Only Nixon could go to China
--Old Vulcan Proverb
In a time when logic fails us, is this about to become our next nightmare in bringing the Iraq war to its deserved end? Please let me explain.
This has been a disastrous run for democrats on Iraq. The Republicans have hijacked the debate from the minority side of the aisle. Why the democrats even allowed the Move-On vote to get to the floor is beyond me. Even if there was a hidden agenda on the part of the democratic "leadership"to smack down MoveOn.org, playing into the agenda of the Republicans was a total miscalculation. Meanwhile, the dems depart the field at the mere mention of a filibuster on the Webb Amendment or Reed-Levin.
Why does this matter? Consider the above statement about Nixon and China. As the Democrats continue to fail to bring the debate to any fruitful results--even incremental ones, the Republicans scream "politics." Sooner or later, there will be a Republican effort to leverage Iraq. The message will be this: "We don't have a voter base demanding an end to the war. If the Democrats get their way--it's pandering. Our solution is 'responsible' and we won't do it from 'weakness'." It will be a strategy to invert the demands of the majority to end the war by turning that mandate into a liability.
If the Democrats cannot seize the initiative to undermine the Republican's stay-the-course mentality, and make that the target of voters' anger, they risk the Nixon strategy--and the media drumbeat about them having a "responsible" solution.
After this week, I'm not so sure it couldn't happen.