America's Second Lady Tops Kerry

Vice President and Mrs. Cheney were in Joplin, Missouri, on Wednesday, for a town hall meeting. Here's a reporter's question, and Lynne Cheney's answer:

QUESTION: Senator Kerry has made the statement that he would like to fight a more sensitive war on terror. What in the world he be thinking about there? What's your thoughts?

MRS. CHENEY: I just kind of shook my head when I heard that. With all due respect to the Senator, it just sounded so foolish. I can't imagine that al Qaeda is going to be impressed by sensitivity. (Laughter.)

But it did remind me of kind of this -- we've heard for a long time from the extreme left in this country, whenever it comes to a matter of our national interest, that somehow the problem is not with the people who are attacking us, the problem is with us. You've heard that. And it struck me as a kind of expression of that idea -- somehow the problem is not with the people who are attacking us, the problem is with us. If we'll just adjust our attitude seems to be the idea. We just do a little mental adjustment here, things will go well. Well, I think it just fits with what Dick is saying. This is kind of left-wing foolishness that certainly isn't appropriate for someone who would seek to be Commander-in-Chief. (Applause.)

Lynne Cheney "gets it," as do most Americans. But not Senator Kerry--his foreign policy was formed by "channeling" Jimmy Carter, probably immediately after the President survived that unprovoked attack by a mysterious "killer rabbit." So here's a tutorial on the Dem's foolish EURO-foreign policy.

1. Democrats are the party of appeasement. Here's Kerry accepting the Dem nomination:

   And as President, I will bring back this nation's time-honored tradition: the United States of America never goes to war because we want to, we only go to war because we have to.

   Writing in the August 1st WaPo, Robert Kagan pronounced Kerry's approach both callous and radical:

   Kerry's "doctrine of necessity," if seriously intended, would entail a pacifism and an isolationism more thorough than any attempted by a U.S. government since the 1930s. It would rule out all wars fought for humanitarian ends, all interventions to prevent genocide, to defend democracy or even, as in the case of the Persian Gulf War, to uphold international law against aggression. For those are all wars of choice.

2. Dems are dutiful toward Europe, who invented appeasement. Listen lead, spelled out by Javier Solana, the EU's foreign policy chief, who:

   warned against an over-reaction in the European Union following the bomb attacks in Madrid on 11 March. . . The fight against terrorism "must be carried out with various instruments. We need better co-operation between police, justice and intelligence services. We must expose the financial sources of international terrorism and raise the safety of our public transport." . . .Mr Solana said "Europe does not find itself at war.

   Moreover, as I argued in March:

   Britain aside, Europe won't stand on principle. They have none. The continent was content to accommodate Hitler--so long as it didn't cut-off the course of coffee and croissants (think Sartre during the occupation at Les Deux Magots). Western European democracies counseled U.S.-Soviet detente--and ignored the peoples of Hungary (1956) and Czechoslovakia (1968). No, Europe's "strategy" is nothing more than long-term bribery of its enemies (Barbary Pirates for 400 years, West Germany to Soviet Russia for 40). [So] Europe's spinelessness has been S.O.P. for more than a millennium.

3. Appeasement doesn't work.The spiritual leader of appeasement, Neville Chamberlain (British Prime Minister 1937-40) proclaimed "peace for our time." Unfortunately, as US News and World Reports senior writer observes: "In the short run, appeasement seems the more conciliatory, thoughtful, nuanced way to deal with terrorists. But in the long run, it tends not to work." And so Chamberlain's peace endured only 11 more months, at the expense of Czechs, Poles, Belgians, Netherlanders, Norwegians, French, British and Americans. Surrender doesn't prevent war; it perpetuates it.
   
   Parents instinctively knows this. Children don't always listen to reason. Children often ignore parents where talk is not backed by appropriate punishment. Kids so raised probably can parlay--but they've never learned that parlay is more effective when backed with a credible threat of force, as Mark Steyn explains:

   A neighbour of mine refuses to let her boy play with "militaristic" toys. So when a friend gave the l'il tyke a plastic sword and shield, mom mulled it over and then took away the former and allowed him to keep the latter. And for a while, on my drive down to town, I'd pass Junior in the yard playing with his shield, mastering the art of cowering more effectively against unseen blows. That's how the "peace" crowd thinks the West should fight terrorism: eschew the sword, but keep the shield if you absolutely have to. . . .
   
   That's why the EU let hundreds of thousands of Bosnians and Croats die on its borders until the Americans were permitted to step in. That's why the fact that thousands of Iraqis are no longer being murdered by their government is trivial when weighed against the use of Anglo-American military force required to effect their freedom. "Never again" has evolved to mean precisely the kind of passivity that enabled the Holocaust first time round. "Neville again" would be a better slogan. .

   Current Dems promoting a combination of "appeasement" and "just let Muslims alone" forget that, until September 11th, America did just that--and failed:

   Radical Islam didn't suddenly materialize three years ago. Muslim terrorists have been murdering Americans and at war with America for two decades. On various occasions, appeasement's been tried, by President Reagan in Beirut and for eight years under President Clinton. But Islam kept coming; American inaction was never enough.

4. Appeasement's outdated. Appeasement fractures in the presence of weapons of mass destruction. The possibility that radical Muslim terrorists and/or extreme Islamic countries have or may soon develop nuclear, chemical or biological weapons demands new doctrines. Today, the United States must be able to "preempt" an attack when warranted--or face annihilation from anywhere.

To summarize the weaknesses in Kerry's appeasement and/or disengagement proposal: it's a cold-hearted and radical shift that would prevent timely intervention to halt genocide; it's based on millennium of European failures; and it's failed to promote peace.

Some voters claim a visceral hatred for President Bush. Ignore that for a second; I've got a deal for you. In the second term, Mrs. Cheney becomes #2 on the National Security team, and Mrs Bush becomes Secretary of Education. On November 2nd, vote--check the box, tap the light pen, punch-out the chad, whatever--for Bush and Cheney, which includes Laura and Lynne. That will keep the country safe and your conscious clear, all without having to lie back and think of England.