Can You Do This?

One day after this Hitchens comes out with this post at Slate

Christopher Hitchens, Contributor: Kerry

I am assuming for now that this is a single-issue election. There is one's subjective vote, one's objective vote, and one's ironic vote. Subjectively, Bush (and Blair) deserve to be re-elected because they called the enemy by its right name and were determined to confront it. Objectively, Bush deserves to be sacked for his flabbergasting failure to prepare for such an essential confrontation. Subjectively, Kerry should be put in the pillory for his inability to hold up on principle under any kind of pressure. Objectively, his election would compel mainstream and liberal Democrats to get real about Iraq.

The ironic votes are the endorsements for Kerry that appear in Buchanan's anti-war sheet The American Conservative, and the support for Kerry's pro-war candidacy manifested by those simple folks at MoveOn.org. I can't compete with this sort of thing, but I do think that Bush deserves praise for his implacability, and that Kerry should get his worst private nightmare and have to report for duty.

But don't get bogged down with this. The very few Bush responses in Slate's article are interesting. I liked David Bradley Kenner's response (he has a blog here).

I'm voting for Bush. I don't want, or find it necessary, to defend every piece of his record. The simple fact is that he is the only candidate who has had the courage to envision a long-term solution to the danger of terrorism—the liberalization and democratization of the Middle East. John Kerry, on the other hand, cannot manage to think beyond the next political obstacle. Only one candidate has the courage to keep America safe in these dangerous days. Four more years!

It also seems like Drezner has had enough of this issue and is resorting to the time tested method of using Keanu Reaves movies to explain your position on things (something I like to do all the time): it's like being forced to decide whether The Matrix: Reloaded or The Matrix: Revolutions is the better movie.

The best part though, is the title of this article: At this magazine, it's Kerry by a landslide! Yeah, like any major online magazine (except the National Review) is really going to be overwhelmingly voting for Bush. Unless, of course the media is really controlled by Republicans. But Slate is just owned and run by Microsoft.