Maybe It's Not A Lack Of Courage

Alec Dubro

June 01, 2007

The outraged op-eds, blog pieces and columns attacking the congressional Democrats for lack of political courage on the war funding bill could reach from here to their home districts, and probably do. But as soon as we all simmer down, maybe we ought to consider that a factor other than simple invertebracy is at play here.

Begin by taking a look at the character of the Democratic Party. As we all know from watching Fox News, the Democratic Party is the home of spineless surrender-monkeys, people who wouldn’t go to war if we were invaded. Exactly how this image grew is perplexing, for at no time in its history has the Democratic Party been antiwar. In fact, until the Nixon administration, many Republicans derided the Democrats as “the war party.” World Wars I and II, Korea and Vietnam all began under Democratic administrations.

It’s true that during the Vietnam War, a peace faction arose in the party and carried George McGovern to the nomination. But the peaceniks had a short and tenuous hold on the party apparatus, although community-level Democrats were frequently led by liberals with at least some antiwar backing. Jimmy Carter, attacked by the right as a milquetoast who gave away the Panama Canal, was a military man who formulated the Carter Doctrine under which we continue to intervene in the Persian Gulf region. The next Democratic president, Bill Clinton, used as much military force as he thought he could get away with.

The point is that the Democrats are very much a part of the United States, and will not part company with the foundational planks of the country. To put it bluntly, the U.S. is, and has been from the outset, an aggressive, imperial, commercially-driven, religiously-inspired military power. Although isolationist and pacifist politics have held sway for short periods of time when the U.S. contemplated war against white people, they have never stopped a war aimed at the rest of the world. Sure, people objected to the Mexican War, to the Philippine War, to the invasions of the Caribbean and Central America, but it never stopped them. They stopped when they were either won, or victory was impossible, but not before. In case you were going to object, in 1898 Spain was not considered white by most Americans.

War, like the white supremacy to which it is linked, defies any glib and easy remedies. It also defies the intentions of liberals campaigning for office. For instance, Obama and now Clinton are opposing the continuation of this war—at least in its present incarnation. But ask them, as a condition of candidacy or office, to propose serious steps that would change the American military from a worldwide assault force to a modest army capable of repelling foreign invasions. In all likelihood, they wouldn’t even evade the proposal, they’d just dismiss it as fantasy. Maybe Dennis Kucinich on the left and Ron Paul on the right would entertain the idea, but that’s why they’re not likely to sit in the White House.

American aggressiveness is not just the product of venal politicians. Its tenets are shared by a majority of the people, most of the time—although at the moment, their warlike spirit may be lagging somewhat. Enthusiasm for the imposition of American wants across the globe are woven into the commercial, social and political life of the country. It’s part of the culture. It’s not going to be exorcised by a few dynamic and charismatic politicians, no matter how deeply their antiwar sentiments go. They would have to take on nearly every power center in American, including most of the religious community and much of the labor movement.

To seriously oppose war-making—as opposed to curtailing one particular war—would take a change of national character that is not on the horizon. It must begin with those of us who truly want change—and demands more than urging other people to change. We have first to admit that whatever we’ve been doing hasn’t been working. We have to search more deeply and reconsider long-held assumptions. We have to take steps we have not yet envisioned.

Ending the warfare state will require much more than strategies. Much more than elections. And it will not be accomplished by excoriating elected officials—however good that may feel.