David Broder calls for "showdown" with Iran

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I have long thought Broder, the "dean" of the Washington press corps, to be a fool. He is, after all, an advocate of what I have called "difference-splitting centrism," that is, of a centrism that holds the left in contempt that that, for the most part, accedes to Republican demands.

We now have further proof, however, that Broder is not just a fool but utterly insane (or perhaps just a Republican in disguise).

In his WaPo column yesterday, he actually called on Obama, who in Broder's view will not able to spur sufficient economic growth by 2012 to secure re-election, to join with Republicans to go after Iran:

Here is where Obama is likely to prevail. With strong Republican support in Congress for challenging Iran's ambition to become a nuclear power, he can spend much of 2011 and 2012 orchestrating a showdown with the mullahs. This will help him politically because the opposition party will be urging him on. And as tensions rise and we accelerate preparations for war, the economy will improve.

I am not suggesting, of course, that the president incite a war to get reelected. But the nation will rally around Obama because Iran is the greatest threat to the world in the young century. If he can confront this threat and contain Iran's nuclear ambitions, he will have made the world safer and may be regarded as one of the most successful presidents in history. 

But what does that even mean if not an incitement to war? What sort of "showdown" does Broder suggest Obama orchestrate? And isn't the very phrase "orchestrating a showdown" deeply troubling in any context, not least in a liberal democracy, where elected leaders are supposed to conduct the affairs of state more or less openly and certainly only to use the military when absolutely necessary for the sake of national security, not for the sake of re-election? Think what happened the last time a showdown was orchestrated. It got us the Iraq War.

What Broder is calling for here is for war to be waged for political reasons. That is grotesque and outrageous. And yet, of course, Broder is allowed to write and say such things largely unchallenged by his peers -- and to do so from the high-profile platform of The Washington Post.

Otherwise, Broder's very argument, if I may even call it that, is idiotic. It is hardly clear that Iran is "the greatest threat to the world" and, what's more, Republicans have already indicated that they won't cooperate with Obama on anything -- would they really want to give him a "victory" on Iran? (And, really, it is this issue that would make Obama so successful as president? What about pulling the economy back from the brink of disaster, or health-care reform, or Wall Street financial reform, or recovering America's image and credibility abroad, or...?)

Besides, it's not like Democrats support Iran's nuclear ambitions (whatever they really are). Democrats object to Iran's nuclearization, even if Broder would have us believe otherwise. But what many of them also object to is warmongering, which is hardly the best way to deal with Ahmadinejad and the mullahs.

Simply put, what Broder is calling for is not just grotesque and outrageous but incredibly reckless. War is not the answer, and neither is some sort of "showdown," which sounds like something Bush would have said -- and just look how successful Bush's warmongering was. And, lest Broder forget, Obama is already pushing tough line on Iran -- through international sanctions.

It hardly comes as a surprise, but this press corps "dean," this "centrist" voice who wants so badly to be seen to be above the partisan fray, merely channels Cheney, Kristol, and the neocons who so desperately want the U.S. to wage war after war with every enemy imaginable, real or otherwise -- and to benefit politically from doing so by appealing to jingoism.

We should perhaps except such punditocratic abominations from David Broder, but that makes this particular column no less appalling.