THE END CAN ALWAYS JUSTIFIES THE MEANS:

Confidence Man: The case for Bush is the case against him. (William Saletan, March 4, 2004, Slate)

How can Kerry persuade moderates to throw out Bush? By turning the president's message against him. Bush is steady and principled. He believes money is better spent by individuals than by the government. He believes the United States should assert its strength in the world. He believes public policy should respect religious faith. Most Americans share these principles and think Bush is sincere about them. The problem Bush has demonstrated in office is that he has no idea how to apply his principles in a changing world. He's a big-picture guy who can't do the job.

From foreign to economic to social policy, Bush's record is a lesson in the limits and perils of conviction. He's too confident to consult a map. He's too strong to heed warnings and too steady to turn the wheel when the road bends. He's too certain to admit error, even after plowing through ditches and telephone poles. He's too preoccupied with principle to understand that principle isn't enough. Watching the stars instead of the road, he has wrecked the budget and the war on terror. Now he's heading for the Constitution. It's time to pull him over and take away the keys. [...]

Bush was right to go to war against the terrorists who struck us on 9/11. He was right to demand the overdue use of force against the scofflaw Iraqi regime. But he couldn't tell the difference between the two threats. He figured that since both Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden were evil, they had to be connected. Saddam must have helped orchestrate the 9/11 attacks. He must have built weapons of mass destruction to sell to al-Qaida. [...]

Bush was right to propose tax cuts in 1999. The economy was booming. The surplus was ballooning. Liberals were itching to spend the money on new programs, despite Bill Clinton's promises to pay down the national debt. Bush wanted to get the money out of Washington before that happened. That's why, under his plan, the size of the tax cut was to grow from year to year. The point was to keep the surplus from piling up, refunding more and more money as it poured in from a growing economy. That's also why Bush cut taxes across the board instead of targeting middle-class families who would spend the money immediately. He wasn't trying to stimulate the economy. He was trying to give the money back to the people who had paid it in, which meant largely the rich.

Then everything changed. [...]

When Bush banned federal funding of research on new embryonic stem cell lines, he said sufficient research could proceed because "more than 60 genetically diverse stem cell lines already exist." Bush's HHS secretary, Tommy Thompson, said of the 60 lines, "They're diverse, they're robust, they're viable for research." In truth, nobody knew whether the cell lines were diverse, robust, or viable. To date, only 15 have been made available, and no one knows how many more will turn out to be usable. But Bush hasn't budged. [...]

Now, to save the family, Bush proposes to monkey with the Constitution. Why is this necessary? Because conservative states might be forced to honor gay marriages performed in liberal states, says Bush. [...]

President Bush. Strength and confidence. Steady leadership in times of change. He knows exactly where he wants to lead this country. And he won't let facts, circumstances, or the Constitution get in his way.

This is a terribly peculiar essay in its seeming argument that one's core principles should yield to the circumstances of the moment. If it was good to remove Saddam why wait for ironclad evidence of a tie to al Qaeda? If it's good to return money to tax--payers why worry about a transitory economic slowdown? If life needs to be protected who cares how many stem cell lines there are? If letting gays marry would destroy one of the key institutions of Western Civilization why not stop it? Of what use are principles if you can always cut them to fit the fashion of the day?

Posted by Orrin Judd at March 6, 2004 11:12 PM