A Thinking Reed

"Man is but a reed, the most feeble thing in nature, but he is a thinking reed" – Blaise Pascal

Where’s the anti-war mojo on the Left?

With all the hype around the Ron Paul candidacy (admittedly still a long shot), I’ve wondered why there hasn’t been a comparable anti-war insurgency on the Left. Why, for instance, hasn’t Dennis Kucinich‘s campaign taken off? Is it that Democratic voters aren’t motivated primarily by the war, or is it that they regard the top tier candidates as “anti-war enough”?

None of the “big three” are calling for anything like immediate withdrawal from Iraq, nor have they repudiated the Bush Doctrine in principle, however much they may have criticized the conduct of the Bush administration. Clinton and Edwards have both made hawkish statements about Iran, and Obama got flak for suggesting we might need to invade Pakistan. All in all, I don’t think you can say that the Dems are set to field anything like a “peace candidate” in the fall. So why has the base been so quiet about this? It’s doubly odd considering that you had a significant anti-war challenge in 2004 (namely, Howard Dean) at a time when the war was considerably more popular than it is now.

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7 responses to “Where’s the anti-war mojo on the Left?”

  1. kip

    I’m not sure I understand what you’re getting at. Ron Paul has set some amazing records as far as raising money is concerned, but he’s not turning that money into votes.
    Also, I doubt the Democrats want to pin their hopes on a guy who says he saw a flying saucer!

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  2. Lee

    Right – Ron Paul isn’t going to win the nomination. But on the left the question is: given that there’s (presumably) a larger anti-war base, why hasn’t that translated into an anti-war challenge to the generally hawkish and centrist frontrunners at least as robust as Paul’s? After all, you’d think there’d be more demand for it in the Donkey party.

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  3. gaius sempronius gracchus

    The fundamental problem, of course, is that the voter base does not get to choose the candidates. They can only choose among the candidates presented.

    Within each party, the initial selection of people to present as candidates in the first place is done by the money guys and the pundits and the party professionals and even the candidates – think of Mike Gravel – themselves.

    By elites, mostly, in other words; but, in any case, not by the people.

    And that initial selection not made by the people determines not only what individuals will run, but what positions will be represented.

    You are wondering why a position very popular among Democratic voters, insisting on withdrawal from Iraq as soon as possible, is not represented among the front runners – or why the front runners are not those who do represent it.

    You do not ask, but easily could, why certain other positions very popular among Democratic voters are not represented among those running at all.

    As to the matter of the war, The Nation supports Kucinich, as do other hotbeds of leftish punditry.

    He has at least as much voter support among the Democrats as Ron Paul among the Republicans.

    Additional Democratic anti-war sentiment appears for Richardson or Gravel.

    But you are right that the mass of Democratic voters is, as a whole, anti-war in comparison with the mass of Republican voters, who appear in one degree or manner or another actually pro-war.

    And you rightly wonder where the heck those voters are. Why aren’t they behind Kucinich, Gravel, or Richardson?

    My impression is that the broad mass of Democrats, while opposed to at least the fighting in Iraq and wanting out pretty quick, are not now and never have been quite as far left as Kucinich on either the question of American military globalism, or social issues, or even the question just how to provide universal health coverage for all Americans.

    It is likely that, on the bulk of these issues, they are further left than the Clintons – those free-trading, NATO-expanding champions of military-industrial complex-feeding liberal military globalismo.

    And that they are easily as far left as Edwards or Obama.

    But they are not as far left as Dennis.

    And, into the bargain, many do not regard him as personally a plausible candidate or president, in any case.

    Personality? Character? Appearance? Hard to say. But it’s true, all the same.

    So if not Kucinich, why are not the masses of Democrats behind either Gravel or Richardson?

    I think, to most of them, Richardson seems lightweight and, this one particular war apart, not that much different from the front runners.

    And, to be frank, Gravel seems too old, sometimes demented, and a plain crank on taxes.

    That leaves Kucinich too far left and nobody else with any real appeal in favor of a quick withdrawal.

    There just isn’t a good candidate to represent that extremely popular view.

    On the other hand, my own guess is that, while Kucinich is too far left, Clinton is actually further to the right on many issues than the party base, and not just on this war issue.

    There is much support for shrinkage of America’s military and military commitments among Democratic voters, though perhaps not for anything quite so thorough as a complete withdrawal to the Western Hemisphere, north of the Equator.

    That places them further left than any front runner, and especially than Hillary, on this question; though not so far left as Gravel and Kucinich.

    And there is much unhappiness with free trade, for instance; and I think the Democratic voters could easily be sold an outright protectionist approach if anybody would try to sell it.

    Failing that, there is support for candidates who at least appear – however hypocritically – more unhappy with the actual results of free trade for America and American workers, and for those who support any efforts at all to control it or limit it, even if only with “fair trade” restrictions.

    Similarly, though generally willing to accept reasonable plans to legalize most current illegals, the Democratic voters, as we saw during the debates, are very unhappy about this whole issue.

    Many, and I think probably most, would likely support or at least accept shutting and locking the door on further immigration, legal or not, for the foreseeable future.

    Much like the question of trade, this is a case where the money and the power, and the pundits and the candidates as well, refuse to represent the urgent interests and desires of the party base.

    I am guessing, to be frank, that the mass of Democrats, like me, agree there is a need for radical efforts to control global warming.

    But I think they would and do refuse to go along with efforts to intentionally cause de-industrialization of America and privilege investment and development elsewhere that are presented and sold as racially or nationally or regionally fair or just environmental treaties.

    That was and remains the problem with the Kyoto approach.

    I and, I think, most Democratic voters would and should oppose a federal approach that would require costly environmental safeguards on steelmaking in Pennsylvania but lesser safeguards in Kentucky.

    In fact, we are much distressed to see states and cities and local communities all over the country acquiescing in an intra-national race to the bottom, selling out consumers and workers and the environment – and the citizenry in general – to become more “business friendly” and “competitive.”

    Likewise, Americans including Democrats, and especially working class Democrats, oppose treaties that would impose costly environmental protections on US producers while waiving such protections for others.

    But they would readily support treaties imposing demanding constraints uniformly on production, throughout the world, without specially privileging production anywhere.

    And that very likely leaves the bulk of Democratic voters wholly without representation in their own party on three matters of great importance to them: immigration, trade, and efforts to accelerate disinvestment in America and the migration of capital and jobs to the third world that are disguised as efforts to protect the environment.

    In all three cases, while the right opposes their interests and political desires where this can be done to privilege those of corporations and the rich, the left opposes them in order, at least according to their intentions, to privilege those of foreigners both as they work abroad and as they flood our labor market.

    As I said at the outset, you wonder why the Democratic slate does not effectively represent the presumed strong and broad anti-war sentiment of the Democratic voters.

    But you could wonder, as well, why it does not represent them in these other matters, at all.

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  4. Marvin

    I don’t think that you’re remembering Dean’s candidacy accurately. In 2004, Dean ran as someone who was opposed to the war at first, but now that we were in it, we need to win it. This put Dean where Henry Kissinger was on the Kosovo campaign in 1999. And were he to reprise that stance today, it would put him in the GOP primary.

    In fact all the frontrunners have called for a withdrawal from Iraq; the only difference is whether the withdrawal is stampede style (Richardson) or a bit more orderly (as in HRC’s call for the removal of one combat brigade per month).

    Barak Obama has not only wondered aloud about invading Pakistan, but has also called for the abolition of all nuclear weapons. The latter is not a centrist position.

    And, in fact, all the leading candidates are rather far to the left of where Bill Clinton and Al Gore were in the late 90s. A Democratic Presient will once again take a stab at universal health care coverage. A Democratic President will likely enact some form of carbon tax to restrain global warming. A Democratic President will raise marginal income tax rates and preserve estate taxes.

    As for Dennis Kucinich, it has everything to do with the fact that he’s a kook. An antiwar kook is still a kook.

    The Democratic Party could tack far to the left on war, the enviroment and health care and still not reach where I am politically, but most people are not where I am politically. So I am satisfied that they’re closer to me than the alternative. And so are most Democrats. Which is why there will be no blood on the convention floor this sumer.

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  5. Lee

    You guys are right that the reason Kucinich hasn’t gotten more traction has to do with more than his position on the war. My question would probably be better put as “Why hasn’t some mainstream dovish candidate emerged given the presumed demand for such among Democratic voters?” E.g. why not a clamor for a Russ Feingold candidacy or somesuch?

    I think Gaius is right that a lot of Dem voters (not to mention the country as a whole) are to the “right” of someone like Kucinich on issues of war and peace. The Iraq war is probably regarded even by many “anti-war” Dems as an aberration brought on by Bush’s mendacity/incompetence rather than as a particularly egregious example of an ongoing pattern of U.S. interventionism.

    Marvin, you’re surely correct that I’m mischaracterizing the Dean campaign; I guess I remembered him as being more strident than he actually was – maybe I was confusing tone and substance in my foggy memories of four years ago.

    Regarding the current frontrunners, I could be wrong here, but my impression is that their positions are probably better characterized as “redeployment” rather than “withdrawal.” IIRC, all have talked of the need to retain troops in the region, if not Iraq itself, to fight AQI, suppress civil conflict, and defend our massive “embassy.” This may be the best we can hope for, but I’d certainly prefer a president who was further to the “left” on withdrawal, even if events would force him/her to modify that stance once in office. Someone already committed to an ongoing U.S. presence will likely be pushed further “rightward” by circumstances, not to mention the D.C. consensus of perpetual U.S. management of the globe.

    Don’t get me wrong: I still think any of the current Dem frontrunners would be preferable to any of the Republicans, but I would’ve hoped we’d be further along by now in rethinking our penchant for “benevolent global hegemony.”

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  6. Gaius Sempronius Gracchus

    Feingold had a big following among Democratic peaceniks, and I think he would have been a much stronger candidate than Kucinich because he’s (a) not as far left as DK on defense though he’s further left than the current top three, and (b) not as far left as DK on other issues though he’s further left than Hillary, and (c) personally more credible and attractive than DK by quite a bit.

    I think he made a mistake deciding he could do more for the anti-war cause in the Senate than running for President.

    All he can do in the Senate is show the flag for the eternally losing side.

    As to your point about “redeployment,” you are correct.

    And, in truth, I think the bulk of Democratic voters would prefer real withdrawal without leaving bases and without so many commitments to intervene in case X, Y, or Z.

    But they are stuck somewhere in the middle between Kucinich (too globally and locally anti-interventionist) and the top three (too globally and locally interventionist).

    Perhaps where Feingold would have been, had he chosen to run.

    As to far along we might all be by now, just consider the foreign policy position of Bloomberg, the anointed bi-partisan, centrist candidate of some establishment boneheads or other.

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  7. Gaius Sempronius Gracchus

    That should be, “as to how far along we might all be by now,” of course.

    Sorry.

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