https://theintercept.com/2019/01/11...re-militaristic-and-pro-war-than-republicans/
So the Intercept just put out a good piece about polling reflecting a troubling change in values among the Democratic Party's electorate, mainly them becoming more favourable of militaristic/interventionist policies in the Middle East and in Europe as a counterbalance to the GOP's perceived isolationism. This results in weirdness such as Democrats supporting keeping the troops in Afghanistan more than independents and Republicans, when in 2008 a majority of Democrats supported a full withdrawal. Another example is the rapid turnaround of Democratic opinion on inttervention in Syria (negative to positive).
This, coupled with the reverence for national-security state officials, makes me and other leftists concerned about the future of the Democratic Party once Trump is gone. Will the militarism and jingoism continue and for how long? How will it affect our foreign policy going forward?
What are your thoughts on this ERA? Do you think that the Democratic Party is becoming too jingoistic or militaristic?
So the Intercept just put out a good piece about polling reflecting a troubling change in values among the Democratic Party's electorate, mainly them becoming more favourable of militaristic/interventionist policies in the Middle East and in Europe as a counterbalance to the GOP's perceived isolationism. This results in weirdness such as Democrats supporting keeping the troops in Afghanistan more than independents and Republicans, when in 2008 a majority of Democrats supported a full withdrawal. Another example is the rapid turnaround of Democratic opinion on inttervention in Syria (negative to positive).
This, coupled with the reverence for national-security state officials, makes me and other leftists concerned about the future of the Democratic Party once Trump is gone. Will the militarism and jingoism continue and for how long? How will it affect our foreign policy going forward?
President Donald Trump's December 18 announcement that he intends to withdraw all U.S. troops from Syria produced some isolated support in the anti-war wings of both parties, but largely provoked bipartisan outrage among in Washington's reflexively pro-war establishment.
Both GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham, one of the country's most reliable war supporters, and Hillary Clinton, who repeatedly criticized former President Barack Obama for insufficient hawkishness, condemned Trump's decision in very similar terms, invoking standard war on terror jargon.
But while official Washington united in opposition, new polling data from Morning Consult/Politico shows that a large plurality of Americans support Trump's Syria withdrawal announcement: 49 percent support to 33 percent opposition.
Identical trends can be seen on the question of Trump's announced intention to withdraw half of the U.S. troops currently in Afghanistan, where Democrats are far more supportive of keeping troops there than Republicans and independents.
This case is even more stark since Obama ran in 2008 on a pledge to end the war in Afghanistan and bring all troops home. Throughout the Obama years, polling data consistently showed that huge majorities of Democrats favored a withdrawal of all troops from Afghanistan:
While Democrats were more or less evenly divided early last year on whether the U.S. should continue to intervene in Syria, all that changed once Trump announced his intention to withdraw, which provoked a huge surge in Democratic support for remaining. "Those who voted for Democrat Clinton now said by a 42-point margin that the U.S. had a responsibility to do something about the fighting in Syria involving ISIS," Edwards-Levy wrote, "while Trump voters said by a 16-point margin that the nation had no such responsibility." (Similar trends can be seen among GOP voters, whose support for intervention in Syria has steadily declined as Trump has moved away from his posture of the last two years — escalating bombings in both Syria and Iraq and killing far more civilians, as he repeatedly vowed to do during the campaign — to his return to his other campaign pledge to remove troops from the region.)
All of this has resulted in a new generation of Democrats, politically engaged for the first time as a result of fears over Trump, being inculcated with values of militarism and imperialism, trained to view once-discredited, war-loving neocons such as Bill Kristol, Max Boot, and David Frum, and former CIA and FBI leaders as noble experts and trusted voices of conscience. It's inevitable that all of these trends would produce a party that is increasingly pro-war and militaristic, and polling data now leaves little doubt that this transformation — which will endure long after Trump is gone — is well under way.
What are your thoughts on this ERA? Do you think that the Democratic Party is becoming too jingoistic or militaristic?