From the Land of Wish and Dream

Someday, the Bull Moose really must visit the planet Earth. In a blog post running down the left for their continued partisan hatred of the President (here is the link to Jon Chait's excellent Case For Bush Hatred), the Moose calls upon the President to do the following when it comes to Iran:

For the sake of the country and the ongoing war on terror, the President should form a genuine government of national unity. A thorough house-cleaning should be followed by appointments of Democrats and Independents for important cabinet and sub-cabinet positions. Far more is at stake here than the fates of political parties - the security of the country is in the balance and it demands credible, bi-partisan leadership.

This is a dangerous world and our enemies will not wait until we put our political house in order. A confrontation with Iraq is not inevitable, but petty and irresponsible partisanship will tell the Iranians that they have nothing to fear from the threats from the U.S. The President should engage and involve and inform the Democratic leadership about any plans about the Iranian threat.

Okay, let's see how many impossible things the Bull Moose believed before breakfast this time.

"The President should form a genuine government of national unity."

At no point has George W. Bush ever shown the slightest interest in national unity. Firing up his political base while alienating the center and left has been his method of governance from the beginning, and, as we've discovered, the only ways Bush ever changes his mind are if a billionaire needs a new stone lion for his villa or if Jack and Rexella Van Impe tell him it'll bring him one step closer to fighting the Dark One in the desert. His idea of comprimise is to say, "Okay, I get what I want, and you get to stand next to me and look happy about it." No Democrat with two good eyes and a pulse would trust George W. Bush enough to form a unity government with him. This doesn't exclude Joe Lieberman, of course.

"A thorough house-cleaning should be followed by appointments of Democrats and Independents for important cabinet and sub-cabinet positions."

Not only would no Democrat consent to form a government with Bush, but Bush would never consent to a political house cleaning. The people who would need to be cleaned out to change the direction of our foreign policy--Rumsfeld, Cheney, et. al.--know where all the bodies are buried. Bush can't afford to alienate them. They're too closely hardwired to the GOP power structure. Besides, Democrats and Independents might ask all kinds of inconvenient questions, and we all know what Bush does to people who do that.

"Far more is at stake here than the fates of political parties - the security of the country is in the balance and it demands credible, bi-partisan leadership."

The security of the country is in the balance? Because Iran managed to employ 180 centrifuges to slightly enrich a quantity of uranium far too small to put together even a tiny nuclear weapon? Wake me when they have 10,000 centrifuges and I might make a note to be scared.

In reality, we could help along our national security a lot more if we spent our energies securing Russia's loosely guarded nuclear arsenal, spending money on port inspections, and making sure no one puts a bullet in our friend, Pakistani dictator Pervez Musharraf. Not that Bush is doing all that much about any of these things.

As for credible bi-partisan leadership, please spare me. Some people continue to succumb to the myth that there are magical leaders out there who will transform America from a screaming match to a singalong. George Bush tried that, but, like every other "uniter not divider" in history, his idea of unity is that everyone agrees to do whatever George W. Bush wants. Those who don't hate America, don't take its security seriously, are objectively pro-terrorist, or whatever. That held the public imagination for a while, but the smears seem less potent now that we've lost a few thousand troops and the city of New Orleans.

The history of democracy has been the history of one long angry fight about who can do what to whom and under what circumstances. And I like it that way. When I see a group of MPs in some parliament insulting each other and hurling fists, I know that country is okay. What's scary is when the argument stops. Singalongs are bad, bad things. I'm sure that Russian citizens felt a need to brace themselves when, in 1929, all the votes of the Politburo starting coming out unanimous. (Ah, Stalin, the ultimate in unity government.)

A little something about me. I don't even like to feel united with people I agree with. I may go to the protest march to support a cause, but I won't chant the slogans and I won't hold anyone's hand. I'll even go so far as to make sure I'm walking at my own pace, because I don't do lockstep. I reserve the right to conclude, at any time, that anyone is completely full of shit.

Boxers touch gloves before and after the game as a sign of sportsmanship; but during the game, I want haymakers and blood. Members of congress should be the same.

"This is a dangerous world and our enemies will not wait until we put our political house in order."

Actually, Iran will have to wait until they can actually do something with their uranium. In the meantime, we can expect them to release a lot of scary sounding reports in an attempt to expand their influence. Our best response would be to stay cool. Even in our enfeebled state--thanks, George--we're still tougher and more widely admired than the Iranians. They're the molehill; we're the mountain. The only way we can blow this is if we lose our heads and start doing stupid stuff. Will Bush do something stupid in the next three years? Gee, what are the odds?

"A confrontation with Iraq is not inevitable, but petty and irresponsible partisanship will tell the Iranians that they have nothing to fear from the threats from the U.S."

Actually, the lion's share of our military forces being stuck in Iraq tells the Iranians they have nothing to fear from our threats. The Iranian regime surely knows that our military has recruiting problems. They know that their terrain makes it much harder for U.S. troops to invade Iran than it was to invade Iraq. The Iranians know that they can conceal their facilities from air strikes. And they know that any U.S. attack on Iran would drive the rest of the Muslim world insane and jeaprodize U.S. troops still in Iraq. And don't forget how helpful this little dick fight is to the Iranian regime. It busies giddy Iranian minds with a massive foreign quarrel, and it allows the regime to blame all of Iran's problems on the west generally and on the U.S. in particular. How do they know this? TV.

"The President should engage and involve and inform the Democratic leadership about any plans about the Iranian threat."

And when he does, magic pixies will crawl out of my butt.