[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1wSZBTAXRs]
So says Kevin James, a right wing radio host, of Barack Obama. Problem is, as the news anchor interviewing him then makes painfully clear, Kevin James has also never heard of Neville Chamberlain. Excruciating.
I’ve been at the Brookings Institution in Washington today for its conference on the transatlantic relationship.
In the chair, Daniel Benjamin, who runs Brookings’ Center on the United States and Europe, and who wrote The Age of Sacred Terror and The Next Attack: The Failure of the War on Terror and a Strategy for Getting it Right with the Council on Foreign Relations’ Steven Simon.
In The Next Attack, Benjamin and Simon argued that:
It is unlikely that even in his feverish reveries, Usama bin Laden could have imagined that America would stumble so badly and wound itself so grievously. By occupying Iraq, the United States has played into the hands of its opponents, affirming the story they have been telling to the Muslim world and adding to their aura as true warriors in defence of Islam…
There is, as has so often been said, a war of ideas going on, a battle for hearts and minds. Unfortunately, America has wound up on the wrong side.
Of course, this was pretty predictable. Every effective terror movement in history has been fuelled by the adverse reaction of its host society. The Bush administration has simply proved particularly obtuse and self-destructive- a fact for which Al Qaeda is appropriately grateful. In 2004, bin Laden mischievously quoted an unnamed British diplomat speaking at Chatham House (!) to support his assertion that ‘it seems as if we and the White House are on the same team shooting at the United States’ own goal’.
Benjamin and Simon’s policy prescription for the US can be summed simply as: stop scoring own goals. They call for a ‘deep and dramatic’ engagement with the Islamic world and point to Turkey’s relationship with the EU as a model. It has moved from military repression to relative liberalism, they suggest, albeit a liberalism that has an Islamic hue.
‘These changes, as well as the speed with which they have taken hold, are nothing short of remarkable,’ they write. ‘That they have happened at all is due to one thing: the prospect of membership in the European Union. The transformative potential this prospect has held has been clear to American policy makers for years, and, wisely, they have supported Turkey’s bid consistently and vocally.’
Of course, US support for Turkish accession to the EU is somewhat problematic. George Bush pushed this line in 2004 despite attempts from the French and others to warn him off. ‘Including Turkey in the E.U. would prove that Europe is not the exclusive club of a single religion, and it would expose the clash of civilizations as a passing myth in history,’ he said.
It’s hard for Europeans to be lectured on this issue by a man who believes that the US is in the midst of a Christian revival prompted by the ‘confrontation between good and evil’ (his words) that America finds itself in. Or from a guy who said this in 2001:
Oh, I know there’s some voices who want to wall us off from Mexico. They want to build a wall. I say to them, they want to condemn our neighbours to the south in poverty, and I refuse to accept that type of isolationist and protectionist attitude.
And then signed a bill to build a 700 mile fence along the Mexican border in 2006 – part of a desperate attempt to shore up his approval rating with the shrinking portion of Americans who represent his base.
But I digress. (more…)
Would you rather be a member of the liberal left on the western or eastern side of the Atlantic right now? Not easy. Labour’s in free-fall. The Democrats are devising innovative ways to lose an election that they should own. But Jackie Ashley at the Guardian still sees cause for hope: Gordon might be the new Hillary.
There can’t be a lot that cheers Gordon Brown over his morning porridge, but if he turns to the foreign pages he might ponder the Hillary effect. In Hillary Clinton, we see a politician loathed by a big section of the population, written off, jeered at, ordered to leave the stage, who, by sheer dogged determination – and by fighting, not quitting – has not only managed a comeback but earned grudging respect.
We have become very used to demanding resignations and calling “off with his head” at the slightest provocation. There has been a strange, semi-hysterical mood around Brown, a kind of national rage that he doesn’t either crumble in public or just bog off.
But all is not lost. Gordon is displaying “gritty determination” just like Hillary:
There may come a time when people begin to tire of the hysteria and see this. The Hillary effect is that just buggering on, to use Churchill’s phrase, can win people round.
Stirring stuff. But stirring stuff that suggests that the author is not entirely au fait with the mood among her U.S. counterparts. You want “a strange, semi-hysterical mood”? Then turn to the op-ed page of the New York Times. You’d think McCain was already ensconced in the White House. Here’s Bob Herbert (admittedly an Obama advocate, if now a jittery one) writing in Saturday’s edition:
Anger is growing like a cancer among Democrats. The Clintons have more than lived up to their polarizing reputations, slicing and dicing the electorate and then gleefully exploiting the myriad divisions. Their message varies, depending on whether it’s in public or behind the scenes. But the mantra is roughly as follows: Obama won’t win! He can’t win whites. Jeremiah Wright! He can’t win women. He can’t win Hispanics. He’ll lose Jewish voters. Farrakhan! We’ll nuke Iran.
The share of Clinton voters who have been telling exit pollsters that they will not vote for Senator Obama if he wins the nomination is inching toward the red zone. At the same time, there is growing resentment of the Clintons’ tactics among Obama partisans, especially the young and African-Americans.
What we’re witnessing here — in what was supposed to have been a championship season for Democrats — is a potential train wreck.
Herbert immediately goes on to say that this isn’t just the doing of the Clintons: Obama bears responsibility too. But while Ashley talks about “buggering on”, the Democrats look like they’re buggering up. You want a piece of this, Labour?
Last month, Sixpoint Craft Ales – with which I share a Brooklyn zip code – launched “Hop Obama”, an electoral ale. It’ll be around until the Pennsylvania primaries and sounds nice:
In keeping with the Illinois senator’s unifying theme, the “Hop Obama” is an indefinable ale that doesn’t adhere to traditional style guidelines. The 5.2% ABV creation contains five different kinds of European crystal malt and three different kinds of Pacific Northwest Hops. Combined with a Scottish yeast strain for fermentation, the result is a highly drinkable beer with a big malt background and an “Obama” of hops that imparts floral and citrus notes with just a hint of spiciness.
“The Hop Obama is our unique Sixpoint creation brewed in honor of the inspirational surgency (sic) of Senator Barack Obama,” said Sixpoint brewmaster Shane Welch. “Although we do not intend this beer to be a direct Sixpoint endorsement of Obama, we believe the delicious and refreshing quality it represents reminds us of the Senator’s successful grassroots campaign that positively blossoms each and every day.”
All mildly amusing, although the funniest part may be the earnest Real Ale enthusiasts’ reviews of the beer (including that quoted in my title) all of which resolutely refuse to get the joke and go on and on and on about malt… And yet not one of them has the gumption to refer to the “Audacity of Hops”, a sad oversight.
Unlike the ubiquitous candidate, the ale is rather hard to spot, but as a service to New Yorkers, I am pleased to note that it will be available at The Gate in Park Slope on the evening of Wednesday 9 April. Indeed, one can imagine no better evening in NYC than attending a thoughtful public lecture by Hans Blix hosted by the Center on International Cooperation, before heading off for a political pint.
(Okay, maybe you can think of a better evening in NYC, but that is why we leave comments firmly off on this blog – we don’t need you to tell us we’re wonks).
Most politician bloggers are somewhat half-arsed, but when Barack Obama posted for the first time on uber-leftie group blog, Daily Kos, back in 2005, his post essay was so impressive that he had to come back a while later for two reasons. First, to reply to eight hundred or so comments, and second to chide those who “wondered whether I wrote the post myself.” (He did.)
Sample extract:
Let me be clear: I am not arguing that the Democrats should trim their sails and be more “centrist.” In fact, I think the whole “centrist” versus “liberal” labels that continue to characterize the debate within the Democratic Party misses the mark. Too often, the “centrist” label seems to mean compromise for compromise sake, whereas on issues like health care, energy, education and tackling poverty, I don’t think Democrats have been bold enough. But I do think that being bold involves more than just putting more money into existing programs and will instead require us to admit that some existing programs and policies don’t work very well. And further, it will require us to innovate and experiment with whatever ideas hold promise (including market- or faith-based ideas that originate from Republicans).
Our goal should be to stick to our guns on those core values that make this country great, show a spirit of flexibility and sustained attention that can achieve those goals, and try to create the sort of serious, adult, consensus around our problems that can admit Democrats, Republicans and Independents of good will. This is more than just a matter of “framing,” although clarity of language, thought, and heart are required. It’s a matter of actually having faith in the American people’s ability to hear a real and authentic debate about the issues that matter.
Finally, I am not arguing that we “unilaterally disarm” in the face of Republican attacks, or bite our tongue when this Administration screws up. Whenever they are wrong, inept, or dishonest, we should say so clearly and repeatedly; and whenever they gear up their attack machine, we should respond quickly and forcefully. I am suggesting that the tone we take matters, and that truth, as best we know it, be the hallmark of our response.