Catastrophic Success

by Eric Martin

Kevin Drum asks a question:

Back in 2004, I remember at least a few bloggers and pundits arguing that liberals would be better off if John Kerry lost. I never really bought this, but the arguments were pretty reasonable. Leaving George Bush in power meant that he'd retain responsibility and blame for the Iraq war. (Despite the surge, that's exactly what happened.) Four more years of Republican control would turn the American public firmly against conservative misrule. (Actually, it only took two years.) If we waited, a better candidate than Kerry would come along. (Arguably, both Hillary Clinton and Obama were better candidates.)

Conversely, it's unlikely that John Kerry could have gotten much done with a razor-thin victory and a Congress still controlled by the GOP...By waiting, we've gotten a strong, charismatic candidate who's likely to win convincingly and have huge Democratic majorities in Congress behind him. If he's willing to fully use the power of his office, Obama could very well be a transformational president.

So: were we, in fact, better off losing in 2004?

I'm not sure I can answer the question, but in August of 2004, I penned one of those posts discussing the upside of a Kerry/Edwards defeat.  I didn't go as far as to say, with certainty, that we'd be better off, but I was conflicted and tried to put forth the pros and cons that were then-swirling around my head.  Below the fold is a condensed version of that post, which in some ways looks eerily prescient, and in others frightfully naive (and that's with some of the warts removed).  Either way, an interesting look back at some of the darker days of the reign of Bush the Younger.

For McCain supporters, perhaps this post will show you that it's possible to take solace in what-if type rationalizations.  But, uh, don't get too carried away there.

Can I confess something that might sound startling to anyone who has read even a portion of my writing: I'm a little ambivalent about my desire to see Kerry win come November. No, I haven't lost it completely, nor am I buying into the ludicrous notion that Bush can better execute the war on terror, nor does the fact that John Kerry might have only skirted the Cambodian border and not actually crossed over changed my mind on his worth as a candidate. I'm just wondering if there is really something worth winning come November, or if the mess created by George Bush's four years would be best left to him, forever enshrined as his legacy and his alone. I admit, these thoughts drift in during my weaker moments when spiteful urges hold sway over my more altruistic nature, but there is a method behind my flirtation with madness. The origins of my own personal dilemma can be found in the larger picture.

First of all, Iraq is unraveling at an alarming rate, and the prospects for this endeavor going forward are hurting if not mortally wounded. This is the area where my political instincts are most conflicted. I am not convinced that Kerry, or anyone else for that matter, can salvage the vision of a democratic, peaceful and stable Iraq. One side of my schism would like to see Bush in power should Iraq continue along its current trajectory. Let Bush turn on the spit while Iraq descends into a lawless state as casualties mount and conflicts erupt, rather than allow the right-wing punditry the opportunity to blame the inevitable collapse on Kerry and the "sensitive" leftist approach. This is how they will capitalize on their own wildly misguided foreign policy blunders. Blame the results on the administration that comes in after the fact.

Just consider the situation on the ground. The probability that Iraq is going to emerge, intact, as a democratic state seems remote. The more likely scenario is increased violence...American troops will need to remain in Iraq for years to come, sustaining a steady drumbeat of casualties, in order to provide cover for either Allawi, some form of totalitarian Saddam-like regime or whatever other government takes the reins. In what is yet another Iraq-generated Catch-22 and paradox, the elections themselves portend the greatest risks to the whole operation.

Then of course there is the damage done to our efforts to stave off the rise in popularity, appeal and support of the radical, Islamist, anti-American, terrorist mentality. The war in Iraq has set back this process immeasurably, with support for America at unprecedented lows globally, and in the Muslim world almost non-existent. We have successfully undermined and alienated the moderate voices in the Muslim world while providing Osama and his ilk with gift after gift, making the increased likelihood of terrorist attacks against American interests a very palpable reality. [...]

Then there's the economy. Despite the pollyannic prognosis of the White House's economic team, there are fundamental structural flaws to this economy, flaws that I'm not sure a Kerry administration would be able to address unless the Democrats seize the Senate and make sizable inroads in the House. The near term economic forecast is not promising, and will likely be punctuated by prolonged stagnation and frequent setbacks. I don't want the conservative punditry to pin the economic malaise on John Kerry, when it is the extremist supply-side cult of the Bush team that has so greatly exacerbated the situation. Consider the litany of problems.

Tax policy has shifted the burden to the states and localities and ultimately the increasingly squeezed middle class which has led to a surge in bankruptcies, personal debt and hardship while slowing down consumer spending, which makes up two-thirds of the GDP. The deficits are so out of control that interest rates have begun inching upward despite the economic stagnation. With Iraq hemorrhaging money, expensive programs like the prescription drug benefit in place, and a Republican dominated House and Senate unwilling to realign tax priorities, those deficits will remain entrenched and thus interest rates will continue to climb. This will burst the real estate bubble and plunge even more Americans into unmanageable debt as floating rate mortgages become unsustainable.

Oil prices are at unprecedented levels, but unfortunately the trend upward in prices is inevitable and probably irreversible in the near future. China, India and other developing economies are developing an appetite for oil that is rivaling our own, yet production, refinement and supply remain relatively static, with little hope of significant enhancements in any of these categories. The cost of oil will continue to drag on the economy, yet vigorous research and development of alternative fuels will be made difficult by a recalcitrant Congress and a strapped budget.

...With the deficit as large as it is, the Republicans in charge of Congress and with the tax base shrunk and shifted, there is little likelihood now for the successful passage of such a grandiose endeavor as national health insurance even if Kerry is elected...My schizoid self wants Bush to be associated with the disastrous results of his own economic policies. My better half wants Kerry to do all he can to reverse the trend and ease the burden on working Americans.

With those mammoth albatrosses gift wrapped and waiting for Kerry and Edwards I now turn my attention to an intriguing power struggle within the GOP, with this election likely tilting the balance in favor of one side over the other. In a recent article, reporters at the New York Times detailed the tension in the Republican Party between the conservative wing and the moderate, Rockefeller Republicans. The internal struggle has been punctuated by pitched primary battles between moderates and conservatives, even for long time incumbents like moderate Senator Arlen Specter (PA) who narrowly eked out a victory in his primary contest with ultra-conservative Patrick Toomey. One of Toomey's chief backers was the conservative group the Club For Growth, which has led the fight to defeat candidates they define as RINOs or "Republicans In Name Only."

Stephen Moore, president of the Club for Growth, acknowledges that his organization's goal is to make moderate Republicans an endangered species. "The problem with the moderates in Congress is they basically water down the Republican message and what you get is something that infuriates the Republican base," Mr. Moore said.

Christie Whitman, the moderate former New Jersey governor and former head of the EPA under Bush (who departed on somewhat acrimonious terms over several public and embarrassing environmental policy divergences, especially when the President reneged on a campaign pledge to reduce CO2 emissions that was highly touted by Whitman in the press) is writing a book titled It's My Party Too, a reference to the increasing marginalization of moderate voices in the GOP. Whitman assesses the impact of the election on the Party dynamic thusly:

Frankly, if the president wins walking away with this, maybe the country is in a different place than where the moderate Republicans are...If he loses, it is an absolute validation of the fact that you cannot be a national party if you are excluding people.

As Whitman predicts if Bush wins, the conservative leadership, validated and emboldened by their victory, will steer the Party even farther to the right. Don't be fooled by the centrist facade on display in the prime time slots during the convention, Tom Delay and the conservative wing want total loyalty and uniformity of ideology. But in that move to the right, the GOP exposes large swaths of political real estate to the Democrats.  [...]

The future viability of the Republican Party rests with the moderate voices, the ones with mass appeal in swing states and among the middle of the road Americans. So any alienation of moderates and independents could severely damage the GOP's ability to produce candidates and platforms with long term national appeal. The hubris of the victorious conservatives could lead to their political over-reaching. So in a bizarre sense, if Bush wins, the GOP may lose. I realize that there are too many other issues of importance such as the gutting of the regulatory state, the appointment of Supreme Court and other federal judges, and the overall direction of the nation to actually claim that the defeat of Kerry and Edwards would be in any sense a positive thing. I also have no doubt that the nation, and the world, will be a safer more unified place under their leadership. It is just that a part of me wants to see Bush burn in the fires he set, and I am sickened by my anticipation of the blame for the enormous problems created by Bush being placed at the footsteps of Kerry and Edwards. Although I eagerly await November, I am bothered by a nagging feeling that even victory will be bittersweet.

Comments

[Existenz]

The one big upside to a John Kerry victory would have been two nominations to the Supreme Court, making it 6-3 liberal rather than 5-4 conservative. Hell, I bet Stevens and Ginsberg would have also retired, so we'd have 6 relatively young liberals/moderates on the court versus 3 aging conservatives.

That said, with Kerry in power I don't think we would have seen the tsunami that changed the Congressional makeup. Perhaps an Obama victory in 08 is better than a Kerry victory in 04, but I would strongly argue that a Gore victory in 00 would have been better than either simply because so many of the disasters of the last eight years would have been avoided.

[Eric Martin]

Agreed on Gore.

[Dave S.]

How about the response to Katrina, arguably the only unavoidable disaster of the last eight years? FEMA probably would have still been a mess only 8 months after transition but the overall response (not to mention the perception thereof) probably would have been better.

[J. Michael Neal]

This is an argument that makes sense in hindsight. I agree that the shape of the last four years says that we are better off with Kerry having lost.

At the same time, I think that it is an argument that is never valid ahead of time. We are better off for having lost the White House, because almost everything that could go wrong did, and it went just about as badly as it could have. Losing is only an advantage if that's the case, and making strategy based upon the worst case scenario isn't any better an approach, in most cases, than blindly going with the best case scenario.

[Anthony Damiani]

We still chose Bush-- knowing the full scope of his atrocities. That damage to my esteem of the American people is substantial, and outweighs a large number of realpolitik concerns.

[Tom Scudder]

The loss has certainly been better for the power of the Democratic Party (aside from the Supreme Court appointments). For the country, it's another four years of crap built up that we will have to dig out from under, a task which would have been much cheaper if it had started four years earlier.

[hilzoy]

Nope. I want all the dead people to still be alive. Plus, as mentioned, the courts.

[Gary Farber]

"Perhaps an Obama victory in 08 is better than a Kerry victory in 04, but I would strongly argue that a Gore victory in 00 would have been better than either simply because so many of the disasters of the last eight years would have been avoided."

Personally, I think it all went wrong when Bobby Kennedy was unable to defeat Richard Nixon in 1968, but I've always been fond of the classics.

Of course, James Buchanan should have lost, too.

[DanM]

I think the Kerry loss was extraordinarily fortunate for the Democratic party, allowing the Republican party to experience one of the most dramatic self-inflicted political collapses of the past century. Without a radical reformation, demographics point to at least 20 years of exile, the bitter but well earned fruit of the last 8 years of lawlessness.

Nevertheless, the Kerry loss was ultimately devastating for America. The corrosive poison of the Bush administration had four extra years to spread and corrode the very fabric of American society. America is a hollowed out shell of the nation she once was, constitutionally, economically, morally, and socially brittle. On nearly every possible front, our nation stands at the precipice of collapse.

Obama appears to be the most talented politician of his generation. There is no better candidate to lead this nation out of the morass and back to her roots. But the cost, the price of creating this perfect moment for Obama, has been far too high.

And should McCain win. It's over.

[dmbeaster]

Without question, the failure in 2004 enabled bigger successes in 2006 and presumably 2008.

But that is a pretty low bar for deciding that the catastrophe of four more years of Bush was worth it. It seems to be some weird form of Democratic weirdness in weighing pros and cons. It should never be OK to lose.

[El Cid]

Since 2002 I argued that when Americans finally got a full, undiluted, unchallenged dose of Reaganism across all 3 branches of government, the conservatives would run out of their promises of paradise and Americans would be left realizing that they actually hated all of it.

Had Reagan had the control of Congress that Bush Jr. had, this might have happened earlier, because the Democrats managed to dilute his awfulness. Not so with Bush Jr.

[ResumeMan]

I certainly think that Democratic party politicians are in a stronger position now than they would have been if Kerry won. But I'm not a Democratic politician so I don't care.

As has been said above, there are a lot of dead people and a lot more domestic catastrophes to dig out of that would not have happened if Kerry won.

Further, 2004 was really a referendum on the state of America's soul. Are we a country that thinks it's ok to randomly invade non-threatening countries or not? Are we a country that allows our government to torture people without punishment and repudiation or not? Do we believe in opportunity for all, or not?

We answered wrong. We sold off a piece of our soul in 2004, and we aren't going to get it back.

I'd like to still have that bit of my national soul, and would gladly trade an Obama presidency for it.

[ResumeMan]

I certainly think that Democratic party politicians are in a stronger position now than they would have been if Kerry won. But I'm not a Democratic politician so I don't care.

As has been said above, there are a lot of dead people and a lot more domestic catastrophes to dig out of that would not have happened if Kerry won.

Further, 2004 was really a referendum on the state of America's soul. Are we a country that thinks it's ok to randomly invade non-threatening countries or not? Are we a country that allows our government to torture people without punishment and repudiation or not? Do we believe in opportunity for all, or not?

We answered wrong. We sold off a piece of our soul in 2004, and we aren't going to get it back.

I'd like to still have that bit of my national soul, and would gladly trade an Obama presidency for it.

[novakant]

It's pretty simple:

Do you want to look good in the history books or do you want actual political power to affect change? If you want the latter, you grab and hold on to power whenever the opportunity presents itself, no matter what the circumstances.