What a responsible American Left would look like
<p>The congressional Democrats have made Nancy Pelosi their leader.<br />
Whether or not this is conscious strategy, it means they&#8217;re going to<br />
run to the left.  And very likely get slaughtered in 2004.</p>
<p>It&#8217;s truly odd how self-destructive the American Left has become.<br />
They&#8217;re like that famous line about the Palestinians, never missing an<br />
opportunity to miss an opportunity.  And there are so many<br />
opportunities!  So many good things Republican conservatives can<br />
never do because they&#8217;re captive to their voter base.</p>
<p>Herewith, then, my humble offering of a program for the American<br />
Left.  This is not sarcasm and I&#8217;m not trying to score points here,<br />
these are issues where the Left could take a stand and gain back some<br />
of the moral capital it has squandered so recklessly since the<br />
days of the civil rights movement.</p>
<ul>
<li><em>Support war on Iraq, but insist on nation-building<br />
afterwards.</em> Saddam Hussein is a genocidal fascist tyrant, exactly the<br />
sort of monster the Left ought to be against.  Support deposing him<br />
&mdash; then be the conscience of the U.S., insisting on our duty to<br />
help rebuild Iraq as a free country afterwards.  Push us to win the<br />
peace, not just the war.</li>
<li><em>Derail the Homeland Security Act and other intrusions on<br />
civil liberties.</em>  The left hates John Ashcroft.  So why don&#8217;t<br />
we see more Left opposition to the law-enforcement power grab that&#8217;s<br />
going on right now, or to the gutting of the Freedom of Information<br />
Act?  Many Americans would respond well to this.</li>
<li><em>Stop the War on (Some) Drugs.</em> This is a civil-rights<br />
issue.  Blacks and other minorities are disproportionately victims<br />
both of drug prosecution and of the criminal violence created by drug<br />
laws.  It&#8217;s a civil-liberties issue for many reasons too obvious to<br />
need listing &mdash; how can any self-respecting liberal countenance<br />
no-knock warrants and asset forfeiture?  For too long the Left has<br />
gone along with conservative anti-drug hysteria out of a craven fear<br />
of being dismissed as a bunch of dope-loving ex-hippies.  Time to<br />
stand up and be counted.</li>
<li><em>Support school vouchers.</em> Another civil-rights issue<br />
&mdash; it&#8217;s precisely minorities and the poor who most need to escape<br />
the trap that the public-school system has become, and black parents<br />
know this.  Yes, it will be hard to take on the teachers&#8217; unions<br />
&mdash; but you&#8217;re in serious danger of losing the black vote over<br />
this issue, so switching would be not just the right thing but a<br />
way to shore up your base as well.</li>
<li><em>Speak up for science.</em> Religious conservatives are up to a<br />
lot of anti-scientific mischief &mdash; banning stem-cell research,<br />
excising evolutionary theory from textbooks.  Make a principled stand<br />
for science, secularism, and the anti-Establishment clause.  Remind<br />
the world that the U.S. is not a Christian nation, and seek to have<br />
the tax exemption for religious organizations ended because it puts the<br />
U.S. government in the position of deciding what&#8217;s a religion and<br />
what is not.</li>
<li><em>Stop the RIAA/MPAA from trashing consumers&#8217; fair-use rights.</em><br />
The Left claims to be on the side of consumers and against corporate<br />
power elites.  So where was the Left when the DMCA passed?  If the<br />
RIAA and MPAA have their way, personal computers will be crippled<br />
and consumers will go to jail for the `crime&#8217; of copying DVDs they<br />
have bought for their personal use.  Young people, who are trending<br />
conservative these days, care deeply about the RIAA attack on<br />
file sharing.  Wouldn&#8217;t you like to have them back?</li>
</ul>
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