I think Ezra gets it just about all right in his attempt to understand the mystery that is Chuck Hagel.As far as I can tell, Ezra thinks that Hagel’s biggest challenge willbe finding a "constituency for a sober foreign policyrealist." This may be true, but I think it’s part of a much biggerproblem for Chuck Hagel: G.W.F. Hegel.
Of course, Hegel won’t be running for president. But his shadow will be hanging all over the GOP primary. A while back, TNR’s Jeffrey Herf explained how Condi Rice in particular, and the Bush admin in general, have adopted a troublingly Hegelian view of history:
Theidea that a decision cannot be judged at the moment but onlyretrospectively opens a slippery slope of justification. The futureSecretary of State was indulging an understanding of politics favoredby advocates of a Hegelian view of history—most of whom have, in thelast century, been communists.
…The capacity of history to absolve political actors is a cynical andimmoral doctrine. No one can know for sure how political decisions willturn out. Iraq may emerge as a stable democracy. Yet that fact wouldnot justify having gone to war in spring 2003 based on false premises.It would not excuse the woeful lack of preparation for battle after themajor combat operations. Nor would such success justify the use oftorture. Nor would it absolve the leading officials of the Bushadministration, including Rice, who declined to share theiruncertainties about the facts in Iraq with the public. Nor would itexcuse their decision to allow rampant speculation that Saddam hadsomething to do with September 11 to percolate among Americans. Norwould it render moot their assertions, made with far more confidencethan the facts allowed, that the threat was so imminent that a warcould not be delayed until fall 2003 or spring 2004.
Simply put, the Hegelian view of history is what explains the modern GOP’sobsession with striking poses for history’s watching camera. It is theconviction that there can be no such thing as accountability in thepresent, history will provide absolution.
This is exactly the spirit that Republican leaders have invoked tosidestep questions about why we went to war, whether we planned for itadequately, whether our use of torture is morally problematic, etc.What we are doing will put us on the right side of history, they claim- and it will put critics on the wrong side. To them, history’s vote isthe only one that matters. And when you convince an entire chunk of theelectorate to think this way, your chances of getting them to embrace acritique are next to nil.
The appealing thing about Hagel, to Democrats, is that he seems toembrace American mistakes as opportunites to do better, to right a shipthat’s gone off course. But to Republicans, who are focused chiefly onvindicating themselves instead of improving themselves, this view isanathema. This, I think, will be Hagel’s biggest challenge in apresidential primary: Convincing Republican voters that a sensible,realist critique of American policy can jibe with their need tosuppress dissent and criticism, in case Doris Kearns Goodwin iswatching.
