RALEIGH — Tony Blair, prime minister of the United Kingdom and once considered the Bill Clinton of British “Third Way” politics, is now a popular leader to American conservatives. He won their confidence, respect, and even affection by studying the Iraqi situation carefully, coming to an informed conclusion that military action would likely be needed, and then sticking to his decision in the face of blistering attacks from many in his own Labour Party.
Is it in any way conceivable that our own John Edwards might undergo a similar transformation?
OK, stop your snickering. I’m not kidding here. North Carolina’s senior senator is currently headed to California to join his fellow presidential aspirants in auditions before the state’s Democratic Party. While hardly a resolute as Blair, both Edwards and former House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt have more or less supported President Bush’s position on Iraq. Other candidates have courted the activist Left in the party — and, I supposed, expressed their own questionable judgement — by savaging Bush and parroting the peacenik line. Even Joe Lieberman, he of longtime hawkish credentials, has been trying to have it both ways of late.
The Edwards-Gephardt position is requiring a surprising degree of political courage. The Democratic Party of John Kennedy and Scoop Jackson is gone. The modern party, radicalized by Vietnam and infuriated by the GOP gains of the past decade, barely extended their own president, Bill Clinton, political support for his military actions in the Balkans. Now, with a despicable conservative from Texas in the White House, they’ve, well, come undone (as the Zombies tune goes). Most party activists are not only against the war, but are rabidly so. That means that if Edwards continues to advocate military action, he’ll likely get icy stares or worse at political gatherings like the upcoming California Democratic Convention. If he doesn’t wilt, if he hangs in there and articulates a relatively hawkish Democratic position, Edwards has a chance to redefine his image, at least for a possible reelection run next year in North Carolina.
Now, don’t worry about me. I’m not about to carry this point too far. The Republican Party will still seek to defeat Edwards in 2004, and he won’t become the conservative movement’s favorite Democrat (Lieberman used to be, many years ago, before he started doing back flips). There are too many leftist leanings in Edwards, and some on the Right will never get past his trial-lawyer credentials. But he’ll get grudging admiration, and perhaps more among the less partisan of war supporters, if he perseveres in his support for the Washington-London-Rome-Madrid Axis against the Paris-Berlin-Brussels-Baghdad Axis.
John Edwards, meet Tony Blair. He’s had a rough few months, but his future still looks bright.
Hood ([email protected]) is president of the John Locke Foundation and publiser of Carolina Journal.