archy

Only wimps are Republicans
Last week, while reflecting on Bob Dole throwing away his last shreds of credibility, several writers pointed out that this should not have come as a surprise to anyone. Bob Dole has always been a vicious, partisan attack dog. What’s surprising is that after each round of attacks, he pulls out his genial, self-effacing, good ol’ Bob persona and convinces us that this is the new Dole. Then the party calls on him to be a vicious, partisan attack dog and the old Dole is back.

In going over the history of this cycle (perhaps we should call it a flip-flop), I was reminded of an argument he brought up as Ford’s running mate in ’76. In his vice-presidential debate with Walter Mondale, Dole characterized all of the twentieth century American wars as the Democratic Wars. Democrats, he argued were the party of war because we entered WWI, WWII, Korea, and Viet Nam during Democratic administrations. He did not follow his argument through by pointing out that the only two of those we won were won by Democratic administrations.

Obviously, Republicans don’t know squat about winning serious wars. Sure they can see us through a couple week commitment in Grenada or Panama, but how do they do with a long-term commitment like Viet Nam or Lebanon? They cut and run. Just this week Bush showed the true defeatist nature of the Republican Party when he said we can’t win the war on terrorism. To steal the right wing punditry’s favorite adjective, serious people will be voting Democratic this year. Anything else is just letting the terrorists win.