As is frequently the case, Jeff Lord and I disagree again,
mightily, on political strategy and tactics, even though both of us
are solidly conservative. (That’s an important point, by the way:
Differing tactical senses do not necessarily mean different degrees
of commitment to the conservative cause, much less a lack of, or
conversely proof of, principle.)
Jeff’s column the other day, full of his usual vim, vigor, and
high emotional dudgeon, accuses those who didn’t take his exact
stance on the “fiscal cliff” negotiations of showing “timidity,” of
“not taking the full measure of [the] adversary [meaning Barack
Obama],” of a “clueless inability to understand what it means to
deal with Obama,” of “simply protesting while passively accepting,”
and most of all of operating without a “long-term conservative
strategy.”
Well. Where to begin?
Try this: Maybe, Jeff, just maybe, there are those who took
other tactical positions not because they don’t have a long-term
strategy but because they do — because they look at the long term
and see better ground to fight on in the future. They may be right;
they may be wrong — but they aren’t timid. (Is Jeff Sessions
timid? Is Pat Toomey timid? Is Stephen Moore timid?) Indeed, they
might think that you, Jeff, are the one guilty of dealing with
“only the issue at hand” by treating every skirmish
as an inch of ground to die for. It is not necessarily a mark of
timidity or lack of vision that looks at the situation — as George
Will did, and as Harry Reid’s aides reportedly do from the other
side — and sees trouble ahead for Obama now that this tax fight is
over. It may be prudentially wrong and it may be prudentially right
to look at the different legal and polling circumstances and come
to different conclusions about tactics, but it is not a mark of
character or courage. Alas, Jeff seems to suggest the latter.
For instance: In the fiscal cliff deal, the tax hikes would have
been automatic if nothing were done. Policy advantage, by
law, to Obama. But when the sequester hits, it is the
spending cuts that will be automatic if nothing is done.
Advantage, by law, to conservatives who want to cut spending.
Moreover, polls showed large majorities of Americans wanting to
raise taxes on upper-income folks. Advantage by short-term politics
at least, in the fiscal cliff negotiations, to Obama. But polls
also show a large majority of Americans not wanting debt to go up
without spending cuts. Potential advantage ahead, at least by
short-term politics, to conservatives.
Those suppositions may or may not prove correct, but they are
hardly unreasonable.
This is not to say that the prudential judgment of when and
where to make the biggest stand is necessarily better one way or
the other. I myself thought throughout the morning of
Dec. 31 that it was better to give no ground in the cliff
negotiations; but then when Biden made more concessions I thought
that by a 50.1 to 49.9 margin, it was perhaps better to take the
deal and start setting up a big trap for the president involving
the March 1 sequestration deadline in which, if nothing is done,
not a single tax will automatically go up. I pledged then, and say
again, that I will very soon be publishing a plan for conducting
that coming battle in conjunction with other battles also imminent.
I will be surprised if there is a hard-liner in the country who,
when reading my plan, will think anything other than that it is
bold and tough-minded and strongly conservative. (They might think
it’s unlikely to work, or that it has holes, or have other
criticisms, but they won’t say it’s not bold, tough-minded, and
conservative.)
Again, the point is that there are different ways of choosing
when and how and where to fight, with none of those choices
necessarily being reflective of lack of vision or lack of
character. (This is not to say that Mitch McConnell and John
Boehner do have a strategic sense about all this, or
that they do see Obama as he really is, or that they do see the big
picture, or that they do have enough spine. It is just to say that
it is possible to differ on tactics without being a
turncoat or a weakling. Jeff and some other conservatives do not
appear willing to even consider that possibility, and seem all to
willing to write completely out of the conservative movement
anybody who doesn’t toe Jeff’s own particular line. As for me, I
think that, objectively speaking, the deal Mitch McConnell got was
a better deal than eventually would have passed had he not reached
out to Joe Biden. I’ve been a strong critic of McConnell at times
— without ever questioning his character — but here
I think he pulled at least a small rabbit out of a very deep hat.)
Because this isn’t a one-off battle, but a long war, there may have
been virtue in “banking some long-term gains,” which is how I seem
to remember Grover Norquist described it while saying the deal on
taxes was acceptable.
No, Jeff: This was not an Anschluss; it was a different way of
playing chess.
To use martial examples: McCarthur temporarily abandoned the
Philippines while vowing to return. Washington abandoned Manhattan
Island. The Russians being attacked by Napoleon retreated steadily
for three solid months and even abandoned Moscow. All three
retreats proved salutary in the long run. And they proved salutary,
and eventually triumphant, even though none of them featured any
important gains of long-term goals for the
retreaters, which is what the fiscal cliff deal did by finally
writing into permanent law 99 percent of the Bush tax cuts that
liberals had long opposed. In short, this deal was hardly a full
retreat, not at all in the sense that Manhattan and Moscow were.
Instead, this was a reasonably orderly withdrawal while taking
plenty of prisoners and significant enemy supplies.
Finally, let it be noted that my reluctant acceptance of the
cliff deal and this blog post itself are not mere after-the-fact
justifications or excuses for a big loss. Instead, I am doing
exactly what Jeff says conservatives should do, which is to
recognize that Obama is playing a different game from most liberals
and, in response, for conservatives to not just treat
each battle as a separate entity but instead specifically as part
of a longer struggle requiring long-term strategy. I wrote exactly
as much in the
December print edition, which I penned seven full weeks before
we reached the “cliff.” Some excerpts:
Barack Obama is not a normal politician. He’s out for blood—or,
as he told voters in the last days before the election, for
“revenge.”…. The entirety of both the political and societal
playing fields will be altered, and our side will be demonized
every time we dare set foot in the arena…. Meanwhile, we may
need to pick our battles. Even with a Republican House majority
protected via clever redistricting, we won’t be able to fight
on every front. We might need to use flanking maneuvers, political
guerrilla warfare, and pinpoint attacks rather than full frontal
charges. Yet when it comes to defending the
Constitution, or defending truly essential principles, we must be
fiercely defiant against anything Obama throws at us. If
this man in the Oval Office truly wants to transform America rather
than just reform it, he must be resisted with every legal weapon we
can muster…. Conservatives must not delude ourselves: The
2012 elections were a disaster. Barack Obama has the upper hand and
will try to use it for terrible ends. But for the many (we’ve all
heard them) who say we now are doomed, it’s time to reconsider.
We’re not in yet in perdition; we’re retraining ourselves in Valley
Forge.
It is precisely because Obama is waging a new and more dangerous
kind of war that we must not offer up a new Pickett’s Charge or
attack on Gallipoli at every opportunity. Sometimes — as Stonewall
Jackson showed at Fredericksburg, and as Meade showed at Gettysburg
— it’s better to choose excellent high ground, and then wait for
the adversary to over-extend himself in an uphill attack.
The tools for a Stonewall Jackson-type counter-assault are very
much available for conservatives in coming months. As John Paul
Jones said, we have not yet begun to fight.
