We should work diplomatically and aggressively to give them reasons why they [the Iranians] don't need to build a bomb, to give them incentives. . . . I'd like to use carrots as well as sticks to see if we can change the nature of the debate.
--Ned Lamont, April 25, 2006
Ned Lamont's victory over Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut primary was a triumph for the European wing of the Democratic party. So it's fitting that Lamont is pro-carrot. It was impossible to go to Europe during Bush's first term without getting a lecture about the utility of carrots, the futility of sticks, and the Bush administration's regrettable neglect of the former and unfortunate proclivity for the latter. So Lamont is an appropriate spokesman for what one might call the Bugs Bunny caucus that now dominates the Democratic party.
Lieberman is fighting that dominance by not conceding his seat to Lamont--but others are rushing to ingratiate themselves to the new powers that be in their party. Former Clinton U.N. ambassador and hopeful Democratic secretary of state Richard Holbrooke--something of a Liebermanite in the past--tried to get right with the Bugs Bunny-ites in a Washington Post op-ed two days after Lamont's victory. His point? More diplomacy. In particular, we need "sustained high-level diplomacy" with Syria and Iran.
Now
Holbrooke is too clever to go into full Bugs Bunny mode. In fact, he is too clever to say with any precision at all what his diplomatic initiatives would consist of--and he is clever enough to try to cover his bases by emphasizing not once but twice that all of this diplomacy with Syria and Iran (and, implicitly, Hezbollah) would have to be conducted "in full consultation with Israel at every step." But it is clear that the point of this diplomacy would not be to defeat or disarm Hezbollah (a goal Holbrooke never mentions). Nor would it be to stop Iran's nuclear program (a goal whose importance he minimizes).
Instead, there should be three U.S. foreign policy priorities: "containing the violence," "finding a stable and secure solution that protects Israel," and "unwinding America's disastrous entanglement in Iraq in a manner that is not a complete humiliation and does not lead to even greater turmoil." The first really means not defeating Hezbollah. The second means nothing. As for the third--"not a complete humiliation"--now there's a foreign policy slogan for the Bugs Bunny Democrats!
So the Democrats are hopeless. Unfortunately, back in the real world, Bush administration policy hasn't been particularly strong either. During its second term, the Bush administration has come too close to embracing Holbrookean passivity. And what good has the recent affinity for carrots done us? Are our enemies in retreat? Are Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Moktada al-Sadr, Bashar Assad, the Sunni holy warriors in Iraq, al Qaeda operatives and sympathizers in the United Kingdom, and Kim Jong Il on the run? Have they become more cooperative, and less bent on trouble, since Secretary of State Rice started serving up the carrots last year?
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