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Right Hook C¥

J.J. McCullough
OP Columnist

One of the most admirable features of the United
States’ system of government is its set election dates.
Unlike their contemporaries in Europe, the American
founders did not believe that elections should be a
tool of the politicians, to be called at their own con-
venience. Thus, while Prime Minister Paul Martin is
likely to keep Canadians guessing at what point he
will “call” an election to ratify his rule, Americans
know exactly when they will go to vote for their pres-
ident, just as they have for the last 200 years.

Next year’s November election in America will be a
very interesting one to follow. Unlike the general non-
event that was the 2000 election, the 2004 presiden-
tial election will likely be one of the most important
in recent US history. Though whether or not it will be
as closely contended as 2000's remains to be seen.

President Bush, by all accounts has done a stellar
job in his unexpected role as a wartime president. The
world is free of two of the most brutal dictatorships
the world has ever seen, and as a result a heavy blow
has been dealt to the worldwide specter of Islamo-
Fascist terrorism. Despite the doomsday warnings of
numerous self-proclaimed experts, there has been no
follow-up terrorist attack to 9/11, thanks to the Bush
administration’s security initiatives.

If Bush had been President 20 years ago, his re-elec-
tion would no doubt seem inevitable. However, this
President is unfortunate enough to be cursed with an
extremely politically unlucky father; one whose shad-
ow continues to hang over the presidency of his son.
Bush Senior was badly defeated in the 1992 election,
and proved that even the most popular wartime pres-
ident is not invincible, and can be defeated by a
skilled opposition. The electoral demise of the first
President Bush continues to be a tale that inspires the
current president's jealous political opponents.

One myth Canadians often tend to believe is that
since the United States only has two “main” parties;
there is a lack of “real” political debate in America and
a lack of “diversity” of political opinions. In actuality,
this is far from the case. Because of America’s weak
party discipline, and extremely inclusive party mem-
berships, the two US parties actually have far more
diversity of opinion within their ranks than you could
ever find in say, the ranks of the NDP. One only needs
to look at the motley crew of Democrats pining for
America’s top job to see this principle in action.

The nine Democrats running for President are all
over the board when it comes to politics.

Senator Joseph Lieberman from Connecticut is
both a social and an economic conservative, and a
strong supporter of most of the Bush administration's
foreign policy initiatives. Needless to say, he is not
doing too well. Senator Joseph Kerry from
Massachusetts and Congressman Dick Gepheart from
Missouri represent the middle wing of the party.
Conservative on military matters but quite liberal on
social matters; Kerry and Gepheart represent the
party’s mainstream, Clinton-esque appeal. Senator
Graham of Florida is an “angry liberal” who
denounces just about every word the Bush adminis-
tration says, but has few ideas of his own.
Congressman Dennis Kucinich of Ohio is an
extremely far-left nutcase, who views anyone to the
right of Che Guvera as being part of some vast right-
wing conspiracy. The Reverend Al Sharpton is a racist
demagogue who stopped being politically relevant
decades ago, and disgraced African-American Senator
Carol Moseley-Braun’s candidacy as a transparent
attempt to siphon the black vote from the embarrass-
ing Sharpton.

The candidate that everyone is watching, however,
is former Vermont Governor, Howard Dean. Vermont

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is a notoriously leftist state. It is the only state that
currently has a member of the “Democratic Socialists
of America” representing them in Congress, and is
generally regarded as a “testing ground” for liberal
polices (Vermont is the only state that grants full mar-
riage powers to gay unions, for example).

Dean himself is a member of the Democratic left,
though certainly not a race-baiter like Sharpton, or a
conspiratorial nutcase like Kunichnch. He has vowed
to eliminate the Bush tax cuts, is a proponent of affir-
mative action, and a supporter of the various other,
generally inoffensive liberal causes de joure. His main
campaign gimmick, however, is his ambitious, anti-
Bush Administration views on foreign policy.

Democratic legislators came under fire from the left
wing of their party for not opposing the Iraq war
enough. Though most questioned the war before it
was launched, they nevertheless found it hard to
directly challenge Bush’s plans to overthrow Saddam
Hussein; a plan supported by a majority of Americans
of both parties. Rather than risk electoral defeat in the
midterm elections, the Democrats reluctantly got on
board and voted to grant the President war powers to
defeat the Iraqi strongman. Now that the war is over,
Congressional Democrats seem to be regretting their
brief flirtation with common sense, and have come
out swinging against the president’s handling of the
Iraqi war.

Governor Dean, on the other hand, has been an
opponent of the war since day one. Loudly and
aggressively, the retired politician condemned Bush’s
attempts to liberate the Iraqi people, and claimed that
“regime change” would be better suited for
Washington than Baghdad. When the war ended vic-
toriously, Dean refused to acknowledge Bush’s success,
stating that “we don’t know whether in the long run
the Iraqi people are better off” without the Hussein
dictatorship. In recent debates Dean has also
announced that the United States should not “take
sides” in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, echoing the
common left-wing demand that the US should view
the democratic and free government of Israel as a
“moral equivalent” to oppressive, suicide-bombing
Islamic terrorists.

While Dean may be in tune with the people on
some of his social issues, he is completely out to lunch
with his leftist views of foreign policy. The American
people supported the removal of Saddam, support the
international war on terror, and the partnership with

September 24, 2003

Election 2004—anyone’s game?

America’s longtime ally Israel in the face of Islamic
extremism. Dean’s support comes mainly from the
halls of America’s universities, certain cities in
California, and other traditional conclaves of young
left-wing radicals.

Because of his views, Governor Dean is frequently
compared to both Bill Clinton and George
McGovern, the former usually favorably, the latter
almost exclusively negatively. Bill Clinton started his
campaign for president as an unknown and unimpor-
tant southern governor. As a baby-boomer and former
60s radical, he brought significant appeal to numer-
ous sectors of the American left. Clinton employed
much of the “New Left” rhetoric and made enormous
promises to implement a variety of extremely liberal
reforms to the American system. Left-wingers
cheered, and embraced the idea of finally having “one
of us”, a true left-winger, occupying the presidency.

However, Clinton was smart enough to realize that
in order to be elected, he would have to compromise
on some of his principles. After the party primaries,
he moved toward the center, and toned down his lib-
eral rhetoric. Throughout his presidency, Clinton
remained popular with moderate Americans, and
moderate Democrats. Though the far-left condemned
him as a sell-out and “traitor,” the fact remains that
Clinton's political compromises made him the most
electorally successful Democratic president since
FDR.

The opposite of the Clinton scenario, and the
strongest warning to the Democrats about the dangers
of listening to the noisy extreme left at the expense of
all others, was the case of Senator George McGovern.
In the 70s many Americans saw the ongoing Vietnam
War with increasing distain. The war was poorly
planned, American causalities were disturbingly high,
and there seemed to be little accountability for the
men in the Pentagon. Most Americans wanted to see
the war end and see American troops returned home.

However, they also wanted to see lasting and hon-
ourable peace established in Vietnam; a conclusion to
the conflict that would validate the sacrifice of so
many American lives. Though these demands seem
logical, to the far-left they were anything but. The
radical “revolutionary” far-left of the 70s saw the
Vietnam War as fundamentally immoral and crimi-
nal. As I explained in my last column, radical mem-
bers of the American academic scene like Noam
Chomsky indoctrinated a generation of young stu-
dents to view the war as American “imperialist”
aggression, with America as a fascist monster crushing
a peaceful socialist peasant revolution. This troop of
radical leftists in turn staged mass protests and rallies
against the war, and provoked many of the scenes of
campus violence that have since become synonymous
with the 70s.

Though many radicals despised electoral politics,
others demanded the Democratic Party listen to the
voice of the left-wing mobs which claimed to be the
only legitimate voice of opposition to the war and
President Nixon. After staging infamously violent
riots at the 1968 Party convention, in 1972 the radi-
cals were able to score a victory in the nomination of
the aggressively anti-war candidate, George
McGovern. McGovern promised that if elected he
would order an immediate withdrawl of all American
troops from Vietnam. He denounced the US-sup-
ported, anti-Communist regime of South Vietnam,
portrayed Nixon and his inner-clique as war crimi-
nals, and condemned what he called the “stupidest
and cruelest war in all history” all with vicious leftist
rhetoric. McGovern’s views were so out of touch with
the majority of American voters that he ended up los-