The Surprise Party
BAKER, GERARD
The Surprise Party What you can learn from a little platform diving. BY GERARD BAKER HOW GOOD is your knowledge of the political parties' platforms for November's presidential election? which...
...Certainly no one would say the Bush administration's diplomacy in the last four years has been of the highest quality...
...For all their criticism of President Bush's foreign policy, it seems they have decided the safest way to trump the incumbent is to look even tougher...
...Almost every speaker emphasized the Democrats' determination to fight the war on terror more effectively than President Bush...
...Here's a clue: This same party says it will try to build global alliances, but will "never wait for a green light from abroad" to defend the country against new threats...
...which party promises to achieve these aims by transforming the U.S...
...Congratulations if you picked the party of Edward Kennedy, Al Sharp-ton, Howard Dean, and Dennis Kucinich...
...while it supports the creation of a Palestinian state (but under new and responsible leadership), it says it is "unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949...
...It wants to strengthen the Patriot Act to make it harder for terrorists to launder money through the United States...
...which party says that the most pressing priorities the nation faces in the next four years are winning the global war against terror, stopping the spread of weapons of mass destruction, and promoting democracy and freedom in the world, starting with a peaceful and stable Iraq...
...In this view, a list of policies carefully crafted for public consumption is not the best guide to a party's real intentions in government, for which we need to look at the voting and rhetorical record of its presidential candidate over 20 years in public office...
...Instead, the Democrats' approach seems to assume that, with a kind word and a charming smile, all the objections that European and Arab states have had to the same policies the Democrats seem willing to execute can be just waved away...
...Elsewhere in the world, the party says, a nuclear-armed Iran is an "unacceptable" risk...
...But, haggled over as it is by party strategists, it is a helpful guide to what the leadership thinks will sustain a presidential election campaign...
...Nothing in the Democratic platform in fact comes close to justifying the claim it makes right at the start: "This November the choice we face as Americans may have more impact on our people and our place in the world than any in our lifetimes...
...No fewer than four generals addressed the 5,000 cheering, clapping delegates...
...A parade of top brass was wheeled out to take a bow in prime time just before John Edwards's vice presidential acceptance speech...
...But when you strip out the rhetorical barbs, you would be surprised at how much like a paper on Republican national security strategy it sounds...
...Typical of this approach is the wonderfully blithe assertion in the platform that, in order to better secure the peace in Iraq, "we must convince NATO to take on a more significant role...
...there is some muted criticism of the way President Bush handled the U.N...
...It pledges unstinting support for Israel and promises to help it retain the qualitative edge necessary for its security...
...In between the startlingly martial policy prescriptions was some familiar knockabout stuff about how President Bush has alienated the world, bullied allies, and diminished respect for America...
...editor of the Times of London and a contributing editor to THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...foreign policy in a Kerry-Edwards administration...
...The Democrats are fighting this presidential election on their most aggressive foreign policy manifesto in almost half a century...
...International jurists will find not an encouraging word about the Rome Treaty on the International Criminal Court...
...But here's the trouble...
...Just as remarkable as what is in the Democratic platform is what has been left out...
...The party left nothing to chance at its convention in Boston last week in its determination to demonstrate to a skeptical but interested public its national security credentials...
...A Boston Globe poll this week indicated that 95 percent of the delegates who came to the convention believe the war was a mistake...
...How do they think an administration determined to prosecute the war in Iraq, to defend firmly Israel's right to its own security, and to ignore many of the international treaties much of the world holds sacred, could achieve its goals without alienating some old allies...
...in the war in Iraq, but not the slightest suggestion that it will be at the center of U.S...
...Liberal environmentalists will search in vain for any kindly reference to the Kyoto Treaty on global warming...
...Indeed, that record would at least explain why a Democratic party now animated by a boiling hatred of President Bush's foreign policies seems so willing to emulate them...
...military through technological innovation and investment, adding 40,000 soldiers, doubling the size of the Pentagon's Special Forces, and ending America's dependence on Middle Eastern oil...
...This confidence flies in the face of the political realities in Europe, where NATO members are neither willing nor able to provide much support for the United States...
...And it shows that, despite the deep unpopularity of the Iraq war among Democrats, the party's leadership is still unwilling to reject President Bush's decision to remove Saddam Hussein...
...Indeed, fans of the United Nations in general will be disappointed...
...And of course, the story of John Kerry's own personal heroism in Vietnam, repeated endlessly through the week, was intended to convey the promise of strong, decisive leadership...
...The platform, of course, is read only by a few fanatics and curious journalists...
...Instead of rejecting head-on the Bush team's post-September 11 strategy, the Kerry-Edwards approach seems to be: We could have done all these things without alienating our allies and upsetting the world...
...have "no illusions" about Kim Jong Il...
...But no amount of sugar-coating could have sold these policies to America's allies without producing stresses in its global relations...
...Of course a cynical view might be that what happens at the party's convention and what goes into the platform tells us more about where the Democrats' leaders think their electoral interests lie than what they might actually do in office...
...But the closest the party leadership could get to their position was the following: "People of good will disagree about whether America should have gone to war in Iraq...
...All right, I'll confess this was a slightly selective reading of Strong at Home, Respected, in the World, the 37-page blueprint for a John Kerry-John Edwards administration...
...the United States should continue the six-party talks with North Korea, but should Gerard Baker is U.S...
Vol. 9 • August 2004 • No. 45
