Wall Street Journal
Edited to get to the money quotes.
America has seen this before, seen Krushchev bang his shoe on the table and say "We will bury you." We grew up watching our flag being burned on TV. So it's tempting to think this is part of a meaningless continuum.
But the temperature of the world is very high, and maybe we're not stuck in a continuum but barreling down a dark corridor. The problem with heated words now is that it's not the old world anymore. In the old world, incompetent governments dragged cannons through the mud to set up a ragged front. Now every nut and nation wants, has or is trying to develop nukes.
Harsh words inspire the unstable.
Coolants are needed. Here is an idea. Don't try to ignore Chavez, answer him. With the humility that comes with deep confidence, with facts, and with some humor, too.
There is an opportunity for the Democratic Party. Some Democrats responded with spirited indignation the day after Chavez spoke. It was rousing. But Chavez's charges were grave, and he claimed America's abuses could be tracked back a century. If the Democrats seek to speak for America, why not start with a serious and textured response, one that isn't a political blast-back but a high-minded putting forward of facts? This would take guts, and farsightedness. Rebutting a wild-eyed man who says you can find redemption reading Noam Chomsky is a little too much like rebutting a part of your base.
Which is why Rangel and Pelosi are being villified as traitors to the cause on the Angry Left websites even as we speak. Sad to say, but even most of the grownups in the Dem party (and there are some)are afraid of the moonbats and of Soros' millions.
As for the administration, it is so in the habit of asserting, defending and repeating, it barely remembers how to persuade and appeal. It speaks starkly and carries a big stick. It feels so beleaguered on a daily basis, and so snakebit, that even its mildest players have taken refuge in gritting their teeth and tunneling on. They take comfort in this: They think Chavez helps them. See what we're up against? But that's not a response, it's a way not to respond. It doesn't help, because it doesn't even try to cool things down. Which is no good, because the temperature of the world is very high. |