Life In Wartime

Here in Virginia, it sure doesn’t feel like wartime. I suppose in Israel it does, if it doesn’t always. A missile does get in there every so often. And surely it does in Iran. We are now in the unenviable situation of having a leader who likes to demonstrate his power by abusing relatively powerless, smaller nations, with a Congress that is inclined to let him do as he likes.

I want to object to what may be the most common Democratic criticism: that there is no “plan.” There was a plan. It was to flex muscles, kill some people, and expect no meaningful opposition.

The Administration doesn’t much care what comes next. If Iran manages to inflict damage, or dares to do so, the U.S. can just repeat the cycle: throw bombs, gloat, and walk away. There will be no risky boots on the ground. If there is no overt retaliation, Trump claims he whipped their ass, end of story. His prior claim that he already wrecked Iran’s nuclear program is never cited by his loopy supporters. He’s covered either way. He accomplishes whatever he says he did.

Nor will there be any “regime change.” That’s another misnomer. The U.S. can eliminate personalities, but there are always more who will step up. The regime will live on, as it does in Venezuela. The attacks will bind the Iranian population closer to their crappy rulers. This is well understood on all sides. Regime change is not the plan.

Among the left of the left, there is the usual griping about our “one-party system.” To be sure, I fully expect the Democrats, as a party, to roll over for this war. Our obligation, however, is to raise enough of a fuss as to induce one of those parties to put up some friction, if not obstacles. To reject that job for the sake of a pure posture of alienation from any such influence is political abstentionism. It is radical in form, submissive in essence. There is no law that says you have to be political, but the laws of good taste dictate that you not claim to be political while sleeping through any efforts at political activism.

We can’t know for sure if a President Harris would have gone down the same road. My guess is she would have dithered, as she did in so many other ways. That could have been disastrous, but it might have delayed the disaster. One of my pet peeves is how Bill Clinton’s dithering sanctions on Iraq greased the skids for George Bush’s calamitous invasion.

There is no ambiguity about where we are now. I ranted repeatedly that denying a vote to Harris would facilitate further lethal attacks on Muslims in Yemen, Lebanon, and Iran. Nor would there be any additional constraints on the Israeli regime in Gaza or the West Bank. Now we have the proof: there is no comparison in the scale of U.S. government aggression perpetrated under Trump 2.0 vs. Biden. Too many think yelling ‘Biden funded genocide’ and avoiding politics is some kind of politics.

A slightly better criticism from Democrats is that the attack went forward without a vote by Congress. Procedure looks like a weak place to plant oneself, but it does provide a grain of political utility: a Congressional vote on the campaign, which would surely be approved along with a dozen of so Democratic senators led by Cryin’ Chuck, forces members of Congress to go on record. That isn’t much, but it is something. It’s how, for instance, AOC could end up as the senator from New York state and we could get a different, better leader of Senate Democrats. The Democratic caucus in Congress is a wondrous mountain of jelly to behold, but absent primary campaigns and mass mobilization, its incumbents are our only handle on policy.

A few other bits of political correction, for any who need it. Biden and Harris had four years to get Obama’s Iran deal reconstituted. That would have precluded the current antics of Trump with respect to Iran. So shut up, Kamala.

The other annoying thing is the purported fuss over the departure of the president from the celebrated Constitutional prerogative of Congress to make war. Why do people keep harping on that? This departure of course did not at all originate with Trump, or even with Republican administrations. If you care to look back, even all the way to the 1960s, it appears to be a total fiction. Trump’s innovation is to extend absolute presidential powers to fiscal policy.

Why be a Member of Congress under these circumstances? I guess, for the hookers and blow.