WAR IS OVER IN 2012! (if you want it)

A recent CNN/Opinion Research Poll shows 63 percent opposition to the war in Aghanistan. Despite this, organized resistance to the war is largely ineffectual, particularly within the two major political parties. Although this is a situation that could change quickly within the next two years, I sadly think it more likely that the trend would be toward more military intervention (Iran, Pakistan, Yemen) rather than less. And given the increased centrality of the chief executive/commander in chief in the decidedly skewed and constitutionally unstable division of powers, I don't think it's too early to engage in some serious speculation about the 2012 presidential election.

Despite the near-absence of serious foreign policy discussion in the midterm elections, I think the climate is increasingly conducive to just that kind of dialogue. The Wikileaks releases are laying bare the cynicism and venality of American imperialism, with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton instructing her minions in the State Department to commit identity theft against fellow diplomats (perhaps as a creative way to bring down the deficit?). Meanwhile, the publication of Volume 1 of the Autobiography of Mark Twain should introduce a new generation of readers (is that phrase the height of naivete, or what?) to the Bard of Hannibal's apoplexy at the genocidal, naked land grab that was the McKinley/Roosevelt Administration's Spanish-American War (also a lightning rod for Ambrose Bierce and William Dean Howells, the, I don't know, William Vollman and Gore Vidal of their time?).

I submit that the anti-imperialist moment could be on us, if not now, certainly as 2012 gets closer, and those of us across the political spectrum who would like desperately to at least return to a flawed but evolving constitutional republic should be thinking in terms of legitimate electoral revolution. And I believe I might just know how to do it.


What I propose are simultaneous and coordinated insurgent primary campaigns in both major parties, and perhaps even as independents or within established third parties. I think the ideal candidates would be chosen from among Democrats Russ Feingold (outgoing Senator from Wisconsin) and Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich and Republicans Texas Congressman Ron Paul and former Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel. Let me explain how it would work.


All four men are extremely popular with passionate constituencies within their respective parties. Kucinich and Paul have both run for president before, while Feingold and Hagel have been encouraged to do so. Despite the statistical opposition to the war, neither President Obama nor the talked-about Republican candidates (Barbour, Gingrich, Huckabee, Palin, Romney) seem likely to alter their positions in the next two years, so antiwar candidates on either side would have the field to themselves, much like Eugene McCarthy in 1968 (before Bobby Kennedy's entry into the race). Finally, all four men have impeccable records as independent-minded opponents of recent American military actions in Afghanistan and/or Iraq, and the campaigns should focus with a laser-like intensity on the economic, social, constitutional and moral costs of those wars and the imperial conceits that sustain them.


The coordination of the campaigns should take the form of each candidate vowing to make the other his vice presidential candidate in the event of securing the nomination. Feingold would vow to make Paul his vice presidential pick, and vice versa. Yard signs, bumper stickers, t-shirts, websites and rallies should emphasize Feingold/Paul 2012 or Hagel/Kucinich 2012 interchangeably, with the bipartisanship that polls and pundits clamor for constantly on display.


Prominent insurgent political candidates (of all political stripes) of the recent past should be recruited to the cause, in whatever capacity they are comfortable. Off the top of my head, the list would include John Anderson, Jerry Brown, Pat Buchanan, Howard Dean, Mike Gravel, Jesse Jackson, George McGovern, Ralph Nader, Ross Perot and Jesse Ventura. Again, the emphasis is on multipartisanship, as well as on candidates whose campaigns seized people's imaginations and created intense emotional connections. Of course, some would be unwilling to commit to such a radical campaign (Brown and Jackson seem the least likely), but even a handful could make a real difference.


As current members of Congress, Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich would be risking real ostracization by subverting their respective parties, but both have proven time and again their willingness to buck the party leadership and blaze an independent trail, without electoral repercussions. Paul's fiscal conservatism and opposition to Federal Reserve policies contribute to his popularity among the Tea Party faction of the Republican Party, while Kucinich embodies the progressive base of the Democratic Party, increasingly frustrated with Obama's trail of broken campaign promises. Feingold and Hagel would be free of such baggage, while harkening back to the proud and vocal Midwestern anti-imperialists of our nation's past (such as Wisconsin Republican Senator Robert "Fighting Bob" LaFollette and Nebraska Democratic Senator William Jennings Bryan, who resigned as Secretary of State upon U.S. entry into World War One).


The challenges would be daunting, of course. The establishments of both parties would be arrayed against them, as would be the corporate money. Additionally, many lifelong members of both parties would simply be unwilling to support a ticket that included someone from the other party. And the phenomenon of Obama as a galvanizing figure cannot be underestimated: given the historic 2008 election of this country's first black president, many Democrats/liberals/ progressives would simply be reluctant to support a ticket of two white males.

While I am as disconcerted as anyone by the perpetual campaigning that seems to define and trivialize our political discourse, I also recognize that even unsuccessful presidential campaigns can have tremendous impacts, capturing the zeitgeist of the time and perhaps prophecying the future. I really think two years from now could be one of those times. Carpe diem, my friends.