From Anti-War Democrats to Pro-War Republicans

The Democratic Party has had the stigma of being the anti-war party for more than thirty years in this country. While this might not seem to be such a bad thing in the abstract, it has come with a heavy political price. It has been interpreted by the American electorate as a sign of weakness.

Is that fair? Of course not. But what's fair is not what's relevant in politics. The message after the Vietnam and Nixon debacles should have been - it turns out, we should have elected McGovern after all. Instead the lesson became, "Democrats are weak McGovernites, who are too squeamish for war."

Nixon's withdrawal from Vietnam wasn't exactly the picture of strength as we boarded helicopters on top of rooftops. But no matter, the Republicans won the spin game.

Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, "Truth forever on the scaffold. Wrong forever on the throne. But that scaffold sways a future." Well, this is the future. Eventually the pendulum always swings back. Eventually we find balance.

Now, I believe we are at the tipping point where the public perception is going from "the Democrats are the weak anti-war party" to "the Republicans are the mindless pro-war party." Republicans always think war is the answer. And as we have seen in Vietnam and Iraq and Somalia and Lebanon and many other places, war is not always the right answer.

It doesn't seem like the Republicans have any other options in their arsenal at this point. Every argument devolves into, either you're for war or you're for surrendering to our enemies. People have had enough of this. It's a great argument for a school yard bully, and it has had its run. But now America is tired of all the Republican wars.

Every time the Republicans offer more war as their only option, they start to look crazier and crazier. It's gotten to the point where people are wondering whether Republicans are capable of cognitive thought. Or is an unintelligible grunt and throwing a spear the only thing they've got left.

I believe we are seeing the pendulum swing before our eyes. If the Republicans keep going in this direction - and they have given every indication they will - Americans are going to start seeing them as the hopelessly pro-war party.

This is going to have the exact opposite effect of the anti-war Democratic Party image - the Republicans will seem like they can't bring peace and aren't smart enough to pull off diplomacy.

I think this image might become as unfair as the anti-war image of the Democrats because people like George H.W. Bush and James Baker were masters of diplomacy. But fair or not, if these group of Republicans push this image over the tipping point (and I am certain that they will, if they haven't already), they will be seen as the hopelessly pro-war party. And it will haunt them for decades to come.

The Young Turks

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