john kerry had been tough-talking (if vaguely) enough for me up to now to ease my doubts to the point that i put a kerry-edwards bumpersticker on my car.

then came the first debate.

i "watched" it on radio and thought bush had won on substance and style.

the kerry campaign's decision to draw out their candidate's distinctions with the president on foreign policy erased the vagueness, and the tough talk.

i was distrubed by what i heard and would have voted for bush that night. i got a copy of the transcript to make sure i had not misheard or remembered things out of context. there it was: a "global test" for american military intervention, reaching out to "moderate" muslim nations, pounding the president's failure to go back to the u.n. for yet another resolution on iraq, for not building a "meaningful" coalition.

these are antithetical to everything this page has advocated for 2 1/2 years.

and a new concern: kerry wants bilateral talks with north korea, a subject i thought was closed. i had always thought that there was consensus that bilateral talks were just what kim il jong wanted and that we benefited enormously by having others, most notably china, at the table with us.

off came the kerry bumpersticker.

then i picked up a copy of newsweek and in a little boxed article on page 8 was the news that some pentagon planners were working on "regime change" in syria and iran (conventional war almost out of the question, covert destabilization more likely).

that's more like what i've wanted. my bitter criticism of the bushies has been that they haven't done ENOUGH war-making, not that they've done too much. it's hard for me to justify the iraq war unless it was to be the first step in a broader civilizational battle.

then today's cover story in the times magazine: "really. what does he think? john kerry and the post 9/11 world."

it couldn't have been worse for me. kerry said 9/11 hadn't really changed him. further,we are not in a war at all, forget with islam, not even in a war on terrorism, according to richard holbroke, a plausible kerry secretary of state designee. the thing we should be doing is treating al qaeda like a particularly dangerous drug cartel, i.e. as a law enforcement issue, not a military one.

"we are not in civilizational war said kerry in a speech at u.c.l.a. in march." missed that one.

this page has always advocated caution on american military intervention. i have argued that a new doctrine is needed that establishes the threshold at a "direct threat to our national security" rather than the squishier one of our "national interest." i have opposed the use of american military power in bosnia and somalia. but i have argued that when the conditions are met that then we should adopt the powell doctrine of overwhelming force.

i believe that we are at war (a different kind, admittedly) with islam and that to win this war the entire islamic world (that means saudi arabia and pakistan too) must be changed and that american military power will be needed to effect this change.

neither political party has all of this that i'm looking for, no wing of either party does, but given kerry's "clarification" of his positions on these issues i am much closer philosophically to george bush and the republicans.


-benjamin harris