It's About Acting Tough, Not Talking Tough Posted by Ilan Goldenberg

There’s been an annoying paradox for the past year where Democrats maintain a significant lead in the polls on Iraq but are far behind on keeping America safe.  As part of the usual paranoia of looking weak a number of Dems have argued that putting in place a timeline and confronting the President is only going to make this problem worse.  But could it be that the fact that the Democrats are standing up to the President and showing some backbone is actually having the opposite effect?  Might it actually be making them look tough thus driving up their security numbers?  I think it’s a distinct possibility. 

A Democracy Corps poll released today (PDF) had Democrats trailing Republicans by only 6 points on the question of which party do respondents associate with keeping people safe.  That is down significantly (PDF) from a similar question around election time where the spread was 13 (For full disclosure the questions were worded slightly differently).  Still, 6 points is the smallest the gap has been in quite a while.

So what’s going on here?  Here’s one theory.  The Iraq numbers are based on policy and a statement of the obvious.  The situation is bad and everyone knows it.  Democrats are the party of change.  They win on that issue hands down.   But keeping people safe is a gut question.  Who is tougher?  Who makes me feel safer?  Bush and Giuliani do well on this metric because they are seen as willing to stand up, take a position and stick with it.  Kerry had problems because of the whole flip flop image.  It could be that the fact that Democrats are showing some backbone and standing up to the President is actually more important than what they are saying.  They are acting tough and showing some real conviction.  For the first time in four years you don’t see “Democrats have no plan” stories all over the media. 

This whole thing could still blow up, but I’m thinking that in this case being tough and being right are one and the same.

Comments

[HeatherH]

Over at US in the World we just commissioned a review of more than five years of public opinion on national security issues -- 200+ polls and focus groups. One of the findings was that perhaps "tough" is actually not the relevant category anymore, having been discredited as you say by fruitless tough posturing, which would account for that huge swing in party perception.

Of course, then you look at the gulf in perception between the parties that the Democracy Corps poll shows (75% of Republicans supporting Bush on Iraq vs 90% of Dems disapproving) and you realize that what we can say about the country as a whole is pretty darn limited.

[JRBehrman]

This is entirely correct. Everybody knows, as the pollsters put it, that the US is "on the wrong track" in Iraq ... and the world.

But, the question of confidence in my party -- I am a Democratic ward heeler -- to make things better is a whole 'nother kettle of fish. Democrats were and, in some conspicuous cases, still are utterly complicit in this war and indeed pretty much everything since 1948.

So, in looking for change, voters have to look for a break with the cartoonish, "won't anybody think about the children", "cringing" and "reactionary" liberals who have never single-handedly terminated a single defense program for all their whining.

That is why Jim WEBB's "different direction" speech was so very effective.

My concern is that the pork-ridden supplemental with mere verbiage that the President can so obviously veto or just ignore will confirm the public's worst fears about and low opinion of the Congress, Democratic or otherwise.

It is true that House Democrats cannot both "cut off funding for the war" and "support the troops". The defense budget way too "metastatic" for that.

But, House Democrats can need not authorize, say, the F-22 at all and should not appropriate one red dime for one more "rivet". That would conspicuously stop the production dead, close the GOCO facility in Marietta Georgia, and break the "Treaty of Miami". It would be "shock and awe" inside the Beltway.

The GOP used swagger, arrogance, and extremism to fool even skeptical people into thinking that "at least" they were "determined" and "meant what they said" in contrast with the mush-mouthed "hold harmless" Democrats.

I think Democrats need to be quiet, business-like and rather cold-blooded in the use of their veto-proof negative power to originate spending authorization and appropriation bills or not. We should savage the agro-military welfare state and academic-financial industrial complex that has nothing to do with the "the troops" or the war but everything to do with our political and economic elite.

It is true there will be collateral damage -- a good Democratic shop steward in Fort Worth, say, -- will complain. The DLC will scream to high heaven. But, we will and should spend a little more money on some things our armed forces really need.

I do not agree with BACEVICH today that "(i)n an age of the citizen as consumer-spectator, Americans care enough to complain, but not nearly enough to act."

The only action the demobilized and unarmed electorate with two weak parties competing for money, not votes, have available is look away as the DLC + DSCC + DCCC try to buy themselves an election instead of a spine.

[Matt W.]

As we all know, the Democrats are experts at snatching defeat out of the jaws of victory. I do agree with you that right now perception is everything, and the Democrats benefit by appearing tough, but that will soon wear thin. People are looking for results, not sound bytes.

[Don Bacon]

Excellent thread and comments.
The Dems have a window of opportunity--but will they seize it? Or will it be business as usual.

1. America's chief enemies are not Islamic anythings, they are the neocon cabal that has taken over the US government from our liberal traditions, and even from our conservative traditions for that matter. The principal enemies of the American people are in the White House and the people who enable them.

2. These evil people, with their destructive foreign policy, have decreased not increased America's security. This is reflected in world polls, and the fact, cited by the CIA, that Americans are now more at risk of terrorist attacks.

3. It IS possible to end these wars AND 'support the troops'. In fact, ending the wars is THE way to support the troops who don't want to go back to the hellhole of Iraq where everyone over the age of ten years is a potential enemy. These courageous people have to suffer the possibility of death, dismemberment, psychological impairment, divorce, suicide and homelessness from our 'support'. Stop it already.

4. The US Constitution gives the Congress, not the president, power to provide for the common defense. This is a Dem congress. It is their war.

5. So as Ilan and John say, the Democratic Party must be the party of change. Afer all they, together with the Repubs, have made third parties virtually impossible in America so what choice do we have if they don't give us one? So, Dems, give us a choice--you owe us that. Turn into a bunch of bobbing dolls and America goes down the toilet, and, as Matt says, so do you. The idea that Dems can win in 2008 as they did in 2006 by letting things go bad is a losing strategy. Losing for the Dems and also for America.

P.S. JRB--we need to hear more from you. You speak with much truth and you are in the Dem system--how do we compete with K street for Dem pol attention?

[Zathras]

I don't mean to beat a dead horse here, or specifically to go on at great length on a theme I've sounded before. The fact remains that is has been many years since foreign policy and national security affairs were salient issues for the organized interests that dominate Democratic Party politics, and consequently for national Democratic politicians.

Sounding tough is fine; I have myself often wondered why Democrats were always so reactive to President Bush and so reluctant to challenge him personally. But this really isn't just a matter of tone. You can't beat something with nothing; you won't persuade the American public that you care about national security until you start showing some interest in national security.

Obviously this doesn't matter so much to voters, and campaign contributors, whose priorities are abortion, blocking legislation that might limit lawsuits, removing obstacles to union organizing, protecting movie and music copyrights or supporting gay marriage. Support from such voters, plus voters who are passionate about a few other parochial domestic causes, has been enough to win low-turnout Democratic primaries in the past. In the long run, though, Democrats won't sustain a public image of being strong on national security and foreign affairs if the only subject in that field they seem passionate about is support of Israel. And before Iraq really turned sour in terms of public opinion in the United States, that was pretty much the case.

Democrats also need to deal with the foreign policy legacy of the last Democratic administration. The crippling of the State Department, the atrophy of our foreign aid programs and public diplomacy, the rapid growth of the Pentagon as a foreign policy instrument -- these were all well underway during Bill Clinton's first term (and only the last has really gotten worse under Bush). There is also the matter of the Clinton administration's inaction over the course of years as al Qaeda grew and prospered.

If Democrats want to turn their backs on that legacy that is fine; I'd certainly recommend it. They can't do that, though, while telling each other that all that is really needed is to go back to the way the Clinton administration did things. Right now Democrats get a hearing from Americans who do not vote in low-turnout party primaries for one reason, and one reason only: the mess the Bush administration has gotten the country into in Iraq. They'd better have something to say, and it had better make sense, or the "bump" Democrats are now getting in public opinion polls won't amount to anything more than that.

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