War Party Intramurals

El Presidente's National Security Adviser is a young-looking fellow named Stephen Hadley. He's been defending his boss lately:

Hadley said the intelligence Bush used for those arguments "was roughly the same intelligence that the Clinton administration saw."

"They drew the conclusion that Saddam Hussein was a threat to peace, that he had weapons of mass destruction. They acted against him militarily in 1998," Hadley said, referring to the administration of Bill Clinton, a Democrat.

Leaving aside the amusement value of a Republican operative defending Republican actions on the grounds that they are the same thing the Democrats had also been doing, Mr. Hadley's words are also useful for underlining the fraudulent nature of the simulated conflict between the Elephant and Donkey wings of the War Party. He's right: Imperial war policy really is perfectly bipartisan. The ferociously warlike words of Mr. Kerry, during the 2004 campaign, and of Howard Dean, since taking over the Donkey Caucus, are two good examples of the Unholy Alliance. I've heard Elephant partisans demand assent that it surely was a good thing that when 9-11 came around, Al Gore had not been elected; and I've heard Donkey Caucus folk say the opposite: that Mr. Gore would not have presided over Bush's gory and futile war. I'm reasonably sure, though, that if Mr. Gore had become the Emperor in 2000, pretty much exactly the same thing would have happened. Just blank out the names in the news stories, and it becomes nearly impossible to tell which beast, the pachyderm of the jackass, was triumphant the last time Americans held their civic charade of futility.

Mr. Hadley again:

"We need to put this debate behind us," he said. "It's unfair to the country. It's unfair to the men and women in uniform risking their lives to make this country safe."

I notice that, in his photo on the CNN site, Mr. Hadley looks relatively youthful and fit. In fact, he'd look very good in desert camo. He could show some fairness to those "young men and women" by taking the place of some lucky soldier.