Split liberal Democrats from the left. Since 9/11 President Bush has made it clear that America’s war will be waged not only against terrorists and insurgents but also against those who sponsor and support them. This logic has a domestic equivalent. Should conservatives do political battle with the domestic insurgency while ignoring the intellectual movement and the political party that sponsors it? We know who the domestic insurgents are, and we know who is sheltering and supporting them. There is a symbiotic relationship between mainstream Democrats and the left that conservatives simply cannot ignore. Typically the Democratic Party looks to its left wing for ideas, activism, and money. When Democratic candidates need funds, they turn to the music industry and Hollywood. When they need advice on judicial nominations, they bring in activist groups like NARAL, the ACLU, and People for the American Way. During the election season, Democrats count on left-wing blogs and groups like moveon.org to rally their activist base.
Leftists, for their part, benefit from the political cover provided by mainstream liberalism. The leftist fantasies of Michael Moore became respectable when leading Democrats began to fawn over him, and when he was invited to share Jimmy Carter’s box at the 2004 Democratic Convention. (You are unlikely to see David Duke in Nancy Reagan’s box at the Republican Convention.) Not only do liberal Democrats propel domestic insurgents like Moore and Cindy Sheehan to national prominence, but the left is also able to deploy “useful idiots” from the Democratic camp in order to advance its ideological agenda. A perfect example is Congressman John Murtha, whose great value to the left is that he endorses leftist propositions while sporting war medals on his chest. Every time Murtha makes ethnocentric and ignorant proclamations about Iraq and about Muslims, two subjects on which he knows virtually nothing, the left parades his military credentials to immunize him from criticism. Hey, this man served his country! Don’t question his loyalty, even when he makes the same arguments as Noam Chomsky and Osama bin Laden.
Conservatives should force liberal Democrats either to embrace the domestic insurgency or to repudiate it. This is a choice that liberal Democrats will make supreme efforts to avoid. They do not wish to disavow the left because they rely so heavily on its ideas and activism. Conservatives must pressure liberal Democrats to decide how they want to be perceived by the American people. Do liberal Democrats agree with Cindy Sheehan and Arundhati Roy that Bush is more dangerous than bin Laden? Do they support the claims of Howard Zinn and other leftist pundits that the Iraqi insurgents are freedom fighters who represent the true voice of the Iraqi people? Will they echo Howard Dean’s insistence that there is no way America can win in Iraq? Are they, like Nancy Soderberg and Gary Kamiya, waiting and hoping that things go wrong for America in Iraq? Are they unmoved, like Markos Moulitsas of dailykos.com, when U.S. civilians are murdered by Islamic fanatics? Would they, like William Blum, welcome bin Laden’s endorsement of their foreign policy views? Do they applaud Michael Moore’s plaintive wish that bin Laden’s 9/11 attack should have been directed at red America instead of blue America? By driving a wedge between liberal Democrats and the left, and forcing the liberals to spurn the domestic insurgency or be tarred by it, conservatives can strengthen their political prospects and at the same time weaken bin Laden’s allies in the United States.
None of the strategies outlined here is easy, but each of them needs careful consideration in view of the peculiarity of our situation. It’s a two-front war in which conservatives are embroiled, a military fight against the radical Muslims abroad and a political battle against the radical left at home. These two forces have formed a strange coalition—a kind of alliance of the vicious and the immoral—and they are now working together against us. We have to recognize this, and take them on simultaneously. There is no way to restore the culture without winning the war on terror. Conversely, the only way to win the war on terror is to win the culture war. Thus we arrive at a sobering truth. In order to crush the Islamic radicals abroad, we must defeat the enemy at home.
NOTES
INTRODUCTION
1. Michael Moore, “Death, Downtown,” September 12, 2001, michaelmoore.com.
2. “You Helped This Happen,” transcript of remarks by Jerry Falwell on the September 13 edition of the 700 Club; “Falwell Apologizes to Gays, Feminists, Lesbians,” CNN.com, posted September 14, 2001.
3. Ahmed Rashid, Taliban, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2001, p. 115.
4. Paul Berman, Terror and Liberalism, W. W. Norton, New York, 2000, p. 7.
5. Kristine Holmgren, “Nightmare of Fascism Seems Too Real Since Sept. 11 Attacks,” St. Paul Pioneer Press, November 20, 2001.
6. Robert Byrd, Losing America, W. W. Norton, New York, 2004, p. 91.
7. Ibid., pp. 129, 178.
8. Salman Rushdie, Imaginary Homelands, Viking, New York, 1991, p. 389. Maureen Dowd, “Rove’s Revenge,” New York Times, November 7, 2004. Nina Siegal, “The Progressive Interview: Art Spiegelman,” Progressive, January 2005, p. 37. Wendy Kaminer, “Our Very Own Taliban,” American Prospect, online edition, September 17, 2001.
9. Transcript of Cindy Sheehan remarks, rally in support of Lynne Stewart, San Francisco State University, April 27, 2005, discoverthenetworks.org. Edward Said, From Oslo to Iraq, Pantheon Books, New York, 2004, p. 229. Jonathan Raban, “September 11: The View from the West,” New York Review of Books, September 22, 2005, p. 8. Jane Smiley, “Why Americans Hate Democrats,” November 4, 2004, slate.msn.com. Eric Alterman, “Corrupt, Incompetent and Off-Center,” The Nation, November 7, 2005, p. 12. Jonathan Schell, “The Hidden State Steps Forward,” The Nation, January 9, 2006. Garry Wills, “Fringe Government,” New York Review of Books, October 6, 2005, p. 48.
10. Statement of Senator Edward Kennedy on the Federal Marriage Amendment, July 13, 2004; statement of Senator Edward Kennedy on Iraq, September 10, 2004. Clinton cited by Kate O’Beirne, “Hillary Prepares,” National Review, October 10, 2005, p. 34. Markey cited by Lewis Lapham, “Democracyland,” Harper’s, March 2005, p. 8.
11. Graffito in “Iraq 182,” collected and translated by Amir Nayef al-Sayegh, Harper’s, November 2004, p. 19. Zawahiri cited in “Al Qaeda Number Two Hits Out at U.S. in New Audiotape,” Agence France-Presse, February 11, 2005.
12. Bernard Lewis, Islam and the West, Oxford University Press, N.Y., 1993, p. 35.
13. “Interview: Osama Bin Laden,” Frontline, May 1998, pbs.org.
14. Benazir Bhutto, “Western Media: The Prism of Immorality,” New Perspectives Quarterly, fall 1998, p. 32. Bernard Lewis, The Crisis of Islam, Modern Library Press, New York, 2003, pp. 80–81.
15. Fareed Zakaria, “Culture Is Destiny: A Conversation with Lee Kuan Yew,” Foreign Affairs, March-April 1994.
16. Neil MacFarquhar, “Bin Laden Denounces Muslim Infidels,” San Diego Union-Tribune, November 4, 2001, p. A-3.
17. Eve Ensler, The Vagina Monologues, Villard, New York, 2001, pp. xxviii–xxix.
18. Bin Laden cited in The 9/11 Commission Report, W. W. Norton, New York, 2004, p. 54. “Bin Laden’s Statement: The Sword Fell,” New York Times, October 8, 2001, p. B-7.
19. Anne Norton, Leo Strauss and the Politics of American Empire, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2004, p. 216. Mari Matsuda, “A Dangerous Place,” Boston Review, December 2002–January 2003. Rashid Khalidi, Resurrecting Empire, Beacon Press, Boston, 2004, p. xi. Reprinted in Edward Said, The Politics of Dispossession, Vintage, New York, 1995, p. 298.
20. Transcript of Osama bin Laden speech, October 30, 2004, aljazeera.net.
21. Michael Moore, “Heads Up,” April 14, 2004, michaelmoore.com. James Carroll, Crusade, Metropolitan Books, New York, 2004, p. 3. Joe Conason, “Bush’s Ideological Quagmire,” September 24, 2005, salon.com. Gwynne Dyer, Future Tense, McClelland & Stewart, Toronto, 2004, p. 9. Arundhati Roy, An Ordinary Person’s Guide to Empire, South End Press, Boston, 2004, p. 94.
ONE
1. The 9/11 Commission Report, W. W. Norton, New York, 2004, p. 154.
2. Early on
the report offers this explanation of the motives of the enemy: “Its purpose is to rid the world of religious and political pluralism, the plebiscite, and equal rights for women.” This is one of the few unsupported statements in an otherwise expertly documented report. As I will show later in this book, it is completely wrong to suggest that the political goal of the 9/11 attackers or their sponsors is global elimination of voting rights or women’s rights or religious diversity. The report gives no evidence for this claim because there is no evidence for it. Fortunately the report does not continue this line of unfounded speculation. See p. xvi.
3. Al-Risala in Bernard Lewis, The Crisis of Islam, Modern Library, New York, 2003, p. 157. Al-Maydan in Lance Morrow, “Who’s More Arrogant?” Time, December 10, 2001. Sheikh Omar in Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank, “Clerical Error,” The New Republic, August 8, 2005.
4. Thomas Friedman, “The Land of Denial,” New York Times, June 5, 2002, reprinted in Longitudes and Attitudes, Anchor Books, New York, 2003, p. 183. Edward Said, “Islam and the West Are Inadequate Banners,” Guardian, September 16, 2001. Stanley Hoffman, “On the War,” New York Review of Books, November 1, 2001, p. 6. George Bush, Address to Joint Session of Congress, September 20, 2001. Barbara Ehrenreich, “The Empire Strikes Back,” Village Voice, October 9, 2001. Hendrik Hertzberg and David Remnick, “The Trap,” The New Yorker, October 1, 2001, p. 38.
5. The 9/11 Commission Report, p. 169.
6. “Terrorism of the rich” is from Jean Baudrillard, The Spirit of Terrorism and Requiem for the Twin Towers, Verso, London, 2002, p. 23. “Notes Found After the Hijackings,” New York Times, September 29, 2001, p. B-3.
7. “In for the Long Haul,” New York Times, September 16, 2001.
8. George Bush, Address to the U.N. General Assembly, November 10, 2001.
9. George Bush, Address to the Nation, September 11, 2001. Bush, Address to Joint Session of Congress. Victor Davis Hanson, An Autumn of War, Anchor Books, New York, 2002, p. 170.
10. Bush, Address to Joint Session of Congress. Norman Podhoretz, “Defending and Advancing Freedom,” Commentary, November 2005, p. 56. “The Week,” National Review, August 29, 2005. Mustafa Akyol, “Bolshevism in a Headdress,” American Enterprise, April-May 2005, p. 29. George Bush, State of the Union Address, January 29, 2002.
11. Daniel Pipes, In the Path of God, Transaction Publishers, New Brunswick, 2003, p. xi. Francis Fukuyama, “Their Target: The Modern World,” Newsweek, January 2002, special issue. John Gibson, Hating America, Regan Books, New York, 2004, p. 88. Bush, Address to Joint Session of Congress.
12. Tony Blair, speech to the Labor Party Conference, October 1, 2001.
13. Pipes, In the Path of God, p. xii. George Bush, Second Inaugural Address, January 20, 2005.
14. George Bush, speech at the National Endowment for Democracy, Washington, D.C., October 6, 2005.
15. Dexter Filkins, “Foreign Fighters Captured in Iraq Come from 27, Mostly Arab, Lands,” New York Times, October 21, 2005, p. A-10.
16. Khaled Abou El Fadl, The Place of Tolerance in Islam, Beacon Press, Boston, 2002, p. 11.
17. Maxime Rodinson, Islam and Capitalism, University of Texas Press, Austin, 1978, pp. 14, 16. Gilles Kepel, The War for Muslim Minds, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2004, pp. 6, 141.
18. Noah Feldman, After Jihad, Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York, 2003, p. 7. Madani cited by John Esposito, The Islamic Threat, Oxford University Press, N.Y., 1992, p. 184.
19. See, e.g., Mona El-Naggar, “Banned Group Urges Egyptians to Vote on Sept. 7,” New York Times, August 22, 2005, p. A-7. Joshua Hammer and Christine Spolar, “Ballot Initiative,” The New Republic, September 26, 2005, p. 16. Megan Stack and Tyler Marshall, “Islamists Ride Wave of Freedom,” Los Angeles Times, December 18, 2005, p. A-22. Najoub in David Remnick, “The Democracy Game,” The New Yorker, February 27, 2006, p. 63.
20. Fareed Zakaria, The Future of Freedom, W. W. Norton, New York, 2004, p. 18.
TWO
1. The actual vote in the Senate was 29 Democrats for and 21 against. The vote in the House was 81 Democrats for and 126 against. Ruth Conniff, “The Progressive Interview: Barbara Boxer,” Progressive, July 2005, p. 41.
2. “10 Questions for Al Franken,” New York Times Magazine, April 4, 2004. Stephen Applebaum, “Interview with Michael Moore,” BBC-TV, June 30, 2004.
3. Patrick Buchanan, The Death of the West, St. Martin’s Press, New York, 2001, p. 6.
4. Robert Jensen, “Saying Goodbye to Patriotism,” counterpunch.org, November 12, 2001. Katha Pollitt, “Put Out No Flags,” The Nation, October 8, 2001.
5. Bill Clinton, speech at Georgetown University, November 7, 2001.
6. See, e.g., Peter Bergen and Alec Reynolds, “Blowback Revisited,” Foreign Affairs, November-December 2005. Noam Chomsky, 9–11, Seven Stories Press, New York, 2002, pp. 12, 40.
7. Arundhati Roy, “The Algebra of Infinite Justice,” Progressive, December 2001.
8. Michael Scheuer, Imperial Hubris, Brassey’s, Inc., Washington, D.C., 2004, p. 240. Richard Falk, The Great Terror War, Olive Branch Press, New York, 2003, p. 19.
9. Statement of Senator Ted Kennedy, Committee for a Democratic Majority, September 10, 2004.
10. Cited by Bob Herbert, “35 Years Later,” New York Times, April 24, 2006, p. A-23.
11. Amy Goodman, radio interview with Cornel West, Democracy Now, September 7, 2004. Rashid Khalidi, Resurrecting Empire, Beacon Press, Boston, 2004, p. x. Maureen Dowd, Bushworld, G. P. Putnam, New York, 2004, p. 15. Bob Herbert, Promises Betrayed, Times Books, New York, 2005, p. 253.
12. George Soros, The Bubble of American Supremacy, Public Affairs, New York, 2004, p. 62. Stanley Hoffman, “Out of Iraq,” New York Review of Books, October 21, 2004. Herbert, Promises Betrayed, p. 247.
13. Gore Vidal, Imperial America, Nation Books, New York, 2004, p. 165. Edward Said, “Thoughts About America,” Al-Ahram, February 26–March 6, 2002.
14. Arthur Schlesinger Jr., “Disgrace at Guantánamo,” New York Review of Books, April 8, 2004. Paisley Dodds, “Amnesty Takes Aim at ‘Gulag’ in Guantánamo,” Associated Press, London, May 25, 2005, aol.com.
15. Mark Danner, “We Are All Torturers Now,” New York Times, January 6, 2005.
16. Wendy Kaminer, “Patriotic Dissent,” American Prospect, online edition, November 5, 2001. Anthony Lewis, “Bush and the Lesser Evil,” New York Review of Books, May 27, 2004.
17. Falk, The Great Terror War, p. xxvi. Edward Said, From Oslo to Iraq, Pantheon, New York, 2004, p. 111. Benjamin Barber, Jihad vs. McWorld, Ballantine Books, New York, 1996, pp. 9, 213.
18. Nicholas Kristof, “Iraq in the Rear-View Mirror,” New York Times, November 15, 2005. Robert Scheer, “U.S. Occupation Is Worse Than Hussein,” huffingtonpost.com, November 30, 2005.
19. James Carroll, Crusade, Metropolitan Books, New York, 2004, p. 20. Robert Reich, Reason, Alfred Knopf, New York, 2004, p. 49. Soros, The Bubble of American Supremacy, p. 18.
20. Christopher Hitchens, Love, Poverty, and War, Nation Books, New York, 2004, p. 413.
21. Jonathan Franzen, “Alice’s Wonderland,” New York Times Book Review, November 14, 2004, p. 16. Bill Moyers, keynote address to the Environmental Grantmakers Association, Brainerd, Minnesota, October 16, 2001, commondreams.org. Stanley Greenberg, The Two Americas, Thomas Dunne Books, New York, 2005, p. 5.
22. James Wolcott, “The Counter-Life,” The Nation, November 22, 2004, p. 23. Jonathan Chait, “Mad About Me,” The New Republic, December 13, 2004, p. 50. Pauline Jelinek, “Dean Defends Criticism of Republican Party,” AP, June 8, 2005, aol.com.
23. Josh Gerstein, “Audience Gasps as Judge Likens Election of Bush to Rise of Il Duce,” New York Sun, June 21, 2004.
24. Thomas Frank, What’s the Matter with Kansas? Metropolitan Books, New York, 2004.
25. Molly Ivins, “Pickup Driving Liberal,” Progressive, July 2005, p. 50. Morris Fiorina, Samuel Abrams, and Jeremy Pope, Culture War? Pearson Longm
an, New York, 2005.
26. “Beyond Red vs. Blue,” Pew Research Center, Washington, D.C., 2005. “Voters Liked Campaign 2004, but Too Much Mud-Slinging,” Pew Research Center, Washington, D.C., November 11, 2004.
27. See, e.g., Katharine Seelye, “Moral Values Cited as a Defining Issue of the Election,” New York Times, November 4, 2004. John Green, Corwin Smidt, James Guth, and Lyman Kellstedt, “The American Religious Landscape and the 2004 Presidential Vote,” pewforum.org; see also the Fourth National Survey of Religion and Politics, Bliss Institute, University of Akron, 2004.
28. “Beyond Red vs. Blue.”
THREE
1. Salman Rushdie, Imaginary Homelands, Viking, New York, 1991, p. 170.
2. Bernard Lewis, From Babel to Dragomans, Oxford University Press, N.Y., 2004, pp. 34–35.
3. Ed Koch, “World War IV,” Commentary, December 2004, p. 7.
4. Patrick Buchanan, “Creating a Nation Out of Paper,” American Conservative, September 12, 2005, p. 6.
5. Edward Said, Orientalism, Vintage, New York, 1978.
6. Joseph Ellis, “Contain Ourself,” The New Republic, July 4, 2005, p. 5.
7. Bernard Lewis, What Went Wrong? Oxford University Press, N.Y., 2002, pp. 3, 6.
8. Albert Hourani, A History of the Arab Peoples, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1991.
9. George Bush, news conference, White House, October 11, 2001, www.whitehouse.gov.
10. Dan Eggan and Scott Wilson, “Suicide Bombs Potent Tools of Terrorists,” Washington Post, July 17, 2005.
11. Ziad Jarrah in Christian Caryl, “Why They Do It,” New York Review of Books, September 22, 2005, p. 30. “London Bomber Video: Full Statement,” London Times, September 3, 2005, www.timesonline.co.uk. Nasra Hassan, “An Arsenal of Believers,” The New Yorker, November 19, 2001, pp. 37–41.
The Enemy At Home Page 34