joe Biden, John McCain
and Dick Lugar did - I assumed the Bush officials were
doing the same. I was wrong. They were always so slow to
change course because confronting their mistakes didn't
just involve confronting reality, but their own politics.
Why, in the face of rampant looting in the war's aftermath,
which dug us into such a deep and costly hole, wouldn't Mr.
Rumsfeld put more troops into Iraq? Politics. First of all,
Rummy wanted to crush once and for all the Powell doctrine,
which says you fight a war like this only with overwhelming
force. I know this is hard to believe, but the Pentagon
crew hated Colin Powell, and wanted to see him humiliated
10 times more than Saddam. Second, Rummy wanted to prove to
all those U.S. generals whose Army he was intent on
downsizing that a small, mobile, high-tech force was all
you needed today to take over a country. Third, the White
House always knew this was a war of choice - its choice -
so it made sure that average Americans never had to pay any
price or bear any burden. Thus, it couldn't call up too
many reservists, let alone have a draft. Yes, there was a
contradiction between the Bush war on taxes and the Bush
war on terrorism. But it was resolved: the Bush team
decided to lower taxes rather than raise troop levels.
Why, in the face of the Abu Ghraib travesty, wouldn't the
administration make some uniquely American gesture? Because
these folks have no clue how to export hope. They would
never think of saying, "Let's close this prison immediately
and reopen it in a month as the Abu Ghraib Technical
College for Computer Training - with all the equipment
donated by Dell, H.P. and Microsoft." Why didn't the
administration ever use 9/11 as a spur to launch a
Manhattan project for energy independence and conservation,
so we could break out of our addiction to crude oil, slowly
disengage from this region and speak truth to
fundamentalist regimes, such as Saudi Arabia? (Addicts
never tell the truth to their pushers.) Because that might
have required a gas tax or a confrontation with the
administration's oil moneymen. Why did the administration
always - rightly - bash Yasir Arafat, but never lift a
finger or utter a word to stop Ariel Sharon's massive
building of illegal settlements in the West Bank? Because
while that might have earned America credibility in the
Middle East, it might have cost the Bush campaign Jewish
votes in Florida.
And, of course, why did the president praise Mr. Rumsfeld
rather than fire him? Because Karl Rove says to hold the
conservative base, you must always appear to be strong,
decisive and loyal. It is more important that the president
appear to be true to his team than that America appear to
be true to its principles. (Here's the new Rummy Defense:
"I am accountable. But the little guys were responsible. I
was just giving orders.")
Add it all up, and you see how we got so off track in Iraq,
why we are dancing alone in the world - and why our
president, who has a strong moral vision, has no moral
influence.
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/13/opinion/13FRIE.html?ex=1085494683&ei=1&en=ae318f47ccfd65f5
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