Some More Stray Thoughts on Syria

In no particular order:

• Unless there is some serious head-faking going on--and I doubt that there is--maybe it's not such a great idea for our government to leak its operational plans. Of course, the leaking shouldn't surprise us; the Obama administration continues to believe, apparently, that telling national security secrets out of school is a bad thing unless it is being done to make the president look good in the eyes of the general public.
• Like all good dissents, this one will likely turn into a majority opinion relatively soon.
• All of the sudden, illegal wars are all the rage. I am shocked--shocked!--to contemplate that this might have something to do with a Democratic president getting the kind of pass no Republican president would get in similar circumstances.

Someone Please Listen to Ramesh Ponnuru

Comme d'habitude, he makes a lot of sense:

Newt Gingrich is telling Republicans not to fear a government shutdown because the last one went so well for them. This is pure revisionist history, and they would be fools to believe him.

Some Republicans are urging the party to refuse to back any legislation to keep the government operating unless funding for President Barack Obama’s health-care overhaul is stopped. Other Republicans say this tactic will fail, citing the conventional wisdom that the government shutdowns of 1995-96 helped President Bill Clinton and hurt congressional Republicans.

The former speaker of the House is off message, or rather is revealing a contradiction in the political strategy of his current allies. Their public line is that any shutdown would be the unfortunate product of Democrats’ obstinate refusal to give in to the Republican demand to defund Obamacare. But it’s not easy to convey that message when prominent Republicans are saying that shutdowns are good for their party.

More important, Gingrich’s current spin on the events of 1995-96 is just wrong. The election of a Republican Congress in 1994 put government spending on a lower trajectory, as the election of a Republican House did again in 2010. Whether the shutdowns contributed to that result is a different matter.

The irony, of course, is that Gingrich is a historian by training--as he so often reminds us. I can get better history lessons from a coffee table, and for that matter, so can the current batch of congressional Republicans.

Thank Goodness that Charles Krauthammer Can Strategize, Because Many Republicans Can't.

There is talk amongst Republicans about forcing a government shutdown in order to defund Obamacare. Krauthammer shows why the idea should be a complete non-starter:

This is nuts. The president will never sign a bill defunding the singular achievement of his presidency. Especially when he has control of the Senate. Especially when, though a narrow 51 percent majority of Americans disapproves of Obamacare, only 36 percent favors repeal. President Obama so knows he’ll win any shutdown showdown that he’s practically goading the Republicans into trying.

Never make a threat on which you are not prepared to deliver. Every fiscal showdown has redounded against the Republicans. The first, in 1995, effectively marked the end of the Gingrich revolution. The latest, last December, led to a last-minute Republican cave that humiliated the GOP and did nothing to stop the tax hike it so strongly opposed.

Those who fancy themselves tea party patriots fighting a sold-out cocktail-swilling establishment are demanding yet another cliff dive as a show of principle and manliness.

But there’s no principle at stake here. This is about tactics. If I thought this would work, I would support it. But I don’t fancy suicide. It has a tendency to be fatal.

As for manliness, the real question here is sanity. Nothing could better revive the fortunes of a failing, flailing, fading Democratic administration than a government shutdown where the president is portrayed as standing up to the GOP on honoring our debts and paying our soldiers in the field.

How many times must we learn the lesson? You can’t govern from one house of Congress. You need to win back the Senate and then the presidency. Shutting down the government is the worst possible way to get there. Indeed, it’s Obama’s fondest hope for a Democratic recovery.

I would only add that the GOP is not bothering to sell the American public on alternatives to Obamacare--and yes, excellent alternatives can be adopted and should be pointed to in order to show that Republicans have a plan on health care reform. Ramesh Ponnuru and Yuval Levin took the time to craft such a plan. (Ponnuru, it should be noted, is on Krauthammer's--and my--side in saying that any effort to force a government shutdown in order to defund Obamacare is a terrible idea that will backfire on Republicans.) If Republicans want to replace Obamacare, it would be helpful if they could point to an actual plan that would serve as an acceptable substitute. Until they do so, their efforts against Obamacare will be quixotic at best.