Customer Reviews

The Good Fight: Why Liberals---and Only Liberals---Can Win the War on Terror and Make America Great Again

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

I have voted Republican in every presidential election since 1988. Peter Beinart would probably consider me a "conservative." It may therefore surprise anyone reading this review that I have given his book five stars. It may also surprise you that I voted for Walter Mondale in 1984, the first time I ever voted in a presidential election.

I am a product of working class liberals from Cleveland, Ohio. I viewed the arms race as dangerous and needlessly expensive. So Mondale got my vote. Then I spent a year in Europe. Being on one of the front lines of the Cold War transformed my thinking. Totalitarianism, and the threat it posed, was real. The Cold War needed to be fought, and it needed to be won. Reagan's policies gave us a chance to win it. I became a hawk.

At the same time, I learned a little about WWII and the ensuing Cold War. I came to realize that Republicans were not the original hawks. They were largely isolationists. To my surprise, Democrats were the original hawks. From WWII into Vietnam, the Cold War was fought by Democrats. What happened to the Democrats between Vietnam and 1984, and then into the present? Where did Reagan come from?

If you have any curiosity about these questions and their answers, Mr. Beinart's book is a must read and earns five stars on his treatment of these historical issues alone. Mr. Beinart is a "liberal" partisan, so kudos to him for criticizing "liberals" where criticism is due and recognizing "conservatives" where recognition is due.

But Mr. Beinart did not write a book just to tell the history of the Cold War. He writes to persuade us that the war on terror is every bit as real as the Cold war and, perhaps more importantly, every bit as important to fight. In the process, he offers a fair assessment of why the war in Iraq might not advance, and may actually hinder the war on terror, just as the war in Vietnam did not advance, and probably hindered the Cold War. If Vietnam caused a generation of "liberals" to abandon the Cold War, Mr. Beinart is concerned that Iraq may cause "liberals" to abandon the war on terror. He has good reason to be concerned. He reports that "only 59 percent of Democrats - as opposed to 94 percent of Republicans - still approve of America's decision to invade Afghanistan."

As a "conservative," it is refreshing to hear a "liberal" voice speak honestly and directly about the dangers facing America today and about the need to confront those dangers using all available means, including military means. To the extent anyone, "liberal" or "conservative," needs reminding that the war on terror is real and worth the fight, again Mr. Beinart's book warrants five stars. To the extent anyone, "liberal" or "conservative," wants to critically assess what the war in Iraq means for the war on terror, his book will give any staunch (if open minded) "conservative" something to think about. After all, even George Will concedes that Mr. Beinart may have written "one of those rare books that turns a political tide."

Mr. Beinart would like to turn the tide for "liberals" and his partisanship on this issue is not subliminal: the subtitle to his book declares that only liberals can win the war on terror and make America great again. The subtitle is unfortunate if it serves to dissuade "conservatives" from reading the book because the very history Mr. Beinart elucidates without bias tells us that someone in either the Truman or Reagan mold can lead America to win the war on terror. Only diehard partisans care whether that person is a "liberal" or "conservative." The rest of us just hope that someone emerges as a leader because Mr. Beinart convincingly persuades that the "good fight" is worth fighting, which makes the "Good Fight" worth reading no matter your political stripe.

"Good Fight" is quite possibly the best work of liberal intellectual history since Schlesinger's The Vital Center. It really is that damn good. Beinart knows his stuff. If all you're interested in reading is another empty-minded polemic on the Iraq War, don't buy this book. "The Good Fight" isn't about the War. It's about a historical narrative spanning 60 years. In the age of mind-numbing hyperpartisanship, books like these are becoming increasingly hard to find.

Beinart would have been better off keeping the title to the first three words instead of promising something he does not deliver, and thus the average of the title and contents gets this book two stars.
Beinart does a good job of showing that Truman and Reagan had far more in common when it came to foreign policy than any of the Democrat standard bearers since JFK.
While the historical notes about the Cold War and what the Democrats did before Vietnam are fairly accurate, the book departs from reality in explaining what the Democrat Party stands for today vs. 50 years ago.
Beinart is living in a fantasy world if he thinks that the current generation of Democrat Party leaders can abandon the billionaires and Hollywood elites, not to mention the illegal contributions from foreign nationals, who support them from the left. He really does not deliver a single policy proposal that any Democrat candidate could possibly support in today's world, and he really doesn't deliver a policy proposal at all. Citing the Clinton administration intervention in a teacup like the Balkans with massive deadly air strikes on a part of the world with little strategic importance to anyone is not something that has any relevance in the rest of the world, especially the Middle East. If the Balkan experience had any strategic value, in spite of a 500 year history of "ethnic cleansing" it has been far surpassed by 9/11, and the attacks on the US that were ignored by the Democrats going back to bin Laden's fatwas of 1996 and 1998 declaring war on the USA and other infidels.
This might have been a good book if Beinart weren't so wedded to a Democrat Party that no longer exists. But he is, so this book isn't much of an answer to anything

In 2004, Peter Beinart wrote an article for the "The New Republic" calling on Democrats to reject the pacifists in their party - such as Michael Moore - and to toughen up in the fight against Islamist totalitarianism. Beinart was trying to rally the Democratic Party around the so-called "liberal hawks."

In the past two years much has changed. Although he is still trying to enlist Democrats in the good fight, he admits that he was wrong about Iraq in several ways. One, of course, was the failure to find weapons of mass destruction, but the other, more importantly, was the failure to realize the limits of American power and legitimacy. Borrowing from Rheinhold Niebuhr, he now believes we would do well with a little humility.

That said, Beinart still believes that liberals are uniquely equipped to fight global jihad. He supports his argument by drawing on the Cold War era and the Truman administration. Centrist liberals from the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) rejected communists and communist sympathizers at home as well as abroad. They set the Democratic Party on a centrist path and became mentors and supporters of the Truman administration. The policies of deterrence and containment advocated by Dean Acheson, George Marshall, George Kennan, and Paul Nitze served this country well up until the presidency of JFK.

In his potted history of this period, Beinart is trying to draw parallels between the fight against communist totalitarianism and today's Islamist jihad. There are, however, important differences. Osama Bin Laden is no Josef Stalin. Providing support for loosely connected cells of terrorists is much different than commanding the government of the Soviet Union and its nuclear equipped army. Moreover, demonizing communism in the 50's and 60's was one thing, but demonizing Islamist jihad, and by extension Islam, one runs the risk of inflaming a clash of civilizations that is already in danger of becoming full-blown. Even the Bush administration is tactful enough to call it simply a war on terror.

Fact of the matter is, Beinart doesn't need to draw on the Cold War era and the Truman administration. (Bush has already done that.) He should be paying more attention to Francis Fukuyama's latest book "America at the Crossroads." Fukuyama like Beinart agrees that the war on terror must be fought more agressively and more intelligently. And, if it is to be successful, it must be done multilaterally and through international institutions.

In the current chastened environment, Beinart is correct in noting that humility is in order. He tells us that when America recognizes that it too is capable of evil it will then be in a better position to determine the fates of others. This is why he believes Democrats will be better able to fight the good as opposed Republicans who believe in American infallibility and who confuse American interests with universal values. It's time to start leading more by example and consensus than by force, more by negotiation and less by confrontation. This will be the tone of the next administration whether it is Democratic or Republican.

Peter Beinart, the editor-at-large of The New Republic, admits something up front: he was wrong about the invasion of Iraq, which he supported. He devotes much of the introduction to analyzing why he and many Beltway Democrats supported the war and, unlike many top Democrats, admits he was wrong. Some have said this is not enough: they wish to condemn Beinart for eternity over his miscalculation. Instead, I see this as intellectual growth. However, the Iraq War is not really the point of the book.

Instead, the book consists of two parts: a history of the Democratic Party from 1948 to the present, and an analysis of the roots of fundamentalist Islam and the proper Democratic response to it. The first part is excellent, as Beinart (who wrote this as a fellow at the Brookings Institution) uses many sources not unearthed for decades. He paints a compelling narative starting with Henry Wallace's challenge of Harry Truman in the 1948 presidential election, covers the Vietnam War and Civil Rights movement (two turning points for the party) in depth, and then moves briskly through the Reagan and Clinton years to part two.

The second part should be appreciated as a primer, although there are much better (and more comprhensive) books on the roots of Islamism. In it, Beinart gives a quick overview of the rise of Sunni extremism, what it believes about the world and the state, and how it has manifested itself in al Queda. Then, he covers the lead up to the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, analysing the Democratic Party's response. He is critical of it, although he reminds readers of his own mistakes as well.

Beinart ends by saying the party should draft a new foreign policy that is willing to use force when it is in the nation's best interests, is mindful of the economic and historical roots of terrorism, and respects international opinion and institutions, as these can give the US global support for its efforts.

According to reviews, this has become a very hot book in DC. Regardless of what effect it has on national policy, it provides a quick read for those who want to think about an alternative to the Bush Doctrine. Highly recommended.

If you are a liberal dove or a conservative hawk and are willing to challenge your own assumptions, this is a great book to read. The sub-title "Why Liberals - and Only Liberals - Can Win the War on Terror and Make American Great Again" sums up Beinart's main argument quite well. Liberals, he argues, must rediscover its anti-totalitarian roots if it is to triumph in modern American politics.
The Good Fight spends about a third of its time with a very interesting and long forgotten history of Anti-Communists Liberals from 1947-1970s. Beinart pays particular attention to the ADA (Americans for Democratic Action), Hubert Humphrey, Reinhard Niebuhr, Arthur Schlesinger and Walter Reuther and their battles with Henry Wallace in the 1940s and the SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) in the 1960s. He then traces how different in basic assumptions Conservative Hawks are from Liberal Hawks, focussing particularly on GW, Nixon, McCarthy, Dulles and Eisenhower.
Beinart distinguishes Anti-totalitarian Liberal Hawks from Left/Liberal Doves and Conservative Hawks. While Liberal Hawks view totalitarians (Fascists, Communists and Salafists as fundamental threats to a liberal society, Doves view American conservatives as the true enemy. They, therefore, refuse to fight against the foreign enemy out of principle. While Liberal Doves view foreign wars as a fundamental distraction from domestic reform, Liberal Hawks view foreign wars as a driving force in generating national support for internal reform.
While conservatives view Americans as so instrinsically good that all the world knows our good intentions, Liberal Hawks know that all people can be corrupted by power, so it is essential to demonstrate their goodness. Conservatives see domestic reform as a fundamental weakening of our national will to fight, while Liberal Hawks view it as essential to demonstrate our goodness to the world.
Or as Beinart says: "From Henry Wallace in the late 1940s to Michael Moore after September 11, some liberals have preferred inaction to the tragic reality that America must shed its moral innocence to act meaningfully in the world. If the cold war liberal tradition parts company with the right in insisting that American power cannot be good unless we recognize that it can also be evil, it parts company with the purist left in insisting that if we demand that American power be perfect, it cannot be good."
These are very disorienting words from anyone familiar with today's stark Liberal Dove/Conservative Hawk divide.
My main concern with this book, and the reason that I did not give it 5 stars, is that Beinart does not give a persuasive argument as to how a Liberal Hawk could ever get the party nomination. I have no doubt that a Liberal Hawk (such as Joseph Lieberman) would do quite well in a general election, but he has no chance in the Democratic primaries (as 2004 showed).
Beinart is absolutely correct that liberals must establish a narrative that describes their view of America's role in the world and that the Cold War is the perfect metaphor for it. But, let's face it, liberals rejected the Cold War in Vietnam and they show no signs of changing any time soon. Any drift that way in the Clinton years and after 9-11 has been wholely undone by their intense opposition to Iraq. I have a hard time seeing Democrats supporting an enthusiastic hawk any time soon. Most likely, they will great "the next Truman" with as much scorn as they have greated Bush.
But aside from this glaring weakness, this is a very good book, primarily for its historical analysis of Liberal Hawks, Liberal Doves and Conservative Hawks in the Cold War.

Very well-written and economical, making a strong point about the recent history of
liberalism in this country as a pointer to our future foreign policy. Courageous in its
argument unlike the watered-down political commentary we are so used to. Detailed references support the general story.

An incredibly well articulated trek through a rarely discussed period of modern American history. Courageously honest and self critical. This should be required reading for every living Democrat.

I bought this book together with Paul Waldman's "Being Right Is Not Enough: What Progressives Must Learn from Conservative Success," and between the two, would certainly rate this one as being the most detailed intellectually, but that is a flaw as well as a virtue. My eyes glazed over, between the fine print and the fine points.

Without any way disagreeing with the author's belabored and detailed commentary, I would boil the book down to two bottom lines:

1) Liberals also known as Progressives must restore their communion with the PUBLIC and draw the line between conservatives supporting corporate fascism, and the public interest focused on equal opportunity for INDIVIDUALS.

2) Deep in the book is the other bottom line: the Democratic Party has completely lost its mind and heart and its connection with the blue collar white worksrs (as well as other folks that one author would call the "working poor").

This is a very serious book, and it will help the intellectuals among the left of center elite understand their failure, but this book is not going to win any points with the labor unions, the working poor, or the broader coalition of Independents, Reforms, Greens, Libertarians, and -- my own proclivity -- moderate Republicans.

Clearly the right-wingers who've posted reviews have not read, and probably don't intend to read, the book. (Especially funny is the guy who lambasts Beinart for not owning up to his support for the Iraq war. Beinart completely takes responsibility for this erroneous position, admiting he was wrong, very, very early in the book).
If you're a liberal it really gives you food for thought. The history is fascinating and I think it actually provides those who are inclined a glimpse of what the future of liberalism is capable of. If you're not a liberal, but are still intellectually honest, it'll challenge you as well. If you love Fox News, don't bother. This is a serious book with serious ideas. It'll only serve to annoy those who've already opted out of the reality-based community.

Happy reading and God Save America.