A rather permanent concept<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Michael Kinsley, in an op-ed piece last week, highlighted the strangeness of the debate over the continuing war in Iraq. Or, rather, he highlighted the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2004\/12\/03\/a-rather-permanent-concept\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A rather permanent concept\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Michael Kinsley, in an op-ed piece last week, highlighted the strangeness of the debate over the continuing war in Iraq. Or, rather, he highlighted the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2004\/12\/03\/a-rather-permanent-concept\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"slacktivist\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2004-12-03T16:12:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Fred Clark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2004\/12\/03\/a-rather-permanent-concept\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2004\/12\/03\/a-rather-permanent-concept\/\",\"name\":\"A rather permanent concept\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2004-12-03T16:12:58+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2004-12-03T16:12:58+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/#\/schema\/person\/0173c85e46e7e0951fef5752bed78b6e\"},\"description\":\"Michael Kinsley, in an op-ed piece last week, highlighted the strangeness of the debate over the continuing war in Iraq. 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A former managing editor of Prism magazine, Fred worked in the parachurch nonprofit world for a decade and then for a decade in the newspaper biz. He began blogging in 2002. In 2003 he began writing a review of the best-selling Left Behind series. Eight years later he still hasn\u2019t finished reviewing the second book of that series and the experience has left him a broken shell of a man. Fred knows the difference between the possessive \u201cits\u201d and the contraction \u201cit\u2019s,\u201d and he is acutely bothered when others mistakenly confuse the two, yet he himself just kind of instinctively types the apostrophe whether or not it belongs there. Some feel this is his greatest hypocrisy, but those who know him better know better. He\u2019s guilty of much greater hypocrisies. Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. You can reach him via email at slacktivist at hotmail dot com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/author\/fredclark\/\"}]}<\/script>\n","yoast_head_json":{"title":"A rather permanent concept","description":"Michael Kinsley, in an op-ed piece last week, highlighted the strangeness of the debate over the continuing war in Iraq. 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Jesus loves Fred far more than Fred loves Jesus, but he at least has the decency to recognize the unfairness of that lopsided relationship and he has long wished that he were better at maybe kind of sort of doing something more to correct that some day. A Baptist, an amateur, a Gen-Xer, a Gemini and a Mets fan, Fred lives in Southeastern Pennsylvania with his wife and two teenage daughters. 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{"id":975,"date":"2004-12-03T16:12:58","date_gmt":"2004-12-03T16:12:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2004\/12\/03\/a-rather-permanent-concept\/"},"modified":"2004-12-03T16:12:58","modified_gmt":"2004-12-03T16:12:58","slug":"a-rather-permanent-concept","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/slacktivist\/2004\/12\/03\/a-rather-permanent-concept\/","title":{"rendered":"A rather permanent concept"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Michael Kinsley, in an op-ed piece last week<\/a>, highlighted the strangeness of the debate over the continuing war in Iraq. Or, rather, he highlighted the strange lack<\/i> of debate.<\/p>\n

Kinsley notes that today's anti-war arguments echo the pro-<\/i>war arguments from Vietnam:<\/p>\n

What seems to be today's antiwar position \u2014 it was a terrible mistake and it's a terrible mess, but we can't just walk away from it \u2014 was actually the pro-war position during Vietnam. In fact, it was close to official government policy for more than half the length of that war.<\/i><\/p>\n

Today's antiwar cause doesn't even have a movement, to speak of, let alone an agenda. It consists of perhaps 47 percent of the citizenry \u2014 the ones who voted for John Kerry \u2014 who are in some kind of existential opposition to the war but don't know what they want to do about it.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, U.S. soldiers die by the hundreds and Iraqis \u2014 military and civilian \u2014 by the thousands in a cause these people (and I'm one of them) believe to be a horrible mistake.<\/p>\n

It's an intriguing piece, so go read the whole thing<\/a>. But in challenging one aspect of the unquestioned conventional wisdom, Kinsley also reinforces another assumption of the CW \u2014 the idea that Sen. Kerry's position on the war in Iraq was not substantially different from President Bush's.<\/p>\n

This assumption arises from the similar set of vague and unpromising steps \u2014 an international summit, training more Iraqi troops more quickly \u2014 that both men suggested in response to the question, \"what next?\"<\/p>\n

As Kinsley notes, Kerry's position was not to end the adventure and bring the troops home, but:<\/p>\n

\u2026 that he would try, but not promise, to bring the troops home in four years. Four years! U.S. involvement in World War II lasted 3 1\/2.<\/i><\/p>\n

Answers to the question \"what next?\" were bound to be very similar because there simply aren't very many options left in Iraq \u2014 at least not many good ones. <\/p>\n

Yet this question \u2014 \"what next?\" \u2014 only makes sense in the larger context of another question, \"to what end?\" And in addressing that question, Kerry clearly stated what seems to be a stark and substantial difference from Bush's position.<\/p>\n

Here is what Kerry said in the first presidential debate:<\/p>\n

I think a critical component of success in Iraq is being able to convince the Iraqis and the Arab world that the United States doesn't have long-term designs on it. <\/i><\/p>\n

As I understand it, we're building some 14 military bases there now, and some people say they've got a rather permanent concept to them. <\/p>\n

When you guard the oil ministry, but you don't guard the nuclear facilities, the message to a lot of people is maybe, \"Wow, maybe they're interested in our oil.\" \u2026<\/p>\n

I will make a flat statement: The United States of America has no long-term designs on staying in Iraq.<\/p>\n

Jim Lehrer, the moderator of that first debate, did not take the opportunity to ask Bush if he would make a similar flat statement. And in the months that have followed, I have not heard anyone from the White House press corps ask him to do so either.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, those 14 bases are looking more and more permanent.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"