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Democrats have been failing their civics tests in the most spectacular
ways. First we have Tom Daschle — whose international experience
can be etched on marble and dropped in your eye with no ill effects
— bemoaning the fact that some European leaders are unhappy
with W.'s decisions on the Kyoto Treaty, missile defense, and bacteriological
weapons. Quite aside from the fact that the decisions were exceptionally
good ones, anyone with any real knowledge of contemporary diplomacy
knows full well that the Europeans rarely say in public what they
actually want: European citizens cut a lot of slack for their leaders
in foreign policy, and their leaders gratefully respond by telling
the citizens what they are presumed to want to hear. The only tell
us in private what they really want us to do, and they expect us
to take the heat for it. That's one of the prices of being top dog.
A few years back German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, an unusually
outspoken Social Democrat, came to Washington to implore the likes
of Kissinger and Haig to "kill the SALT II Treaty," and, when the
Americans asked if he would support them in this effort, chuckled
and said, "Of course not. But you must do it." If we had passed
the treaty, we would have received public accolades from the Europeans,
but private frustration. I rather suspect that the Kyoto Treaty
is the same story; the Europeans know as well as anyone in Washington
that the "science" on global warming is highly suspect, and I doubt
they want to burden their groaning economies with yet more fiscal
demands. But it's unfashionable to speak the truth on this matter,
even though the "greens" are in fairly bad odor nowadays in most
European countries, and have even vanished from the party list in
Italy. Radical environmentalism isn't a great force over there,
either. Surely nobody believes that the government of France —
which produces more nuclear-generated electrical power than any
other country in the world — is really in favor of shutting
down nuclear-power plants in favor of solar panels and windmills.
But they will never say this in public.
Daschle simply doesn't know what he's talking about; he's just another
in a long list of earnest Americans from the back woods and the
Great Plains who assume that "people are people," the world over.
No American statesman could get away with the blatant doublespeak
the Europeans favor, but no serious student of the world would assume
that European leaders really mean what they say. If Daschle were
concerned to advance the national interest instead of scoring debating
points against our president, he'd learn something about diplomacy.
Then there's the latest in a growing stream of public embarrassments
from Abe Foxman, the head of the Anti-Defamation League. There really
isn't enough anti-Semitism in America nowadays to justify big fundraising
drives and big staffs, and Foxman has been very entrepreneurial
about concocting "threats" for the ADL to thwart. His latest effort
to attract public attention was a denunciation of the Israeli government
for monitoring the reportage of Middle East events, and criticizing
news agencies when the Israelis thought the newsies had got it wrong.
"Undemocratic," thunders Foxman. Not. It's properly called "doing
your job." Are the Israelis — or any other responsible government
— supposed to maintain a dignified silence when their leaders
are slandered by, say, the BBC? On the contrary, citizens should
expect their leaders to expose press bias on every occasion, and
to fight for the truth.
I can't help suspecting that Foxman's laughable critique is linked
to the Democrats' efforts to slime Otto Reich and John Negroponte,
nominated for top diplomatic jobs. Both men were exceedingly effective
at advancing President Reagan's Central American policy. Negroponte
was American ambassador in Honduras, and Reich ran a tiny public
outreach office in State that greatly annoyed the Left, because
he was very good at it. He was later a first-class ambassador to
Venezuela.
These terrific men are under attack precisely because they performed
extraordinarily well under exceedingly difficult circumstances at
the great turning point in the second half of the 20th century.
The defeat of Communism in Central America was deadly to the messianic
vision of the men in the Kremlin, and to their many supporters and
fellow travelers around the world, because it demonstrated that
history was NOT on their side. The tide of events was running in
favor of the democratic revolution, and Otto Reich and John Negroponte
were among its most effective advocates.
Unfortunately, the American left has still not forgiven the Reagan
administration for destroying the Soviet Empire, and the Senate
Leftists are going all-out to make Reich and Negroponte pay for
their brave virtue. Having lost the ideological battle, the Left
has only one weapon: The politics of personal destruction, and the
lame suggestions of the likes of Foxman and Daschle that our leaders
should not try to advance our interests, but surrender to the baseless
demands of political correctness.
The chief spear-carrier for the senatorial leftists is Christopher
Dodd of Connecticut, a man who performed so shamefully in the 1980s
that one would expect him to avoid any review of those years. While
Reich and Negroponte were fighting our country's enemies, Dodd was
out dancing with them. Dodd hit the chic nightclubs with radicals
like Bianca Jaggar, and cavorted with Daniel Ortega, the Communist
dictator of Nicaragua.
If we had a political class worthy of the name, people like Dodd
would be publicly excoriated, and Reich and Negroponte would get
medals. But the Democrats, whose leaders either know nothing about
the workings of the real world or vengefully persecute those who
exposed their folly, turn common sense on its head and demand the
rejection of the very people who have proven their ability to lead.
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