RALEIGH — Does it seem like just a month ago that the United States military was at war in Iraq — and American hawks and doves were locked in ideological combat at home?
It sure feels like a lot longer ago to me. Many people appear to have moved on. The debate in Washington has returned to tax cuts, the economy, and judicial nominations. Democratic presidential candidates are debating nationalized health care, of all things. Here in North Carolina, we’re discussing crumbling roads, and the death penalty, and state and local budget woes. Our public school students are taking their end-of-grade tests, stirring up another set of hot-button issues.
Still, the war continues. In Iraq, President Bush and the coalition are struggling to establish order, get basic infrastructure back on line, and move forward with an interim government. In Afghanistan, American troops and the central government in Kabul are battling a newly resurgent Taliban along the border regions with Pakistan. Bush’s envoys are trying to restart the peace process in Israel and Palestine, and perhaps seeing more immediate prospects for progress in the parallel quest to bring freedom and free institutions to Arab and Muslim countries.
I don’t think that our politicians and our political system have yet to fully adjust to the new calculus. The majority of Americans, and an even greater majority of the traditionally pro-military population of North Carolina, supported Bush in both the Afghanistan and Iraq phases of the war on Islamofascist terror. But a loud minority said no, and perhaps improbably do not believe that events have invalidated their stance.
The chasm here is much wider than many perceive. If this were just a case of a few naive college students, their addled ’60s-era professors, and some professional neo-com agitators, as some conservative analysts have asserted, then I’d be less worried. But the chasm separates more than Carrboro from Cary.
I think that a recent letter from the Rev. Curtis Gatewood of Durham, former and famous head of the county’s chapter of the NAACP, puts the issue in sharper focus. Published in The Carolinian, an African-American newspaper serving the Raleigh area (and not available online), the letter questions whether Saddam Hussein was a tyrant, suggests that President Bush was primarily trying to settle a family score in Iraq, and accuses the United States of being “the world’s biggest threat to world justice and peace.”
Gatewood’s rant concludes this way:
“America may succeed in violently disarming Saddam as you cheer the destruction of Iraq, but remember, you reap what you sow. Someday soon, God will execute the destruction and disarmament of America. Only then will you understand my pain, sorrow, and shame for America the Brutal-ful. Perhaps the world’s biggest problem is not that Iraq’s president is Saddam Hussein. I believe worse than that, America’s president, who leads the most powerful country in the world, is So-damn-insane.”
Gatewood has, in recent years, thrust himself into a variety of high-profile controversies, ranging from school violence to whether Santa Claus should be a part of Christmas. He’s been denigrated by some, cheered by others. I recall one panel discussion in which he and I participated about racial justice issues. I recall it primarily because it was one of the few times I have ever heard a racial epithet spoken against me (by one of Gatewood’s companions, not by him directly). He’s been a lightning rod of sorts, with diverse adversaries and some loyal friends in the local political and media world.
Here’s the test: given the vile filth that Gatewood has now written, will people of good will on all sides of the war issue do the appropriate thing and shun him? Naturally, he has the right to express an extreme view without government sanction. But will North Carolinians, acting in their private and voluntary capacities, treat him like the moral leper he has proven to be?
That’s when we’ll know that the chasm is capable of being bridged.
Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation and publisher of Carolina Journal.