Endorsements, Such As They Are

I admit to being caught off guard and not a little nonplussed at Christopher Hitchens's apparent endorsement of Kerry in Slate last week. He now tells us he meant to endorse no one:

The late Lillian Hellman was a ghastly piece of goods in numberless ways, but she did still have a percentage of courage and wit. At a campus event quite late in her life, when asked in a whiny way by a member of the audience "why have you not endorsed gay lib?" she paused briefly. Her thick and darkened spectacles were opaque. "The forms of fucking," she finally declared, "do not require my endorsement."

That would be vaguely analogous to my view of this depressing and trivial election campaign, in which I do not in any case yet have the right, let alone the inclination, to vote.

....Sen. Kerry has made enough formal commitment to regime change in Iraq to make the prospect of his election a thinkable one, also.

....If I could choose the person whose attitude toward the immediate foe was nearest to mine, I would pick Bush (and Blair). But if I departed from the strictly subjective, and then considered the ways in which this administration has bitched things up, and further imagined what might happen to a Democratic incumbent who was compelled to get real, I could see a case the other way.

....It's absurd for liberals to talk as if Kristallnacht is impending with Bush, and it's unwise and indecent for Republicans to equate Kerry with capitulation. There's no one to whom he can surrender, is there?

So Hitch says we can live with either and he endorses neither. Weaselly, and certainly a cop out, but at least he isn't a citizen and can't vote, so he would not be able to carry out an "endorsement" - at least that's his story.

But no such mitigating factors apply to Mickey Kaus, who has written what may be the most cynical, dispirited glob of real politik sludge I have ever read by a writer I admire and/or take seriously.

Bush has virtually no appealing second term domestic agenda. Kerry's domestic plans are attractive, especially the expansion of health care coverage, plus he's uniquely positioned to defy traditional Democratic interest groups--especially unions. He doesn't owe them much --most supported his oppponents--and, thanks to the Internet, he isn't that dependent on them for campaign dollars.

Okay, he favors Kerry's domestic agenda, and the part about not being beholden to unions is interesting.

Article Author: Eric Olsen

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