The president, as he revealed last week, doesn't think he can win the war on terrorism. That's a bit of an off-message remark for a man whose re-election campaign is predicated on the notion that only he can win the war on terrorism. Worse, the statement suggests the president has only a passing familiarity with the generally accepted meaning of the term "war on terrorism." Then again, we already knew he wasn't very bright.
Even stranger than this, however, is what the president said he thinks is possible: "I think you can create conditions so that those who use terror as a tool are less acceptable in parts of the world."
Total victory may indeed be setting the bar too high, but is it so unreasonable to expect the president to promise that his policies will reduce the incidence of terrorism, mitigating the problem if not solving it? Apparently so. George W. Bush not only won't bring us total safety, he won't even make us safer -- instead he'll make those who threaten us "less acceptable." He won't thwart their efforts to achieve their goals -- the imposition of a neo-fundamentalist Caliphate on the Islamic world followed by God knows what -- he'll simply discourage them from "using terror as a tool" to advance that goal. It's a starkly pessimistic vision, and a strikingly solipsistic one: a promise to wage a war on terrorism not in the real world of slaughtered schoolchildren, oppressed women, tumbling office towers, and deadly roadside bombs, but in our heads. The terrorists may accomplish their goals, and they may kill Americans, but it will be "less acceptable" for them to do so. At least in "parts of the world."
This retreat from policymaking in the world to policymaking in our heads is not an especially rare lapse. During the 2000 primary elections Bush explained that his favorite political philosopher was Jesus Christ, not because his teachings guided Bush's decisions about what to do in the world but because he "changed [Bush's] heart." That's nice for Bush, but what about the rest of us? He's repeatedly explained the virtues of his domestic policy not in terms of any beneficial impact on the American people -- job losses, rising healthcare costs, and record deficits are hard to spin as beneficial -- but because they're "compassionate" policies. Again, good for him, but I'd rather have policies that work than policies that are well-intentioned.
In his recent interview with Larry King the president expressed confidence in his re-election bid. The American people, he said, are "beginning to understand my deep desire to spread liberty around the world." Look around the world, though: Liberty isn't spreading, it's retreating. It had occurred to me, in light of that fact, to doubt the sincerity of Bush's oft-expressed "deep desire" to advance the cause of freedom, but this isn't really the point. A president who wants to make people free does no one any good unless he does make them free.
Being president isn't -- or, at least, shouldn't be -- about what you say you're doing or think you're doing; it should be about what you're actually doing.
The president we've got, though, doesn't see it that way. He won't win the war on terrorism or even make it less likely that terrorists will kill you. He'll just make terrorism less acceptable, winning the war in the Platonic realm of Forms while losing it here on earth.
It's a strange attitude, but it explains a lot.
Consider the case of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of a Sunni fundamentalist terrorist group that alternates between cooperating with al-Qaeda and competing with it for followers. Before we invaded, Zarqawi was known to operate in Iraq's northern "no-fly zone" outside of Saddam Hussein's area of control. Why not attack him and eliminate his bases? At the time I assumed our failure to do so was a cynical ploy to build political support for the Iraq War by allowing Bush to claim, quasi-truthfully, that terrorists were operating "in Iraq." After the war, we'd be sure to take care of it. But we haven't. Zarqawi has gone on to kill many more people since the invasion than he ever did before, but right now he's sitting in Fallujah -- as he has been for quite some time -- unmolested by U.S. forces, who've abandoned efforts to control central and western Iraq despite the presence of one of America's most deadly adversaries.
It's hard to explain until you understand that the president doesn't think preventing terrorist attacks are important. What matters is making them less acceptable. That is an important goal. Terrorism shouldn't be acceptable. But it would also be nice if it didn't happen. Or else if it at least happened less often. Or happened just as often but was less deadly. But Bush wouldn't want to set the bar too high. So while you may wind up dead, you can at least comfort yourself with the knowledge that, in the future, your death will no longer be acceptable. At least in "parts of the world." Comforting, isn't it?
Matthew Yglesias is a Prospect staff writer.
