The Cindy Sheehan Rorschach Test
The vigil of Cindy Sheehan outside President Bush's Crawford, Texas ranch has come to embody all the anger and division of the increasingly counterproductive American debate over Iraq. Sheehan, whose son Casey was killed in Iraq, says she wants to meet again with President Bush to ask him, "why did you kill my son?" But while she is lionized by the left and vilified by the right, Washington fiddles and Baghdad burns.
The reaction to Sheehan by the Bush White House is one of predictable cowardice. To sustain the effort in Iraq in the face of growing casualties, evaporating war rationales and chaos on the ground, President Bush simply cannot allow the American people to put a human face on the suffering and the sacrifice. That's why there are no photos of soldiers' coffins, no Bush oratory at military funerals, no ceremonies at Dover Air Force Base and, certainly no military draft. And that's why Bush will avoid a one-on-one meeting with Sheehan.
Bush's goose-stepping allies among his conservative amen corner, however, are showing no such indifference towards Cindy Sheehan. Right-wing rumor merchant Matt Drudge published out-of-context comments from Sheehan that supposedly reflected praise for the President. Two days later, Bill O'Reilly said other military families view Sheehan's actions as "treasonous." Michelle Malkin, his guest on The Factor and enthusiastic advocate for internment both in World War II and today, chose instead to channel Sheehan's dead son, "I can’t imagine that Casey Sheehan would approve of such behavior."
But while conservatives predictably savage Sheehan, many on the left are just as predictably making her the poster child for their opposition to the war. A cottage industry has emerged, including a "Meet with Cindy" web site and petition to President Bush. Former Howard Dean Internet czar Joe Trippi made an online plea for people to help Sheehan. And the gamut of liberal blogs, including many Perrspectives' favorites such as DailyKos, Atrios, AmericaBlog and Crooks and Liars, have taken up her cause.
But championing Sheehan's cause and showing sympathy for her loss is no substitute for a strategy for Iraq. Democrats and those to the left of center no less than those on the right need to articulate a path forward in Iraq.
President Bush's rush to war may have been ill-conceived, ill-prepared and now clearly unjustifiable, but the question for progressives of all stripes is what to do now. The administration, at least, has a course for Iraq, albeit for one headed for disaster: increasing chaos in Iraq accompanied by a draw-down of U.S. troops to followed nonetheless by a declaration of victory.
As I've written before, Americans first need to a consensus definition of "success" in Iraq and decide whether or not it is still possible. (I would argue that success in Iraq now means creating sufficient stability to avoid producing the next Somalia, or worse, Afghanistan.) If we believe that "victory" is still possible, we must make the necessary sacrifices (including more, not fewer, troops for the foreseeable future). If not, we should pull out now. In any event, the United States must signal its intentions regarding Iraqi sovereignity, military bases and oil to the region and the world. Conservatives refuse to make the tough decisions; progressives should do better.
Sadly for now, the entire Iraq debate seems to have become symbolized by the grief of single soldier's mother. For the forces of the left and right, Cindy Sheehan has become a Rorschach Test for America's Iraq policy. People see what they want to see. Unfortunately, the partisan venom and media circus in Crawford aren't making the true picture of our Iraq strategy any clearer.
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