Ok, talking about body language and poise and other intangibles is fun for a while, but ultimately it fails to rise to that exhortation of Professor Bacevich's that we should assess the policies of the candidates and make a choice based on which ones will best serve the nation. Citizenship is hard work! But that's not an excuse for the President so I'll be damned if it's going to be an excuse for me. Given Kerry's solid and unequivocal declaration that nuclear proliferation represents the number one threat to American security in the future, and given the President's agreement on that point, it seems to me that if any exchange in the debate should be examined in further detail, it is this one. I started this post aiming to follow up on praktike (and I hope I don't end up treading the toes of his very good earlier argument), myself, and several other post-debate post-mortems and to tackle those issues in further depth than I gave in my initial reactions. In the process it has expanded to something even bigger, and I think will require separation into several parts, so expect a multiple-post format over the next few days.

Broadly speaking, I think the threat of "nuclear proliferation" actually comprises three related issues. The first: How to prevent access to nuclear weapons technology from spreading to those who do not currently possess it. The second: How to deal with countries we view as rogue or non-status quo powers who either currently possess or may soon possess nuclear weapons. The third: How to defend against the threat of nuclear attack itself. In the debates we saw all three of these issues raised with mentions, respectively, of: the surplus nuclear materials of the former Soviet Union and the proliferation network of A.Q. Khan; the regimes in North Korea, Iran, and as puported "success stories" Iraq and Libya ( -- notable absences from this list: India and Pakistan, quite possibly the most likely situation for future nuclear conflict in the world, though tensions seem to have simmered down in recent weeks with talks between Singh and Musharraf); and (theoretically) National Missile Defense (NMD). This first post covers the first topic. Warning: when I say this is long, I do mean long.   more »

Ok, I thought this was just a wierd C-Span thing, but apparently from what I read other networks like CNN and Fox did it too. At one point during the debates last night one of my friends remarked something to the effect that the two podiums didn't match up.. and on closer inspection we realized that the cameras were actually angling their focus to ensure that Kerry and Bush appeared to be the same height on the split-screen when in fact Bush is a couple inches shorter.

Now the question is, is this a neat metaphor for what's so awful about a mainstream media incapable of passing any sort of judgement for fear of being tarred with accuastions of bias, or am I just being overly snarky? I would say both, but since I've still refrained from making comments on Bush's slouching posture through the whole thing, at this point I think the question is still open to interpretation.

Ok, I will first backtrack a bit and bring up a point that was made at the talk Wednesday night I attended on the election in historical context. There is a certain inevitable rhythm to these sorts of events that makes it hard to pick out especially novel lines of argument -- it was, for the most part, a pretty standard generalist take on the election and it's importance, complete with the appeals to voter registration and the fact that, hey, a lot of people disagree this year on who's best to vote for. Since these were political scientists and historians up there, rather than attempting to settle controversy, they were apparently more content in the space of this forum to simply point out that it existed. Fine stuff if you're just now tuning in, but yeah, kind of familiar, and the horse race mechanics ultimately don't interest me much beyond the broad outlines.

I thought Prof. Bacevich did make two crucial points, though. In his opening remarks he made a comparison between this election and that of 1952, when Truman, having articulated the basic outlines of US containment strategy against the Soviets at the start of the Cold War (through the promulgation of the Truman Doctrine, the Korean intervention, NSC-68, and so forth), was challenged by Republicans both for his percieved failures in prosecuting the Cold War (as in the loss of China and the stalemate in Korea) and, in some segments, for the whole strategy of Cold War containment itself. The basic upshot was, Eisenhower won and, while altering some policy details, basically reaffirmed Truman's course.

In doing so, and this I think is an important lesson for today, he depoliticized the Cold War and effectively gained bipartisan consensus on its basic outlines for the next several decades. So advocates of pursuing this "global war on terror" -- whose principles and goals really need to be further explained and debated by both candidates, some of which we saw last night -- might want to consider the real significance that a Kerry donning of its mantle might mean for its future. This stuff is really too important to be left to George W. Bush's handling alone.

Bacevich was critical of Kerry for failing to articulate thus far a really strong comprehensive criticism of President Bush's "Global War on Terror" strategy and for the degree of triviality which has served to obscure a lot of the important foreign policy questions implict in such a strategy, as waged by the Bush administration. Later on, he made a rather affecting appeal for an informed citizenship that takes the time to debate the issues and consider what policies will best serve our country, to which several of the gathered political scientists basically responded, well yeah that'd be really great, but unfortunately it doesn't work that way in our current system. Which, unfortunately, I think, is probably right -- one of the other profs (I don't remember which one now) basically made the point that you to a great extent can't know what sorts of issues your future leader can face, and when it comes down to it the best you can do is take a measure of a candidate's character as you see it, try and get a sense of whether he will vote generally in a way that represents your interests.

And that is, I think, a pretty good summary of my feelings on Kerry; in the debates last night I saw a seriousness and a command of the situation that Bush was clearly lacking. I realize I may be projecting my hopes upon Kerry without the guarantee that he'll match them in office -- but like praktike below, really the best I can do is accept that political constraints will force Kerry to make certain generalizations about the importances of alliances et. al and trust that when the time comes to take charge of the situation, he can do better, by virtue of his intelligence, skills of evaluation, and leadership and George W. Bush's manifest failures by comparison.