When Clinton Hit Back

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"What we're doing is sending a message against the people who were responsible for planning this operation. ... [If] anybody asks the same people to do it again, they will remember this message."

Secretary of Defense Les Aspin
Washington Post
June 1993

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Believe it or not, there was a time — not so long ago — when American presidents wouldn't hesitate to act if a single American was threatened, much less actually injured or killed.

Such a case occurred 20 years ago today.

To put it in context: A couple of months earlier, former President George H.W. Bush — the man Bill Clinton had beaten in the previous year's presidential election — was in Kuwait to commemorate the conclusion of the Persian Gulf War. Seventeen people were arrested and charged with conspiring to kill Bush with explosives that were hidden in a vehicle.

No explosions occurred. No one was hurt. But Clinton was convinced, largely because of information gathered and analyzed by American foreign and domestic intelligence operatives, that the plot originated in Iraq — and 20 years ago today, he used American military might for the first time, ordering nearly two dozen cruise missile strikes on Iraqi intelligence facilities.

The strikes were meant both as retaliation for the plot and warning not to attempt anything like it again. But Clinton didn't shoot first and ask questions afterward. He explored numerous options, even those he felt did not go far enough. Eventually he selected one on the recommendation of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

"I felt we would have been justified in hitting Iraq harder," Clinton wrote in his presidential memoirs, "but [Colin] Powell made a persuasive case that the attack would deter further Iraqi terrorism and that dropping bombs on more targets, including presidential palaces, would have been unlikely to kill Saddam Hussein and almost certain to kill more innocent people."

Most of the missiles hit their intended targets, but a few overshot, and eight civilians were killed.

"It was a stark reminder," Clinton wrote, "that no matter how careful the planning and how accurate the weapons, when that kind of firepower is unleashed, there are usually unintended consequences."

The occasion of this anniversary has led me to think about two recent events that tell me much of what I need to know about U.S. policy in the 21st century.

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First, the evasive stance taken by Barack Obama and the members of his administration after the deadly attacks on the embassy in Benghazi last year tells me the executive branch is not willing to stand up for Americans abroad, be they dead or alive — unless there are clear benefits in doing so.

Second, Obama's recent argument in a speech at the National Defense University that the war on terror must end as all wars do shows a staggering naivete. Rhetorically, it sounds good, but the problem is that the war on terror is not a conventional war with armies and generals. It cannot be resolved in conventional ways — if, in fact, it can be resolved at all.

When you are dealing with terrorists, you are not dealing with anything as organized or concentrated as a single army or nation. Your enemies could be from anywhere on the globe — including your own back yard — and as long as even one is on the loose, so is the danger.

Sympathizers with the opposition have always been around — there were Nazi and Japanese sympathizers in America during World War II — but they weren't generally viewed as combatants unless they took some kind of aggressive action.

By the very nature of their activities, terrorists must be regarded — automatically — as combatants.

The idea that America can arbitrarily declare the war on terror over is as imperialistic as any I have heard, and it tells terrorists around the world, OK, we're going back to sleep now. It harkens back to a time when the prevailing attitude was that we were always in the right; therefore, we were entitled to impose our will on others. We — and only we — could decide when a war began and when it ended.

It was the same attitude — the concept of manifest destiny — that directed the westward expansion in the 19th century. America is entitled to seize what it wants.

American imperialism — as well as hubris — is what the terrorists really would like to see destroyed.

Rush to Judgment

You know the admonition about speaking truth to power?

Power, to borrow the words of a Jack Nicholson character, often can't handle the truth.

In this instance, I refer to the current Republican Party, which has long been accustomed to calling the shots but has been reduced to spectator status in recent years.

If the elections of 2006 and 2008 weren't enough to persuade the members of the party that they were in trouble, folks like former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr and former Secretary of State Colin Powell have been saying it, quite plainly, in recent days.

And, this week, the unofficial leader of the GOP, Rush Limbaugh, testily suggested that Powell should "close the loop and become a Democrat instead of claiming to be a Republican interested in reforming the Republican Party."

"He's just mad at me because I'm the one person in the country who had the guts to explain his endorsement of Obama," Limbaugh said. "It was purely and solely based on race."

It seems to me that is the wrong attitude to take when constructive criticism is being offered. And Powell was offering constructive criticism, observing that the country has changed while the party has not.

Powell is a Republican. Even though he endorsed Obama shortly before last November's election, his words do not indicate that he wants to change parties but that he wants his party to change. Powell's words indicate that he wants to see his party grow and expand, becoming more inclusive rather than exclusive.

But that cannot happen if the GOP leans farther and farther to the right.

Granted, in portions of his speech at a Washington conference on Monday, Powell would have been wise to choose more diplomatic words, befitting a former secretary of state. For example, he said, "I think what Rush does as an entertainer diminishes the party and intrudes or inserts into our public life a kind of nastiness that we would be better to do without."

If Powell had asked for my opinion, I probably would have recommended a different word than "nastiness," although just about any other word I can think of as a substitute still borders on the personal.

And perhaps "nastiness" is a better choice than some of the words I came up with — like "maliciousness" or "spitefulness" or "viciousness."

But it's hard to argue Powell's basic conclusion. In the last two elections, the Republicans have lost more than 50 House seats and more than a dozen Senate seats. His observation that the Republican Party is "getting smaller and smaller" is not a partisan opinion. It's a fact.

The Republicans' collapse has been visible in other ways, such as the defection recently of Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania. In large part, it prompted a thoughtful analysis by Alan Silverleib at CNN.com, who writes about how liberal and moderate politicians have been driven from the Republican Party over the last four decades.

The famous "Southern strategy" helped elect Republican presidents like Nixon, Reagan and both Bushes, but, in the process, it shoved Northeastern voters into the Democratic camp.

"Even after FDR started tilting the region to the Democrats," writes Silverleib, "it produced a slew of moderate GOP officeholders, postwar leaders like New York's Nelson Rockefeller and Jacob Javits, Pennsylvania's Richard Schweiker and John Heinz, Maine's Margaret Chase Smith and William Cohen, Massachusetts' Leverett Saltonstall and Ed Brooke, Connecticut's Prescott Bush and Lowell Weicker, Rhode Island's John Chafee, New Jersey's Clifford Case and Maryland's Mac Mathias."

But today, the Northeastern states from Maryland to Maine "have 18 Republican representatives in the House and three in the Senate," he writes.

The Republican Party has been reduced to mostly a regional party, relevant primarily in the South and Southwest. Neither tantrums by Limbaugh nor what currently appears to be an unlikely rebound in 2010 will be enough to reverse the party's fortunes.

Powell realizes that single–party domination is not a good thing in a democracy. There will always be a majority party and a minority party in a democracy, and the minority party must be healthy for democracy to thrive.

Today's Republican Party is not healthy. If it does not take steps to restore its good health, it will go the way of the Whigs.

This May Be Premature ...

A few minutes ago, Colin Powell announced on "Meet the Press" that he will "be voting" for Barack Obama — which I presume is an endorsement.

At least, it's being treated as one by the media. And Powell isn't denying that, by telling everyone that he plans to vote for Obama, he is encouraging others to do so as well.

Powell also said he does not plan to campaign for Obama in the last two weeks of the campaign.

But, aside from Powell's endorsement, I now feel inclined to predict that the Obama-Biden ticket will win the election — for other reasons (which I'll get into in a few minutes).

What effect, if any, will Powell's endorsement have on the election?

Personally, I feel it will have very little impact on what voters choose to do.

Although I still say, as I did when Powell's planned appearance on the program was hitting the blogosphere a couple of days ago, that the relative value of his endorsement may hinge on what happens in Sen. Ted Stevens' corruption trial in Alaska.

As I mentioned on Friday, Powell recently testified on Stevens' behalf in court. Stevens took the stand in his own defense on Friday.

If a verdict is reached in the case before the election, it may produce an ironic twist. The credibility of a high-profile Republican's endorsement of a Democrat could depend on the vindication of another Republican.

And that leads me to a point that was raised in a segment that followed Powell's appearance this morning.

In a discussion of the electoral map and the shifts that have been occurring (according to the polls), it was observed that a key demographic for both Obama and John McCain is "older, white voters."

To political observers, it's not news that older, white voters represent a major demographic.

The entertainment media focus advertising dollars on goods and services for young consumers, but older voters are the ones who, historically, show up at the polls and vote.

In 2004, 54% of the voters who participated were 45 years of age or older, and the Republican ticket received a majority of the vote from all voters who were 30 or older.

(In 2004, voters in the 18-29 age group supported the Democrat, but they accounted for only 17% of the vote.)

Race will remain important at least until the election results are known, because we have no precedent for a national campaign in which one of the nominees is black. At this point, no one knows what white voters will do when they're alone in the polling booth.

It's clear that what white voters do is important.

In 2004, 77% of the voters who participated were white, and the Republicans received 58% of their ballots.

But if, as was suggested during the program, those voters are shifting their preference, that can affect the electoral map.

What is likely to make older voters change their preference?

• A poor economy. Older voters know — in a way that most young voters do not — that their time is limited. When the economy is bad and those who have retired or are nearing retirement see their investments lose significant portions of their value, that will affect how they vote.


• Integrity. Older voters are not as willing to gamble as young voters are. Much has been said of Obama's "rock star" appeal, but older voters understand that they're not choosing the next winner of "American Idol" on Nov. 4.
  
  And when most older voters act on a recommendation, they do so based, at least in part, on the trustworthiness of the adviser. What would a conviction of Stevens tell older voters about Powell's judgment?

Over the years, though, research has indicated that endorsements have relatively little influence on voter decisions. In my experience, they tend to confirm positions already being taken by the majority in a state or community.

For example, the newspaper in my home city, the Dallas Morning News, endorsed McCain's candidacy yesterday.

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"The last time the nation saw Washington make real progress on deficit reduction was the 1990s, when a Democrat controlled the White House and Republicans held Congress. True, Republicans failed to cover themselves in deficit-reduction glory when they held the executive and legislative branches, but we read that as an argument in favor of divided government."

The Dallas Morning News

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However, "there's little evidence," write Jay Parsons and Theodore Kim in today's Morning News, that North Texas Democrats will expand, in 2008, beyond their surprising sweep of Dallas County races two years ago and record voter turnout in the March primary.

One of the paper's sources speculates that it may be a decade or more before area Democrats are truly competitive with Republicans.

In a state like Texas, where no Democratic presidential nominee has won since Jimmy Carter carried it in 1976, how much influence does an endorsement of McCain have? Some endorsements, in places where the race is perceived to be much closer, may have more influence on the outcome.

But what I think will truly influence the outcome is something I was reading earlier this morning — before "Meet the Press" came on.

A couple of days ago, Charles Blow wrote, in the New York Times, that he sees no plausible scenario in which McCain can win the election — "[u]nless Barack Obama slips up, Jeremiah Wright shows up or a serious national security emergency flares up."

His logic is simple and compelling.

"The wayward wizards of Wall Street delivered the election to Obama by pushing the economy to the verge of collapse, forcing leery voters to choose between their pocketbooks and their prejudices," he writes.

"McCain delivered it to Obama with his reckless pick of Sarah Palin. That stunt made everything that followed feel like a stunt, tarnishing McCain’s reputation and damaging his credibility so that when he went negative it backfired. And, some radical rabble among McCain’s supporters delivered it to Obama by mistaking his political rallies for lynch mobs.

"This perfect storm of poor judgments has set the stage for an Obama victory. It’s over."

NOTE: I'm going to wait a little while longer — to see if Obama commits a major gaffe, Wright returns to the campaign discussion or another Osama bin Laden video message pops up — but right now I expect to post my final presidential election prediction, state by state, on Tuesday, Oct. 28.

What I can tell you is that I am inclined to believe Blow when he says the financial disaster has forced the fence straddlers to "choose between their pocketbooks and their prejudices" — and their choice is likely to be Obama.

I think the jury is still out on the Palin selection, although her candidacy has become as much a media joke as Dan Quayle's was 20 years ago.

But, in 1988, voters picked Bush in spite of his running mate. It also helped that the Reagan economy was doing all right at the time.

I'll say this about Powell's interview on "Meet the Press." It has taken far too long for anyone to say this about Muslims in America.

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"I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, 'Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.' Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, 'He’s a Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists.' This is not the way we should be doing it in America."

Colin Powell

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With 16 days left in the campaign, this election is taking on the look of a foregone conclusion. But it's not over quite yet.

It seems to me, though, that, for a party that has relied on the religious right to provide the winning margin in elections for nearly three decades, it's appropriate that victory this time may depend on divine intervention.

Matchmaker, Matchmaker

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"The change that Obama talks about so much is not simply a change in this policy or that one. It is not fundamentally about lobbyists or Washington insiders. Obama envisions a change in the way we deal with one another in politics and government. His opponents may say this is empty, abstract rhetoric. In fact, it is hard to imagine how we are going to deal with the grave domestic and foreign crises we face without an end to the savagery and a return to civility in politics."

Chicago Tribune

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Speculation is running wild about whether former Secretary of State Colin Powell will issue an endorsement of one of the presidential candidates when he appears on NBC's "Meet the Press" tomorrow.

The speculation has spread and now includes foreign media as well as domestic.

Philip Sherwell of The Telegraph of London sounds like Tevye from "Fiddler on the Roof" as he leaps from one conclusion to the other.

"On the other hand ... "

To illustrate what I mean, Sherwell begins his article by observing "Colin Powell ... is expected to denounce 'ugly' personal attacks on Barack Obama and may endorse the Democrat for the nation's top job."

Sherwell then quotes Powell's former chief of staff as saying that Powell has bemoaned the "vitriol, bile and prejudice" in the campaign and "I'd expect him to talk about it."

But Sherwell also points out that Powell's ex-aide describes him as a "loyal soldier who owes a lot to some people in the Republican Party," which he concedes is "a factor that could mitigate against an endorsement by a man not prone to gesture politics."

In short, Sherwell speculates that a Powell endorsement of Obama is a definite maybe.

(While reading Sherwell's article, I was almost disappointed that I didn't hear a chorus singing, "Find me a find, catch me a catch ...")

There are a few genuine endorsements to talk about today.

• Perhaps the most significant comes from the Chicago Tribune.
  
  It may not seem especially surprising that the fifth-largest newspaper in the United States (with a circulation of nearly 1 million), which happens to serve the city where Obama makes his home, has endorsed the Democratic nominee.
  
  Until you realize that this is the first time in its 161-year history that the conservative Tribune has endorsed a Democrat for president.
  
  The paper was a strong advocate of the abolition of slavery, and it supported favorite son Abraham Lincoln when he sought the presidency in 1860. But it hasn't always endorsed Illinois politicians who ran for the nation's highest office. It did not support Illinois Gov. Adlai Stevenson when he ran against Republican Dwight Eisenhower in the 1950s.
  
  Supporting a Democratic presidential nominee is a new experience for the Tribune, but it doesn't always endorse the Republican nominee, either, as its editorial points out — although the examples it cites are endorsement editorials that were written by journalists several generations removed from the current editorial staff.
  
  In 1912, when former Republican President Theodore Roosevelt sought to return to the White House as the Progressive Party's candidate, the Tribune backed Roosevelt.
  
  And, in 1872, instead of supporting Republican President Ulysses S. Grant's bid for re-election, it endorsed the editor of the New York Tribune, Horace Greeley (at left), who ran as a Liberal Republican but was endorsed by the Democratic Party.
  
  Last spring, the Tribune endorsed both Obama and McCain in their parties' primaries, but the Tribune admits that it is "hard to figure John McCain these days" and asserts that he "failed in his most important executive decision" — when he picked Sarah Palin to be his running mate.
  
  "Give him credit for choosing a female running mate," writes the Tribune, "but he passed up any number of supremely qualified Republican women who could have served. ... McCain put his campaign before his country."
  
  In contrast, says the Tribune, "Obama chose a more experienced and more thoughtful running mate — he put governing before politicking."


• In comparison, I guess, the other two high-profile newspaper endorsements are neither surprising nor particularly historic.
  
  The Washington Post, for example, has a track record of supporting Democrats — although, for many years, late publisher Katharine Graham insisted on a policy of not endorsing presidential nominees.
  
  Since at least 2000, however, the Post has been endorsing presidential candidates — but, while conservatives often mention the Post and the New York Times as the joint Eastern apex of the so-called "liberal media bias" in American journalism, the truth is that the Post has endorsed some Republicans and taken conservative positions on some issues.
  
  But it lives up to expectations in its endorsement of Obama.
  
  "There are few public figures we have respected more over the years than Sen. John McCain," writes the Post, shedding crocodile tears. "Yet it is without ambivalence that we endorse Sen. Barack Obama for president."
  
  The Post also uses Palin as a scapegoat, saying "The choice is made easy in part by Mr. McCain's disappointing campaign, above all his irresponsible selection of a running mate who is not ready to be president."
  
  But, while she may be convenient for that role, that doesn't mean the Post might have endorsed McCain if he had chosen someone else for his ticket.
  
  And the Post recites the qualities it believes Obama possesses that make him the best choice. "He is deliberate but not indecisive; eloquent but a master of substance and detail; preternaturally confident but eager to hear opposing points of view. He has inspired millions of voters of diverse ages and races, no small thing in our often divided and cynical country. We think he is the right man for a perilous moment."


• In the eyes of its modern-day readers, the Los Angeles Times follows a liberal editorial policy, but it was not always so.
  
  When I wrote a paper in graduate school on the 1932 election (to which I referred in this blog last month), I studied the Times' coverage of the campaign — and the Times' editorial policies clearly were different in those days.
  
  Students of history know 1932 was the year Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt defeated President Herbert Hoover in a landslide. On Election Day, the Times' front page ran an item in a box above the fold with a headline advising readers "Where to Vote For Hoover."
  
  Most Angelenos (like most Americans) did not follow the Times' recommendation when they went to their polling places.
  
  Times have changed.
  
  And one of the things that has changed is the Times' long-standing ban on endorsing presidential candidates. The newspaper stopped endorsing presidential candidates during the Nixon presidency but is resuming the practice this year.
  
  Today's Los Angeles Times says it endorses Obama "without hesitation."
  
  And recent voting history suggests that California will be in the Democratic column in November.
  
  It appears likely that, with its first presidential endorsement in nearly 40 years, the Times will achieve an electoral symmetry with its readers in 2008 that it wasn't able to achieve three-quarters of a century ago.
  
  Palin, once again, takes the hit for the Republicans. The Times writes that the decision was "irresponsible ... [It] calls into question just what kind of thinking — if that's the appropriate word — would drive the White House in a McCain presidency."
  
  And the Times isn't bashful about borrowing the poetic style of its preferred candidate. Obama, the Times writes, "represents the nation as it is and as it aspires to be."

I don't know if Powell will endorse anyone tomorrow or not, but I do know there will be legitimate endorsements published in the nation's newspapers in the next couple of weeks.

Whether the so-called "liberal media bias" exists, the truth is — as statistics clearly show — that the majority of newspapers that endorse presidential candidates have tended to endorse Republicans over the years.

In the last half century, the exceptions to that rule have occurred when the Republican candidate was considered to be too extreme (1964) or out of touch with the public while presiding over a recession (1992).

Thus far in the 2008 general election campaign, Obama leads in newspaper endorsements by about a 3-to-1 margin. Obama also has been endorsed by a few magazines — The New Yorker, Vibe, Rolling Stone and Esquire.

But only 82 newspapers have endorsed a candidate so far, according to Editor & Publisher. More than 400 newspapers endorsed a candidate in 2004.

Clearly, many, many newspapers that usually endorse a presidential candidate have not done so yet.

Perhaps they're waiting to focus their attention — as political observers tell us the voting public does — after the World Series.

Will He or Won't He?

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The election of an African-American president “would be electrifying,” Powell told a George Washington University audience, "but at the same time [I have to] make a judgment here on which would be best for America."

CNN's Political Ticker

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Former Secretary of State Colin Powell is scheduled to appear on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday.

And there's a lot of talk about whether Powell will take the opportunity to endorse Barack Obama or John McCain.

Mike Allen speculates, on Politico.com, that Powell will endorse Obama's presidential campaign.

"The general’s camp is being coy about what he might or might not say on Sunday," Allen writes. "But some McCain advisers suspect, without being sure, that Powell will endorse Obama. 'It’s going to make a lot of news, and certainly be personally embarrassing for McCain,' a McCain official said. 'It comes at a time when we need momentum, and it would create momentum against us.'"

CNN's Alexander Mooney joins in with his speculation on Powell's intentions in CNN's Political Ticker blog.

Ann Althouse, a law professor and blogger, chimes in in her blog, "[W]hy else would they book him on the third-to-the-last show before the election?"

Well, NBC may want to get some insight from a former secretary of state about the world situation. The financial crisis has dominated news reports lately (and deservedly so), but the fighting goes on in Iraq and the problems with Iran and Korea — and other nations in the world — haven't gone away.

It's obvious that the next president will have to confront the financial crisis immediately, but he will also face an increasingly unpredictable international situation — especially in the Middle East.

Four years ago, Osama bin Laden caught nearly everyone by surprise by releasing a video taped message the weekend before the election.

In his message, bin Laden said he personally directed the Sept. 11 hijackers and said George W. Bush had been negligent prior to the attacks. Many pollsters reported that surveys indicated movement in Bush's direction after the video tape was aired.

Joseph Nye recalls, in the Financial Times, that bin Laden's 2004 message affected voters by reminding them of the Sept. 11 attacks.

Put in the context of the 2008 campaign, Nye writes, "Americans are transfixed by the aftermath of the September surprise in financial markets. Could there be a very different surprise coming in October?"

NBC may want to ask Powell what he believes the terrorist leader may do between now and the 2008 election. Will he do something similar in an attempt to influence the outcome?

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"There can be no doubt that Saddam Hussein has biological weapons and the capability to rapidly produce more, many more."

Colin Powell
Speech to the U.N. Security Council, Feb. 5, 2003

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Also, Powell has served the last three Republican presidents in high-profile positions, and he considered running against the last Democratic president — as a Republican.

All of which would make a Powell endorsement of Obama really big news.

But, beyond the 24-hour news cycle such an endorsement would surely dominate, how much value would it have?

I guess that may depend — at least in part — on the outcome of the corruption trial of Sen. Ted Stevens.

Just last week, Powell testified in court on Stevens' behalf, saying that the Alaska senator had a "sterling" character and was "a trusted individual whose word you could rely on."

If Stevens is acquitted before the election, Powell's endorsement might have some benefit for its recipient.

But if he is convicted — or if the trial is still being conducted when the voters go to the polls — Powell's endorsement might not mean much.

Personally, I can't see the man who urged the United Nations (and, in the process, persuaded millions of fence-sitting Americans) to support an invasion of Iraq choosing to endorse Obama.

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"I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. He is a brutal man. A ruthless man. A man who butchers his own people to secure his own power. ... The world, and the Iraqi people, would be better off without him. But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors ... and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history."

Illinois State Sen. Barack Obama
Oct. 2, 2002

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Nor, for that matter, can I see Obama, who has made a point of emphasizing his opposition to the war, welcoming Powell's endorsement.

Unless he does so (cynically) on racial grounds.

And, if that's the case, is it still off the table to discuss Obama's association with Rev. Jeremiah Wright?