[+] The Rambo Coalition: "We heard the garbage and the lies..."

by Paul Krugman, New York Times

Almost a year ago, on the second anniversary of 9/11,
I predicted "an ugly, bitter campaign - probably the
nastiest of modern American history." The reasons I
gave then still apply. President Bush has no positive
achievements to run on. Yet his inner circle cannot
afford to see him lose: if he does, the shroud of
secrecy will be lifted, and the public will learn the
truth about cooked intelligence, profiteering,
politicization of homeland security and more.

But recent attacks on John Kerry have surpassed even
my expectations. There's no mystery why. Mr. Kerry
isn't just a Democrat who might win: his life story
challenges Mr. Bush's attempts to confuse tough-guy
poses with heroism, and bombast with patriotism.

One of the wonders of recent American politics has
been the ability of Mr. Bush and his supporters to
wrap their partisanship in the flag. Through innuendo
and direct attacks by surrogates, men who assiduously
avoided service in Vietnam, like Dick Cheney (five
deferments), John Ashcroft (seven deferments) and
George Bush (a comfy spot in the National Guard, and a
mysterious gap in his records), have questioned the
patriotism of men who risked their lives and suffered
for their country:
John McCain, Max Cleland and now John Kerry.

How have they been able to get away with it? The
answer is that we have been living in what Roger Ebert
calls "an age of Rambo patriotism." As the carnage and
moral ambiguities of Vietnam faded from memory, many
started to believe in the comforting clichés of action
movies, in which the tough-talking hero is always
virtuous and the hand-wringing types who see
complexities and urge the hero to think before acting
are always wrong, if not villains.

After 9/11, Mr. Bush had a choice: he could deal with
real threats, or he could play Rambo. He chose Rambo.
Not for him the difficult, frustrating task of
tracking down elusive terrorists, or the unglamorous
work of protecting ports and chemical plants from
possible attack: he wanted a dramatic shootout with
the bad guy. And if you asked why we were going after
this particular bad guy, who hadn't attacked America
and wasn't building nuclear weapons - or if you warned
that real wars involve costs you never see in the
movies - you were being unpatriotic.

As a domestic political strategy, Mr. Bush's posturing
worked brilliantly. As a strategy against terrorism,
it has played right into Al Qaeda's hands. Thirty
years after Vietnam, American soldiers are again dying
in a war that was sold on false pretenses and creates
more enemies than it kills.

It should come as no surprise, then, that Mr. Bush -
who must defend the indefensible - has turned to those
who still refuse to face the truth about Vietnam.

All the credible evidence, from military records to
the testimony of those who served with Mr. Kerry,
confirms his wartime heroism. Why, then, are some
veterans willing to join the smear campaign? Because
they are angry about his later statements against the
war. Yet making those statements was itself a heroic
act - and what he said then rings truer than ever.

The young John Kerry spoke of leaders who sent others
to their deaths because they wanted to seem tough,
then "left all the casualties and retreated behind a
pious shield of public rectitude." Fifteen months
after George Bush strutted around in his flight suit,
more and more Americans are echoing Gen. Anthony
Zinni, who received a standing ovation from an
audience of Marine and Navy officers when he talked
about the debacle in Iraq and said of those who served
in Vietnam: "We heard the garbage and the lies, and we
saw the sacrifice. I ask you, is it happening again?"

Mr. Kerry also spoke of the moral cost of an
ill-conceived war - of the atrocities soldiers find
themselves committing when they can't tell friend
from foe. Two words: Abu Ghraib.

Let's hope that this latest campaign of garbage and
lies - initially financed by a Texas Republican close
to Karl Rove, and running an ad featuring an
"independent" veteran who turns out to have served on
a Bush campaign committee - leads to a backlash
against Mr. Bush. If it doesn't, here's the message
we'll be sending to Americans who serve their country:
If you tell the truth, your courage and sacrifice
count for nothing.

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