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August 26, 2005
Like Father, Like Son
Speaking of Rumsfeld and Joseph P. Kennedy, I'm not the only one noticing a connection. Academic Elephant points to this exhilerating email a reader sent to The Corner, who noticed Rumsfeld's sarcastic reference to the execrable Joseph P. Kennedy's defeatism during WWII. Academic Elephant goes on to relate Rumsfeld's take on Chuck Hagel's ill-founded remarks comparing Iraq to Vietnam:
Having made this case [that the jihadist violence is not a nationalist movement like the Viet Cong], when asked subsequently, "[a]nd what do you say to Senator Chuck Hagel, a prominent Republican, Vietnam War vet, who over the weekend compared what's going on in Iraq now to the Vietnam War?" Rumsfeld could flatly dismiss the parallel: "[t]he differences are so notable that it would take too long to list them." Dana Milbank, no particular friend to the administration, admitted that Rumsfeld had "cut down the senator with one sentence."
The Vietnam meme, like other tired canards of the lib/leftists (tax cuts help the rich at the expense of the poor; Bush lied) is just a lazy way to dodge one's intellectual dishonesty.
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Comments
Thanks for the link.
The more I think about this Hagel thing the more delusional his statements seem. He's simply picked up the 04 John Kerry ("By the way I served in Vietnam") playbook. Perhaps he thinks that because he comes from the midwest and isn't married to Theresa Heinz that he won't have the same problems--but the entire strategy is fundamentally flawed. He should look at the last three election cycles--it doesn't matter if you're from MA, AZ, or GA, single, married or divorced and remarried, with kids, adopted kids or childless, the platform that "I have a special wisdom because I served in Vietnam" has not been a winner.
Now I'm no huge McCain fan, but to his credit he has realized this truth and is adjusting his strategy accordingly, and he did build up some currancy with me through his excellent convention speech last year when he mentioned Vietnam, but as a reference, not as evidence of his moral authority. Hagel has no such insight, and we will have to pity the poor man if he ever meets a Rumsfeld type, or even God forbid Rumsfeld himself, in a debate.
Posted by: AcademicElephant at August 27, 2005 10:45 AM
You said "delusional"...my own thinking in the past has not exactly been superlative, but I'm pretty sure I've managed to avoid the kind of disconnected spasmodic convulsions that pass for thought on the Left. I'm almost to the point where I say "Bring it on...let's have more", because the more they speak, more obviously ridiculous they seem.
Posted by: Jeff at August 28, 2005 01:09 AM
