I am trying really hard to keep harsh language out of the title of this post

[mmcirvin]

The nonsensical argument that I mentioned earlier is now mainstream.

Brooks' reasoning boils down to this: The struggle against terrorists is the one area in which voters must reward failure.

In what world does this make sense? Did the Oklahoma City, Khobar Towers and USS Cole attacks make it wrong to vote against Al Gore, who presumably would have continued Clinton's anti-terrorism policies? There's not even any evidence that pre-September 2001 Bush was harder on terrorists than Clinton—quite the reverse—so the essential difference can't be one of hawkishness. Maybe it's only rightist governments that are supposed to have special immunity from democratic oversight.

This whole line of argument is nothing but a thuggish bid to use the threat of future violence to shut down debate.

Comments

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

What about a thuggish bid to use the threat of future impeachment to shut down "activist judges" who dare vote against God?

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Like I said elsewhere, I'm pretty sure that people have been trying that particular bit of nonsense since the beginning of time; if it worked, Earl Warren would have been gone in five seconds.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Also, man, is that WorldNetDaily guy deranged or what?

[ronebofh.livejournal.com]

I dunno, i think the tin foil looks good on him.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

By the way, the "cowardly capitulator Spaniards" notion has become so universally accepted now that it actually made it into a joke on The Daily Show. It was beneath them.

[davetheinverted]

(I haven't entirely thought this through yet, so I reserve the right to change my mind.)

Yes and no. It's not about rewarding failure. There is no set of policies that can, in a free society, stop sufficiently intelligent and determined terrorists. That the outgoing Spanish government failed to stop this attack from happening says nothing about how effective their efforts in the war on terror have been. That the attack was attempted in the first place, does. I don't have to listen to the imaginary terrorist in my head to know this; I can get it from the terrorists' own statements. They didn't like Spain being in Iraq and chose to respond in their usual fashion. Unless we are to hypothesize that al Qaeda (or the associated group) is playing a giant game of "don't throw me in the briar patch," then it's fair to assume that the policies of the outgoing Spanish government were, in some fashion, hurting a-Q.
I don't know anything about the issues and such surrounding the Spanish elections. I don't know if the Socialists were ahead or behind before the attack. I don't know what else might have gone on in Spanish domestic politics that might have affected the election. But if the Socialists had already stated that they were going to pull out of Iraq if elected, and if some portion of the Spanish electorate changed their votes in response to the attack in the belief that the best way to halt future attacks was to change the policies that were demonstrably annoying the terrorists...then yeah, I have an issue with that. "Go hit him instead" is not, in my mind, an appropriate response to bullying.

Dav2.718

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Now, that's a coherent argument; Kevin Drum said much the same thing, with the same qualifiers, on his blog and got much protest for it, mostly from people who thought he was espousing a cruder version more like what Brooks is saying.

What I've been able to glean about the actual political situation in Spain is that (1) while Aznar's party was ahead before the election, it wasn't by much and the margins were closing, and that (2) many of the swing voters who changed their votes after the attacks were more angered by Aznar's clumsy attempts to pin blame for the attacks on ETA in order to gain an electoral advantage.

I also wonder if the Spanish presence in Iraq was really hurting al Qaeda at all. bin Laden's been going on about "the tragedy of Andalus" since forever, and the claim of responsibility had a bunch of stuff about "crusader Europe" in it; they've got a grudge against Christian Spain that goes back to the Middle Ages. They also have a record of using things as a casus belli that aren't actually damaging them at all. One of bin Laden's perennial favorite subjects was the presence of US troops in Saudi Arabia, but I see no evidence that those troops did any harm to al Qaeda while they were there-- the US presence didn't accomplish much of anything with regard to al Qaeda except provide bin Laden with targets and propaganda fodder, and nobody called it an act of appeasement when they were pulled out. Note also that there's no indication whatsoever that Spain is going to pull out of its contribution to the ongoing fight directly against al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

But these are legitimate differences of opinion. My objection's mostly to the people who say that it doesn't matter what the voters' motivations were or what the issues in the election were, that all that matters is what it looks like to the terrorists. And that's pretty much what I'm hearing from bloviators like Brooks, George Will and Andrew Sullivan.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Mark Kleiman (http://www.markarkleiman.com/archives/terrorism_and_its_control_/2004/03/more_thoughts_on_spain.php) made a long and thoughtful post on the subject in which he brings up yet another point: the swing in the election result was probably mostly because of increased turnout, not swing voters.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

...And that increased turnout was in turn the result of impassioned entreaties from both parties to show up at the polling places in order to defy the terrorists!

[davetheinverted]

In short, the attack did affect the election, but not in the way that a lot of people are interpreting it. It was mostly increased turnout and Aznar's own idiocy that did it.

They also have a record of using things as a casus belli that aren't actually damaging them at all.

Not quite the briar patch concept, but close enough that we can't draw any real conclusions from their choice of target.

...all that matters is what it looks like to the terrorists.

I have to wonder how politically sophisticated they are. They appear to have gotten what they wanted; do they at this point understand why they got it or are they buying into the idea that the Spanish electorate caved? And how much of this did they understand going in?

Dav2.718

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

...And I saw something else today claiming that a regression analysis reveals that turnout alone doesn't explain the shift... but that at least one poll taken very late before the bombings already showed the Socialists ahead!

This afternoon I had the really grim idea that bin Laden could really fuck with our heads right now by actually endorsing a candidate. "Vote for X and I won't kill you any more!" Are we then obligated to vote for the other guy? I'd certainly be tempted. But he'd naturally assume I'd vote for the other guy so maybe that's what he wants! But iocaine comes from Australia, a land peopled by convicts!

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Whoops, somebody in the terrorist group that claimed responsibility for the bombings is way ahead of me, though they stopped short of actually backing the endorsement with the carrot-and-stick.

(They endorsed Bush, as the candidate most likely to destroy America, and claimed to be scared of Kerry. I'm actually relieved they phrased it that way as nobody is ever going to take it seriously enough to take the trip through the hall of mirrors; endorsing Kerry as the pro-al Qaeda candidate would have been the more effective mindfuck.)

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

Here's the link, for what little it's worth. (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040317/wl_nm/security_spain_truce_dc)

[graydon.livejournal.com]

it's funny that you use the word "thug". Thugs were actually a hindu terrorist sect, long ago.

overall, I'm not sure either way about "appeasement". history doesn't seem to offer a clear understanding of whether temporary appeasement relieves or exacerbates the problem. if you look at the many terrorists who have come before, it seems they carry on doing what they want until they are stopped (arrested or killed), appeasement or no. it seems like a red herring.

I think the US is making a mistake focusing on countries, though. a country is very expensive to disrupt, and even more expensive to put back together, and it's hard to guess whether the put-back-together form will be much different than before. a terrorist organization is much smaller and cheaper to dirsupt -- say hundreds of people per group rather than millions -- so you can be a hundred times more thorough with ten times as many targets. for the billions spent on attacking iraq or afghanistan, I suspect they could have deployed a much more effective counter-terror strategy around infiltration and disruption.

alas, it all seems more related to politics than planning.

[graydon.livejournal.com]

er, hundred times as many targets. also: coffee helps you avoid spelling mistakes!

[jwgh]

I was waiting for the Daily Howler guy to weigh in on this issue, and he finally did today. As is his wont, his main complaint is that pundits are reaching their conclusions without bothering to find out or present the actual information that is available on why and how the vote went the way it did, which I don't think is the main thing that annoys you.

[mmcirvin.livejournal.com]

It's another good point, though. As I said above, it appears that in at least one poll the Popular Party wasn't even in the lead before the bombings. That could easily be an outlier, but the situation is a lot less clear-cut than the simple story that seems to have shaped most of the commentary.

Somersby's perpetual indignation would burn out the brain of a guy like me, but I do think he performs a valuable service.

[jwgh]

Incidentally, did you see this?