HOWDY PARDNER! Posted by David Adesnik

My name is David Adesnik and I would like to express my gratitude to Michael Signer and the rest of the folks here at Democracy Arsenal for having me as their guest this coming week.  The rest of the time, you can find my opinions posted over at OxBlog, where I started blogging in September 2002, when the blogosphere was still young.

Of course, I'm not a professional blogger.  My day job for quite some time now has been as a graduate student in international relations, working on a dissertation entitled "Reagan's Democratic Crusade: Rhetoric and the Remaking of American Foreign Policy."  My home university is Oxford, although I have spent the past two years in the United States because of my research.

As everyone at Oxford could tell, I am most certainly not British.  I am a New Yorker born and raised and I wouldn't have it any other way.  Politically, I am adrift.  Five years ago I was a staunch liberal who barely understood how any intelligent American could vote for George Bush.  Now I am an independent.  What hasn't changed is that I am committed as passionately as ever to promoting democracy across the globe.

When it comes to democracy promotion, I find it hard to fully identify with the approach of either the Democrats or the Republicans.  Although I consider President Bush's Second Inaugural Address to be a historic (and sincere) statement of American idealism, I have often found his administration's implementation of those ideals to be lackluster at best.

On the other hand, I find it hard not to be ashamed when a Democratic presidential candidate such as John Kerry says that we should be closing firehouses in Baghdad instead of in Ohio.  I firmly believe that this sort of narrow and selfish approach to national security is why so many Americans considered George Bush to be the stronger candidate this past fall.

Like the folks here at DA, I look forward to the day when the Democratic Party rediscovers the idealism of Harry S. Truman and John F. Kennedy, who both understood that our national security depends on both military supremacy and an unflagging commitment to democratic ideals.

So enough about me.  I hope can put up some posts this week that live up to the incredibly high standard set by the regular contributors to this blog.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that I cannot think of any other blog whose authors have demonstrated such an impressive knowledge of the way things work in Washington.

Finally, I just want to say that I will read all of the comments attached to my posts very carefully, because I have learned a tremendous amount from my audience during my time as a blogger.  Without such an intelligent audience, us bloggers would be nothing.

Comments

[JohnFH]

Welcome, David!

This is a great site to blog on. Here Democrats and wannabe Democrats, plus a few independents and Republicans, at least among those who send in comments, are not afraid to praise the Bush administration's foreign policy initiatives if they merit it, or criticize them when appropriate.

[doc]

welcome.

...interesting take on young george's second inaugural address: personally, i believe he meant less than half of it.

[Dan Kervick]

David Adesnik wrote

..."Finally, I just want to say that I will read all of the comments attached to my posts very carefully, because I have learned a tremendous amount from my audience during my time as a blogger. Without such an intelligent audience, us bloggers would be nothing."...

Very nice pre-emptive suck-up David! Yet I suspect you and I are on different sides of a major divide.

I would like Democrats to recover something of the Kennedy legacy as well, but primarily the legacy of the Kennedy of 1963 who, chastened by the terrifying Cold War brinkmanship, futile adventurism and near-disasters of his first few years, and wary of the machinations of the scheming clandestine agents, rogue ideologues and zealots in his own government, had stepped down from the fanaticism and high-flying, crusading form of "idealism" of his inaugural address, and had moved toward a more mature view of the world, organized around a distinctly re-ordered set of priorities:

http://www.jfklibrary.org/j061063.htm

In this speech, Kennedy says:

..."I speak of peace, therefore, as the necessary rational end of rational men. I realize that the pursuit of peace is not as dramatic as the pursuit of war--and frequently the words of the pursuer fall on deaf ears. But we have no more urgent task.

"Some say that it is useless to speak of world peace or world law or world disarmament--and that it will be useless until the leaders of the Soviet Union adopt a more enlightened attitude. I hope they do. I believe we can help them do it. But I also believe that we must reexamine our own attitude--as individuals and as a Nation--for our attitude is as essential as theirs. And every graduate of this school, every thoughtful citizen who despairs of war and wishes to bring peace, should begin by looking inward--by examining his own attitude toward the possibilities of peace, toward the Soviet Union, toward the course of the cold war and toward freedom and peace here at home."

The view of the world and its challenges that Kennedy goes on to enunciate here is no less idealistic than that earlier view, but it is the idealism of a mature mind, not the romantic, Byronic idealism of the revolutionary, the crusader and the doctrine-infatuated warrior-hero. The strident tone of assertive nationalism and ideological chauvinism is gone, along with the no-price-is-too-high democratic jihadism.

I would note that the goal of "democracy promotion" seems to play no prominent role in the thought of this more mature Kennedy. Indeed, in what is clearly a self-conscious echo of the Wilsonian rhetoric about making the world safe for democracy, Kennedy replaces "democracy" with a different word.

"So, let us not be blind to our differences--but let us also direct attention to our common interests and to the means by which those differences can be resolved. And if we cannot end now our differences, at least we can help make the world safe for diversity. For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal."

[AlanDownunder]

Questions for you about Iraq, David.

Is stability a precondition for withdrawal or is withdrawal a precondition for stability?

Does the answer to that question depend on the size of one's national ego?

[David]

I guess I better work on my suck-ups if they are so transparent. ;)

Anyhow, I don't know enough about Kennedy to take a position on whether there were substantive changes in his foreign policy during his last few months in office, at least with regard to his general hawkishness.

When it comes to democracy promotion though, I think it is stretching to interpret that one speech as evidence of a turn away from Wilsonian idealism, to which JFK was quite committed. But I have more to learn on that front as well, so I will keep an open mind.

[David]

Sorry I missed your comment there, Alan. To answer your question, it's hard to say if stability is the precondition for withdrawal. I think it would be better to ask what degree of stability is necessary for withdrawal. Also what kind of stability: political, military, or both?

As for withdrawal being a precondition of stability, that argument could only hold if one believes that the Sunni insurgents, who slaughter Shi'ite civlians every day, would suddenly decide to make an unprecedented and historic commitment to liberal notions of religious tolerance once the Americans withdraw.

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As for withdrawal being a precondition of stability, that argument could only hold if one believes that the Sunni insurgents, who slaughter Shi'ite civlians every day, would suddenly decide to make an unprecedented and historic commitment to liberal notions of religious tolerance once the Americans withdraw

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