Obama Makes His Move

Barack Obama gave a major speech today about terrorism, and the takeaway that most of the media is getting is that it was a tough speech which argues for the possibility of strikes inside Pakistan to take out Al Qaeda leaders whether or not the Pakistani government authorizes them, which by the way is the right thing to say. And it was a tough speech. But it was also a speech that talks about the fundamental problems with the foreign policy of the Bush years.

But then everything changed.

We did not finish the job against al Qaeda in Afghanistan. We did not develop new capabilities to defeat a new enemy, or launch a comprehensive strategy to dry up the terrorists' base of support. We did not reaffirm our basic values, or secure our homeland.

Instead, we got a color-coded politics of fear. Patriotism as the possession of one political party. The diplomacy of refusing to talk to other countries. A rigid 20th century ideology that insisted that the 21st century's stateless terrorism could be defeated through the invasion and occupation of a state. A deliberate strategy to misrepresent 9/11 to sell a war against a country that had nothing to do with 9/11 [...]

The political winds were blowing in a different direction. The President was determined to go to war. There was just one obstacle: the U.S. Congress. Nine days after I spoke, that obstacle was removed. Congress rubber-stamped the rush to war, giving the President the broad and open-ended authority he uses to this day. With that vote, Congress became co-author of a catastrophic war. And we went off to fight on the wrong battlefield, with no appreciation of how many enemies we would create, and no plan for how to get out.

This is smart, because it puts the critique against invading Iraq in the larger context of the overall struggle against Islamic radicalism. It comes close to John Edwards' critique of the "war on terror" as a "bumper sticker" without using those explicit terms. It casts a new response to 9/11 as one concerned with fundamental human rights and moral authority for America as much as military action, a classic balance of hard and soft power. It also critiques our continued stay in Iraq as a continued distraction in the overall terror war, vowing to redeploy while being honest about his belief in residual forces there to fight Al Qaeda (I tend to disagree with that portion). Here's essentially the precis of the policy changes:

It is time to turn the page. When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won, with a comprehensive strategy with five elements: getting out of Iraq and on to the right battlefield in Afghanistan and Pakistan; developing the capabilities and partnerships we need to take out the terrorists and the world's most deadly weapons; engaging the world to dry up support for terror and extremism; restoring our values; and securing a more resilient homeland.

It should come as no surprise that this hews closely to Samantha Power's excellent New York Times op-ed, where she avers that "the war-on-terror frame has obscured more than it has clarified." Power is a foreign policy advisor to Obama's campaign, and that fact alone causes me to give him a long look.

Really, this speech is an example of Obama's continued push to press the advantage from his dust-up with Hillary Clinton over proper diplomacy and negotiation. By the way the YouTube questioner who asked about diplomacy has come out as agreeing with Obama's answer, which offered a break from the failed Washington consensus of the past that says you must punish your enemies by not talking to them and being bold and tough enough to negotiate. It's telling that most of the Republican candidates have come out on the question against Obama. Obama has gotten the better of that question by wrapping it in a larger critique of the cautious, nervous Democratic leadership that refuses to be ruled by anything but fear.

One difference between Obama and Clinton does not seem to me to have been stressed enough. They are of different Democratic generations. Clinton is from the traumatized generation; Obama isn't. Clinton has internalized to her bones the 1990s sense that conservatism is ascendant, that what she really believes is unpopular, that the Republicans have structural, latent power of having a majority of Americans on their side. Hence the fact that she reeks of fear, of calculation, of focus groups, of triangulation. She might once have had ideals keenly felt; she might once have actually relished fighting for them and arguing in thier defense. But she has not been like that for a very long time. She has political post-traumatic stress disorder. She saw her view of feminism gutted in the 1992 campaign; she saw her healthcare plan destroyed by what she saw as a VRWC; she remains among the most risk-averse of Democrats on foreign policy and in the culture wars [...]

Obama is different. He wasn't mugged by the 1980s and 1990s as Clinton was. He doesn't carry within him the liberal self-hatred and self-doubt that Clinton does. The traumatized Democrats fear the majority of Americans are bigoted, know-nothing, racist rubes from whom they need to conceal their true feelings and views. The non-traumatized Democrats are able to say what they think, make their case to potential supporters and act, well, like Republicans acted in the 1980s and 1990s. The choice between Clinton and Obama is the choice between a defensive crouch and a confident engagement. It is the choice between someone who lost their beliefs in a welter of fear; and someone who has faith that his worldview can persuade a majority.

The progressive blogosphere arose out of disgust with that political post-traumatic stress disorder. We refuse to keep in that defensive crouch. And if Obama continues to move in this direction, acting bold and confident, he will receive a great deal of support. It doesn't mean he will win; in fact, his drift toward Edwards' point of view may end up knocking both of them out. But it's clear that there's a legitimate choice to be made between the Clinton-era worldview of the past and the Obama-era worldview of the future.

UPDATE: Obama's speech today is right in line with the civil rights pledge that a coalition including Human Rights Watch is urging Presidential candidates to sign. It's a hopeful vision.

We are in the early stages of a long struggle. Yet since 9/11, we've heard a lot about what America can't do or shouldn't do or won't even try. We can't vote against a misguided war in Iraq because that would make us look weak, or talk to other countries because that would be a reward. We can't reach out to the hundreds of millions of Muslims who reject terror because we worry they hate us. We can't protect the homeland because there are too many targets, or secure our people while staying true to our values. We can't get past the America of Red and Blue, the politics of who's up and who's down.

That is not the America that I know.

The America I know is the last, best hope for that child looking up at a helicopter. It's the country that put a man on the moon; that defeated fascism and helped rebuild Europe. It's a country whose strength abroad is measured not just by armies, but rather by the power of our ideals, and by our purpose to forge an ever more perfect union at home.

That's the America I know. We just have to act like it again to write that next chapter in the American story.