Wonderful column today by Victor Davis Hanson on the outrage by Democrats that anyone would use their own techniques on them.
The problem is that between 2003-2008 there was such hysterical antagonism to Bush that the combatants never worried about the often vicious means they used to achieve their supposedly lofty ends, and so now, finding themselves in a position of responsibility, are infuriated that anyone, well, would even conceive of playing hardball as they once did.
I've noticed this crying and haranguing in the comments of several of my posts at Common Sense Political Thought (see here and here), where Democrats try to argue that using these techniques, which they applauded from 2001 to 2008, is, seemingly unfair and hypocritical.
I think it's far less hypocrtical to have derided such behavior in the past and then used it to show the clowns from the Left what's wrong with it, than to have been the other way around. I've never said I wouldn't do unto them what they did unto us, and I think that, by and large, the behavior of former Vice President Dick Cheney and others has been exceedingly tame and polite compared to what Democrats did to George W. Bush.
The striking thing about the sudden wounded-fawn Democratic syndrome is that Cheney is far milder than Gore was, that the CIA is not the firebrand Pelosi has been, and Bush has been silent about Obama in a way that even Clinton was not about Bush. If this softball stuff excites such outrage, what will happen if politics really get rough, say, as it was around 2007?
We have a president whose only qualification for the job was being able to read and being the right color for the right time. That others would criticize him for his constant flip-flopping, poor decision-making and political maneuvering should be expected. I didn't elect the man, and I don't think I should be barred from pointing out what a mistake his election was.
More here.
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