Masculine Femininity

George Will today claims that the Democrats have rediscovered the virtues of masculinity, leading them to support Sen. John Kerry. Kerry seems to me to have decided long ago, on foreign policy, to be decisively passive. To be militantly inactive. He came back to dishonestly oppose Vietnam, supposedly on the basis of massive US war crimes. He opposed Reagan's "illegal war in Central America," which helped lead to democracy in that part of the world.

He opposed the first Gulf War, arguing for giving sanctions time to work, for up to 12 or 18 months, knowing full well that a president could almost never launch an offensive between his convention and an election. Kerry argued that sanctions would weaken Saddam's army, while our half-million men and women then deployed could stay out there indefinitely. Having served in Vietnam, he evidently never felt the need to look at a map of Korea.

Kerry, like the French whom James Taranto believes he resembles, has discovered the virtues of langor. Far easier to order up another Manhattan Iced Tea than to actually commit action.

Kerry would like us to believe that his military service alone is somehow important. True, he didn't run away to the slopes like Dean. He served with distinction, and put himself in harm's way, and for that service he's due the extraordinary thanks any veteran gets. But the presidency is about leadership and leadership is about judgment. Were it up to Kerry, Danny Ortega would still be running Nicaragua, and Saddam Hussien would be not only in Baghdad, but also Kuwait City. At least.

George McGovern was a war hero, too. He piloted bombers over Europe. Steven Ambrose wrote a book about him. None of that mattered when he proposed fatal weakness in our foreign policy. It shouldn't matter now.