A Very Strange Respect
Over the years, Obama has carefully calibrated his political message, and he has won a grudging respect among some conservatives. In The New Republic, Bruce Bartlett, a Treasury official in the Reagan and Bush père Administrations, writes that “Obamacons”—libertarians, disillusioned neoconservatives, even a few supply-siders—have been pushed “into Obama’s arms.” In The American Conservative, Andrew J. Bacevich, a professor of international relations and history at Boston University, complains, “To believe that President John McCain will reduce the scope and intrusiveness of federal authority, cut the imperial presidency down to size, and put the government on a pay-as-you-go basis is to succumb to a great delusion.” ~Dorothy Wickenden, The New Yorker
Unintentionally, I think, this paragraph demonstrates perfectly how the “Obamacon” phenomenon is driven pretty much entirely by a negative and anti-Republican impulse. I know I have made this point before, but this passage serves as an excellent example of what I mean, because even when Ms. Wickenden proposes to show examples of how Obama has won over conservative supporters she ends up demonstrating that Obama didn’t win them over, but rather that the Republicans have driven them away. The “grudging respect” for Obama turns out to have no connection with Obama at all, except for the fact that Obama’s opponents are McCain and the Republicans. His conservative admirers have been “pushed into his arms,” which implies that there is no respect, grudging or otherwise, but rather a desperate, necessary embrace of the other major party candidate out of sheer contempt for the alternative.
Prof. Bacevich’s article is a powerful indictment of the GOP and gives the best account you could want for why conservatives should stop supporting that party, and it is only by the accident of the two-party system that the conclusion of this argument is that conservatives should of necessity, according to the argument, support the GOP’s major opponent. Obamacons have taken the lesser-of-two-evils argument to an extreme conclusion that the Democrats are now the lesser of two evils, but in coming to that conclusion they are offering the most empty endorsement of the actual Democratic agenda that the candidate they are grudgingly supporting (but not necessarily respecting) will try to advance.
This position must be incoherent, because it is equally true to say, ”To believe that President Barack Obama will reduce the scope and intrusiveness of federal authority, cut the imperial presidency down to size, and put the government on a pay-as-you-go basis is to succumb to a great delusion.” It must therefore come down to Iraq, so you have the single-issue antiwar voters on the right arraying themselves against the single-issue pro-life voters who will always line up behind the GOP no matter what for fear of the alternative. The only meaningful difference between these two single-issue rationales is that the antiwar voters have a slightly better chance of being vindicated, because a new President will have the authority to withdraw American forces from Iraq, but all of that hinges on Obama not meaning what he says when he says that he will leave some forces in Iraq and that he is willing to return to Iraq to prevent civil war and genocide.
“but all of that hinges on Obama not meaning what he says when he says that he will leave some forces in Iraq and that he is willing to return to Iraq to prevent civil war and genocide.”
And there is the crux of it. You believe him or you don’t. Even some of his strongest supporters argue that his plan to leave some forces in Iraq is essentially a cover story: they “know” he is really committed to getting out of Dodge just as soon as it is logistically possible.
But it’s more than believing him or not believing him. It’s a deliberate willingness to believe that he basically lies about the things that should make you think twice about him and tells the truth about the things you find to be attractive. What makes them think that his opposition to the war isn’t the “cover story” and his promise to keep forces there the real plan? Not a whole lot, when you get right down to it. It requires enormous trust in a politician to engage in these somersaults. I understand the visceral loathing of the GOP and McCain, but how you get from there to where his conservative admirers are still remains a mystery to me.
After 20 years of being presented with the “Republican Lesser Evil”, the conservatives have forgotten the “Republican” part.
I don’t think hopes that Obama will be conservative are any more well founded nor will be met anymore than those same hopes for Bush the younger.
See the quotation from Larry Hunter on the TAC blog:
“Moreover, as I have said in the past, Obama saying all the wrong things on taxes, economic policy, and health care doesn’t bother me for the same reason that Republicans saying all the right things on taxes, economic policy, and health care doesn’t excite me anymore–you can’t believe a word any politician says. From Woodrow Wilson, to FDR, to George W. Bush, they all said one thing as candidates and did exactly the opposite once they got elected. Ronald Reagan was the exception to the rule.”
If there’s more than disillusionment with Bush behind this, it’s that Bill Clinton’s administration turned out quite differently from what conservatives expected. Probably that had a lot to do with the Republican Congress elected in 1994, but the conclusion that nothing in politics is what it seems is hard for some people to shake.
“Obamaconsâ€â€”libertarians, disillusioned neoconservatives, even a few supply-siders—have been pushed “into Obama’s arms.â€
Operative word here is obviously “pushed,” but I find it funny that people analyze this trend as anything more than anti-Bush and anti-neoconservative resentment. What about “Obama’s arms” is inviting to a conservative, whether he/she is a Republican or not?
Mr. Larison, your analysis that this trend is nothing more than an accident of the American 2-party system is a more accurate assement of this phemonemon than any other I can think of. Obama supporters will spin this as a component of the political “moment” and a result of Sen. Obama’s charisma and conservative temperment. It’s really just a symptom of the poisonous American electoral system.
Or his liberal admirers, for that matter. I understand that he leans very much to the left – that is your whole point here, of course – but the unwillingness to call a spade a spade when it comes to things like Iraq, Israel, FISA, ethanol, etc. etc. etc. is going to end liberal pundits up in the same place as the conservatives who were so happy to have a Republican president that they refused to speak out against Bush. Obama is just another politician, albeit one who’s better looking and a more polished speaker than the rest.
But Bacevich wasn’t arguing for Obama because he was the lesser of two evils. He was arguing for Obama because his victory will become an American decision,
We will be saying: No, we don’t want empire.
Perhaps it’s too late for us to change our minds about this empire dealie-bob, but it’s our only hope to survive as a nation of ideals.
To say this is a matter of “a single issue” is just blinkered. It’s kind of a big deal! Interesting that seemingly no one on this board wants to defend McCain on his terms (victory, etc). Obama is assumed to be right about the war, even by his critics here. And yet his “rightness” is also generally assumed to be unequal to the huge task ahead of him, of putting our nation back on track:
“…the Iraq War represents the ultimate manifestation of the American expectation that the exercise of power abroad offers a corrective to whatever ailments afflict us at home. Rather than setting our own house in order, we insist on the world accommodating itself to our requirements. The problem is not that we are profligate or self-absorbed; it is that others are obstinate and bigoted. Therefore, they must change so that our own habits will remain beyond scrutiny.”
This may be the best critique I’ve ever read of the “mindset” that got us into the war in Iraq. Thanks for introducing it to me.
I understand that Prof. Bacevich is making that argument as well, but I find that to be the least persuasive part of his article. The 2008 outcome won’t be a referendum on empire, because Obama doesn’t propose to change the structure or nature of U.S. involvement overseas. It’s not even clear that it will be a referendum on the war in Iraq, or that if it were it would have any lasting effect. We already had one election that repudiated the war, and nothing changed–why will 2008 make any more of a difference? My problem with the article is that it invests elections with far too much significance, as if those perpetual political survivors, the neocons, are going to be undone by something as trivial as popular repudiation. They will adjust, regroup and then start all over again. The point is that if neoconservatism hasn’t already been discredited, no electoral result is going to do what their own obvious failures have not.
Of course no one wants to defend McCain. His position is indefensible. Then again, Obama has no real proposal to set our own house in order, either, and his refusal to look at and admit our own flaws is almost as myopic as the entire political class’. He isn’t changing the mindset, even if he follows through on his promise to withdraw forces.
To support Obama for these reasons, one must believe he is lying, and has a more systematic antipathy to intervention and imperial hubris than he lets on. Inshallah.
That’s the case that the neocons make–BHO’s a secret dove–but if you believe that, I can sell you some options on Iranian real estate–cheap.
Or you can say he’s a doubleplusgood ducktalker and wears nice suits, so wotthehell. In weaker moments I find this argument the most tempting.
My father always used to say, “Throw the rascals out! Elect the new rascals!” but the new rascals will give us domestic policies we can do without, and more interventions albeit with a multilateral flavor.
Perhps the best we can do is stand athwart history and scream, “No ****in’ way!”