“As long as Mr. Bush’s fantasies, self-delusions, false optimism and surrealistic take on the world are passed along with little or no correction by the mainstream media, a passable base of public support for the war can remain and Americans will continue dying in a hopeless cause. It’s that fact behind the missing analysis that is critical.”
— P.M. Carpenter
Connect:
That’s almost exactly what Ronald Brownstein, the L.A. Times said:
Serious debate about the war has practically vanished in Washington. It’s difficult to find many people outside the administration who are satisfied with either the costs (in American lives) or the benefits (the progress toward establishing a secure, pro-Western Iraqi state) of current policies. It is even more difficult to find any major figure willing to publicly offer a significant alternative.
This amounts to a political dereliction of duty…
But most Republicans have chosen to fall in line behind the White House.
It isn’t hard to see why: Although support for the war has collapsed among Democrats and skidded among independents, it remains remarkably solid among rank-and-file Republicans.
In an early August Gallup survey, 80% of Republicans said they believed “the situation in Iraq was worth going to war over,” compared with 36% of independents and 12% of Democrats. In that environment, questioning the president isn’t easy.
Democrats face a different problem. Their core supporters have hardened against the war: In the Gallup poll, 85 percent of Democrats said the war was a mistake. But many in the party, although much of the left insists otherwise, fear that challenging Bush too aggressively on Iraq will open Democrats to charges of weakness on defense.
Another political calculation has encouraged Democrats to stay low. Strategists on both sides generally believe the absence of a clear Democratic alternative has hurt Bush in the near term. By staying off stage, Democrats have kept the focus on whether Bush’s strategy is working, not whether anyone else has a better idea. Instead of debating Democrats on Iraq, Bush is debating events. And as his sinking poll results show, he’s losing the debate.