Stop Beating Around The Bush
The election is finally upon us, which means all you mythical undecided voters are going to have to get off the fence. Our own William Broyles and Paul Burka have known for months who they’re supporting and why.
TO: Bill
FROM: Paul
September 27, 9:19 p.m.
I read your online essay about why you were joining with other Texas writers, artists, and musicians to oppose the reelection of George W. Bush, and while your writing is as eloquent as ever, I thought the case you made for John Kerry was ultimately unconvincing. It was based almost entirely on his performance in Vietnam and its aftermath. You and I are old friends, and I know what a pivotal role your own service in Vietnam played in your life, but I can’t understand what Kerry’s war record—or, for that matter, Bush’s lack of one—has to do with why either man should or should not be president today. I don’t think that the average voter cares. I respect Kerry’s war record, and I detest the scurrilous campaign to discredit it, but it’s not a sufficient reason to vote for him. Here we are, a couple of days before the first debate, and Kerry has yet to provide a rationale for why he should be president except that he is the UnBush. He squandered his chance at the Democratic convention to define the central issues in the election and to define himself, and so the Republicans did both for him: The central issue is terrorism and Kerry is weak. I agree on both counts. I wrote him off when his so-called plan for the war on terrorism in his acceptance speech was a bland “As president, I will fight a smarter, more effective war on terror.”
Not that I was ever going to vote for him anyway—for two reasons. One is that I like George W. Bush. I observed him at close range when he was governor, and I thought he did a great job. The Bush-Bullock-Laney years were what politics ought to be: leaders from opposite sides working together in the public interest. It’s hard to vote against somebody I admire, even if I disagree with some of his policies as president. I still can’t believe he put the kibosh on stem cell research.
The other reason is more substantive. Like it or not, we are living in a time that requires the use of American military power. The world economy is dependent—because of oil—on the region of the world that has the least freedom, the least political stability, the least regard for human progress, and the most radical ideology. It is obvious to me that Kerry, and especially his party, is uncomfortable with the unilateral use of American power. Maybe Bush and his party are too comfortable with it, but if that is the choice, then I have to choose Bush.
This is what we in America should be talking about, not Vietnam. The biggest mistake Kerry has made is to focus on what he and Bush did more than thirty years ago instead of on what he would do as president and what Bush has done and would do. I’m sure that Karl Rove would have paid for the airtime for Kerry to attack Bush’s record in the National Guard instead of his record as commander in chief. So, Bill, here’s what I’m wondering. Who are you more angry with today—my candidate or your candidate? Bush or the UnBush?
TO: Paul
FROM: Bill
September 28, 3:27 p.m.
Let me get this straight. Your number one argument for voting for Bush is that you like him? Amid all the great issues of war and peace that are at stake, you offer us a rationale that doesn’t mean anything to anyone but you. Well, I know the president too: My daughter and his twins were in the same classes at Austin High; he kept up with my son David’s high school athletic career; we even long ago dated some of the same women. There is no doubt he has a great talent for personal connections and can be a very likable guy. But that’s not a good reason to vote for him. I “liked” Jimmy Carter. He was a man of sincere Christian faith, a veteran, a small-business man, a Southerner who had moved to heal racial divisions. But even though I am a lifelong Democrat, I voted against him in 1980 and for Ronald Reagan, a man with whom I had little in common politically. Why? Because in my opinion, Jimmy Carter had failed at foreign policy and at managing the economy; therefore, he did not deserve another term of office. Neither does Bush. That’s why we have elections. To hold the people in power accountable for their actions.
You, of all people, who has followed politics for forty years, who has always been suspicious of ideology, who has always seen politics as the art of building alliances, should be the loudest voice against not just the substance of Bush’s failures but the style of them. Your man has failed utterly, and the stakes are much higher than with Carter and Reagan. Bush promised to be a uniter, not a divider; he has divided America. He was given a chance through the tragedy of 9/11 to unite the world behind the effort to end terrorism; instead, he has done the unthinkable: Through arrogance and incompetence and naive ideology he has left us all but alone in that fight. He promised to be the education president; he has gutted his own No Child Left Behind Act. On every domestic issue, from health care to the environment, he has left America worse than he found it. He came in with a budget surplus; he has given us gigantic deficits as far as the eye can see. The cost of his misconceived and mismanaged war in Iraq now stands at over one thousand American lives and will soon reach $200 billion. Those lives are irreplaceable. That $200 billion—TWO HUNDRED BILLION!!!—could have been spent making our lives better and safer here at home.
As Bush himself wrote about the war in Vietnam, he finally turned against it when it was clear there was no plan for victory, no clear mission, and no exit strategy. I submit all three are true for Iraq. And the obsession with Iraq has distracted us from the real war, the one on terrorism. The president and his allies have poisoned political life in this country: They deliberately paint anyone against them as anti-Christian and anti-American. They have slimed three Vietnam veterans: John McCain, Max Cleland, and now John Kerry. They will say and do anything to win.
But I am just as angry at Kerry and his campaign as I am at Bush. There is a strong case, a powerful case, to be made against the president. Kerry isn’t making that case. When Dick Cheney says the terrorists want Kerry to win, instead of whining that Cheney isn’t being fair and how mean it is to say that kind of thing, Kerry should be hitting back. It’s the president who has played into the terrorists’ hands. It’s the president who has made us less safe. It’s the president who has . . . You get the idea. Kerry should be arguing that it is unconscionable to leave our troops isolated in besieged bases in the midst of no-go zones that have been ceded to terrorists. Kerry should be saying, “Mr. President, put in enough troops to do the job and win, or bring them home. Don’t waste their patriotism and their sacrifice on half measures.” But he’s not. He seems so caught up in focus-group nuances that the clear, tough message isn’t getting made. There is still time to make it, but not much.
So it doesn’t matter if I “like” Kerry or Bush. It’s who would do better the next four years. Bush has failed. We need to give the other guys a chance. They couldn’t do worse.
TO: Bill
FROM: Paul
September 29, 4:53 p.m.
So I am supposed to be for John Kerry just because a war is going badly and the country is divided? I used to think that way once upon a time. It was 1968, and a war was going badly, and the country was divided, and I decided that the Johnson administration—represented by Hubert Humphrey, LBJ’s vice president, as the Democratic nominee—didn’t deserve my vote. And so I voted for Richard Nixon. Stupid, stupid, stupid. It was the worst vote of my life. And what happened? The war continued to go badly, and the country continued to be divided badly, and the man I voted for violated his oath to uphold the Constitution and laws of the United States. I learned my lesson. Like you, I was a Carter voter in 1976 who voted for Ronald Reagan in 1980. But I did so not only because I thought Carter had failed but also because I believed Reagan would succeed. I have seen nothing from Kerry in this campaign that leads me to believe that he can successfully lead this country.
TO: Paul
FROM: Bill
September 30, 7:13 p.m.
You keep holding Kerry to standards you don’t apply to Bush. What has Bush shown in this campaign? What are his plans and programs? You can only claim Kerry might mess up. We know Bush has. And don’t feel so bad about supporting Nixon. We wouldn’t be in this fix if the Republicans of today were Nixon Republicans: the ones who passed the Environmental Protection Act, respected our allies, built bridges to our adversaries, and continued a strong legacy on civil rights, housing, health care, and education. If what you care about for your children in the future is being sure there is a ban on gay marriage, then today’s Republicans are your party. But if you care about good education, clean air and water, cops on the streets, decent health care even for the poor, and a strong economy, then you have to go with the Democrats. Clinton proved that once they shed their big-spender label and became fiscally responsible, the Democrats could manage job creation and prosperity. Bush has only one plan: cut taxes on the rich and on corporations. It’s not working. His vast, undisciplined deficits will burden your kids and mine. He is the only president to preside over a net loss of jobs since Herbert Hoover. Hey, if he were the coach of the Cowboys, Jerry Jones would have fired him long ago. We need to do the same. And now it’s almost debate time.
TO: Bill
FROM: Paul
September 30, 7:22 p.m.
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