Why Scooter's Indictment Doesn't Matter

[yesthattom]

The Democrats I talk to say, “Isn’t this great! We’re vindicated! It proves that we were right when we said Bush lied to go to war.”

The Republicans I talk to say, “So what! That’s old news! We knew Saddam didn’t have any WMDs! But now that we’re there, let’s take the place over!”

I don’t know where this is going to go from here. My theory is that American’s support a war NOT because it is just or fair. Generally we support a war when we’re winning, and don’t support it when we’re losing. Bush kept saying “We’re winning!” and Kerry kept saying, “This is an unjust war.” We should have had every Dem operative talking about nothing but “we’re losing we’re losing we’re losing.” Bush wouldn’t have had a chance.

Comments

[awfief.livejournal.com]

Dems are starting to get some things right. We need to focus on corruption, since that was a promise Bush made. And definitely, we need to put it in black-and-white terms.

Republicans say "we're winning the war", Dems say "it's unjust." People like to win. You are absolutely right.

Just like pro-equality folks say "It's about rights" and anti-equality folks say "it's about the children" for issues of same-sex marriage.

As much as we should, and want to, we should NOT qualify our absolutes. People want absolutes. Saddam is evil. War on terror. Nobody's asking how staying in Iraq helps the war on terror -- if Saddam was the terrorist, well, we have him now. Nobody cares, and the argument is "terrorism".

CNN.com has an article that says that Bush's current approval rating is 37%, which has been steady since early Aug.

Think about that. That means that Katrina hasn't affected the president's ratings. That's HUGE. Of course, some have changed their mind, and many who have changed their mind from 'good president' to 'bad' don't have phones because they're displaced, so can't answer the CNN/Ipsos surveys, but, still.

Vote Nov. 8th. Read the local paper and be current on local politics, because Presidents come from federal Senators and Representatives, which usually come from state senators and reps, which can come from town positions. My local paper comes once a week, and sometimes I sit down with 3-4 weeks' worth of reading, but I read it all.

[alanesq.livejournal.com]

Kerry kept saying, “This is an unjust war.”

Actually, Kerry said many different and often contradictory things about the war.

He actually gave one excellent speech (http://www.livejournal.com/users/alanesq/9305.html) at NYU about a month before the election, where he laid out a strategy arguing that Bush was not fighting the war effectively (Kerry was right). Personally, I believe that had he maintained that strategy (i.e., I'll fight the war better and win), he might have pulled out the election.

[friendlyheretic.livejournal.com]

"Personally, I believe that had he maintained that strategy (i.e., I'll fight the war better and win), he might have pulled out the election." -- this sounds pretty good to me and could still be necessary the next time around. Any politician that claims we are "losing" might as well fall on his sword. Dunno. My crystal ball is a bit murky.

[selki.livejournal.com]

Personally, I believe that had he maintained that strategy (i.e., I'll fight the war better and win), he might have pulled out the election.

Yes.

[marmota.livejournal.com]

Quite possibly. I know I burned out on interpartisan dialogue after gritting my teeth and listening for a while to what I thought of as the "Ann Coulter crowd", and realizing just how fundamentally different our viewpoints were. They really are the kind of people I can only imagine in jail. Utterly sociopathic red in tooth and claw bullies who will lie cheat and steal to get what they want with no moral consideration whatsoever. They in turn see liberals as those weak emo kids whose lunch money they stole back in high school.

While I agree therefore that Kerry's "This is an unjust war" strategy therefore fell on republican deaf ears, I'm not sure switching strategies to "we're losing" or "I can win this and Bush can't" would have resulted in a win, as it could have alienated at least as many democrats as it would gain republicans. I'm inclined more towards thinking a strategy of "This war is only for making money hand over fist for this short list of people and corporations, meanwhile your sons and daughters will come home in bags and social security will get gutted to pay for it" would have gotten through on both sides.

[kimuchi.livejournal.com]

In true conspiracy-theorist form I figure the indictment of Scooter Libby didn't matter because he's taking the fall for someone further up who told him what to say.