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Commentary Oregon Daily Emerald Wednesday, January 12, 2005 NEWS STAFF (541)346-5511 JEN SUDICK EDITOR IN CHIEF STEVEN R. NEUMAN MANAGING EDITOR JARED I’ABEN AY1SHA YAHYA NEWS EDITORS MEGHANN CUNIFF PARKER HOVVEU. SENIOR NEWS REPORTERS MORIAH BALINGIT AMANDA BOISINGER ADAM CHERRY KARA HANSEN ANTHONY LUCERO NEWS REPORTERS CLAYTON JONES SPORTS EDITOR JON ROETMAN SENIOR SPORTS REPORTER STEPHEN MILLER BRIAN SMITH SPORTS REPORTERS RYAN NYBURG PULSE EDITOR NATASHA CHILINGERIAN SENIOR PULSE REPORTER AMY EIGHTY RYAN MURPHEY PULSE REPORTERS CAT BALDWIN PULSE CARTOONIST DAVID JAGERNAUTH EDITORIAL EDITOR JENNIFER MCBRIDE AIIJEE SLATER TRAVIS W1LLSE COLUMNISTS ASHLEY GRIFFIN SUPPLEMENT FREELANCE EDITOR GABE BRADLEY NEWS FREELANCE EDITOR/ DIRECTOR OF RECRUITMENT DANIELLE HICKEY PHOTO EDITOR IAUREN WIMER SENIOR PHOTOGRAPHER TIM BOBOSKY PHOTOGRAPHER NICOLE BARKER ERIK B1SHOFF PART-TIME PHOTOGRAPHERS BRET FURTWANGLER GRAPHIC ARTIST KIRA PARK DESIGN EDITOR WENDY KIEFFER AMANDA LEE DUSTIN REESE BRIANNESHOUAN DESIGNERS SI4ADRA BEESLEY IEANNIE EVERS COPY CHIEFS KIMBERLY BLACKF1ELD PAUL THOMPSON SPORTS COPY EDITORS AMANDA EVRARD AMBER LINDROS NEWS COPY EDITORS LINDSAY BURT PULSE COPY EDITOR ADRIENNE NELSON ONLINE EDITOR SLADE LEESON WEBMASTER BUSINESS (541)346-5511 IUDY R1EDL GENERAL MANAGER KATHY CARBONE BUSINESS MANAGER REBECCA CRITCHETr RECEPTIONIST NATHAN FOSTER AIBING GUO ANDREW LEAHY IOHN LONG MAIXORY MAHONEY HOLLY MISTELL DISTRIBUTION ADVERTISING (541) 346-3712 MELISSA GUST ADVERTISING DIRECTOR TYLER MACK SALES MANAGER MATT BETZ HERON CALISCH-DOLEN MEGAN HAMLIN KATE HIRONAKA MAEGAN KASER-LEE MIA LEIDELMEYER EMILY PHILBIN SFIANNON ROGERS SALES REPRESENTATIVES KELLEE KAUFTHEIL AD ASSISTANT CLASSIFIED (541)3464343 TR1NA SHANAMAN CLASSIFIED MANAGER KATY GAGNON SABRINA GOWETTE LESUE STRAIGHT KER1 SPANGLER KATIE STRINGER CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING ASSOCIATES PRODUCTION (541)3464381 MICHELE ROSS PRODUCTION MANAGER TARA SI/SAM PRODUCTION COORDINATOR JEN CRAMLET KRISTEN DICHARRY CAMERON GAUT IONAH SCHROGIN DESIGNERS The Oegon Dally Emerald Is pub lished daily Monday through Fri day dunng the school year by the Oregpn Daily Emerald Publishing Co. Inc., at the University of Ore gon, Eugene, Ore. The Emerald operates independently of the University with offices in Suite 300 of the Erb Memorial Union. The Emerald is private property. Unlawful removal or use of papers is prosecutable by law Brct Furtwangler | Graphic artist ■ In my opinion When the right was right in retrospect When I become dictator for life, all elections will be abolished. Until then, unruly popularism reigns, leaving those of us on the left side of the politi cal spectrum out in a cold deeper than last year’s ice storm. More than two months have passed since the natural disaster known as the 2004 election occurred. Democrats, still shell-shocked come inauguration day, are faced with massive hurricane dam age and the need to rebuild. Now is the time for the Democrats to set a New Year’s resolution to strength en the party. A unique opportunity to do so is in the appointment of a new national chair who can bring a new tone. For this reason, Howard Dean’s election as DNC chairman would be disastrous. I may like Dean personally, and may endorse many of his policies, but the next nail in the Democrat’s cof fin is the press slipping the-scream that-was into every single discussion of liberal politics for the next three years, as will inevitably happen with a chairman so prominent and so unsuccessful. No. Let the face of the Democrats be a smiling one. Public relations is going to be key to future victories. While the party may be swept with Obama fever, I must ask, why can’t Democrats find a decent candidate with both charisma and experience? Part of it has to do with the unnatural emphasis placed on the organ of democracy most distant from the people — the federal govern ment. For Democrats to rebuild, they must never neglect the local races or the state races. Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s popularity and influence show just how important it is to have national leaders from all levels of politics. Democrats should create breeding grounds free of unnatural Vietnam fetishes and bad haircuts. But good state candidates need the boost a na tional leader can bring; after all, Bush’s JENNIFER MCBRIDE QUASHING DISSENT popularity was enough to bring candi dates into the Senate, even when those candidates were emotionally disturbed or aided via nepotism. It’s an endless, disastrous cycle: Losing at the top means losing at the bottom, but win ning at the top becomes impossible without good bottom candidates to draw on. No two people can completely agree on why the election resulted in so many Democratic casualties, but my theory is not that voters didn’t agree with Democratic policies (CNN exit polls show that people whose primary issue for voting was economics, educa tion, employment or health care voted Kerry by margins of 73 to 80 percent) but that Democrats can’t seem to talk about these kinds of issues clearly or without shooting themselves in the foot. Too often the party has ceded ground that does not need to be ceded. Just putting a soldier in the top spot does not mean the DNC is strong on national security — a public perception of weakness can only be combated by strength. Negating Iraq was not enough. The biggest and most correct criticism of the Kerry campaign was that it did not stand for anything but beating George Bush in an election. Kerry should have been equipped with international arms control provisions, lampooning the underfunding of Nunn-Lugar and screaming about torture and prison abuse. Democrats were unable to spin past Republican allegations that Kerry would defend the country with spit balls. When Kerry touted his service in place of detailing a policy to replace preemptive warfare, allowing the accu sations of double-talking on troop sup port to go unanswered, he might as well have shoveled his own grave. Additionally, Democrats have ceded ground on rhetoric. Why should the word “community” have Republican overtones? Why must “values” always be red? Why is Christianity perceived as so incompatible with the DNC when 40 percent of Protestants voted for Ker ry? If anything, Democratic values are values of communities and of charity. Liberalism is known for weak-kneed, watery-eyed compassion. Why can’t a new party agenda shape this inherent perception as an advantage instead of a disadvantage? Caring too much is not a vice. Some of the best programs to day are Democratic inventions, and the underfunding and scrapping of aid to the mentally ill, inmate populations and students is downright criminal. Crime rates dropped under Bill Clin ton, and military intervention was al ways an option. For this reason, the good side of Clinton is the personifica tion of what the Democrats must be come in order to succeed: humble, in telligent, certain and courageous. Images cannot be changed quickly, but if every local candidate, state can didate and person of national promi nence turns Democratic rhetoric from opposition to Bush and to policies which illustrate that liberals value people — their safety, their rights, their goods — then, at the very least, Republicans will be dealing with a unified donkey instead of a two-headed monstrosity. So this I pray: When a new chair man comes to power, let him or her be able to step out of Bill Clinton’s shad ow without stepping out of his legacy. jennifermcbride@ daily emerald, com ■ Editorial Dangerous situations may hinder Iraq election As elections in Iraq near, Prime Minister Iyad Allawi admits there will be areas too dangerous for voting. “Certainly there are some pockets that will not participate in the election,” he said. “We don't think it will be widespread.” This is about as optimistic as it gets these days in Iraq. A more realistic assessment is that voting will be sporadic due to mass confu sion and fear. A United Nations memo ob tained by Newsday says that major logistical problems still exist; for example, ballots still need to be printed and flown into the country, the names of thousands of candidates are still being entered into computer databases, and there have been difficulties hiring enough poll workers due to threats of violence. One such threat was made yesterday by a rebel group that issued a statement promising to deploy “highly trained” snipers to disrupt the voting process. Meanwhile, violence increases by the day. A suicide car bomber killed seven policemen in Tikrit, and gunmen killed eight people in a minibus south of Baghdad on Thesday, ac cording to Reuters. Insurgents have become bolder and have increased the explosive pow er of their bombs. Already in the New Year, over 30 Americans have been killed in Iraq, ac cording to CNN. As columnist Bob Herbert writes: “Nightmares don’t last this long, so the death and destruction must be real.” The taking of innocent lives in Iraq is not limited to the insurgents. U.S. soldiers killed at least five people, including Iraqi policemen and civilians, in Baghdad on Sunday. The mis take came less than 24 hours after the U.S. dropped a bomb on the wrong home, killing another five civilians. Countless mistakes like these make winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people impossible at this point. Not that the administration seems to care about hearts and minds. Newsweek reports that the Pentagon is debating whether to use the so-called “Salvadorian option” in Iraq. As the article explains, the option refers to “a still secret strategy in the Reagan administration’s battle against the leftist guerrilla insurgency in El Salvador in the early 1980s. Then, faced with a losing war against Salvadoran rebels, the U.S. government funded or supported ‘na tionalist’ forces that allegedly included so called death squads directed to hunt down and kill rebel leaders and sympathizers.” This won’t come back to bite us in the ass. Nah. Meanwhile, violence in Iraq is creating vio lence here at home. Marine Andres Raya, who served seven months in Iraq, committed “sui cide by cop” rather than returning to the mili tary. Raya killed one cop and critically injured another in Ceres, a small town near San Fran cisco, before being killed. Raya’s mother said, “He came back different. ” As more young men and women, our friends and peers, return from battle physically and emotionally scarred, we will see more and more of these kinds of tragic events in our communities. Whether the elections are suc cessful or not, whether we leave Iraq in one year or in 10, we will be dealing with the reper cussions of this war for the rest of our lives. “Nightmares don’t last this long.. EDITORIAL BOARD Jennifer Sudick Editor in Chief David Jagemauth Editorial Editor Steven R. Neuman Managing Editor Gabe Bradley Freelance Editor
