Earlier this week, Weekly Standard editor William Kristol
continued his frantic efforts to prevent the nomination of Donald Trump by suggesting
that National Review writer, attorney, and Iraq war veteran David French
was a good choice for an independent run for president.
The backlash against French was fierce, and immediate. And soon after came
the outrage that there would be distaste for a man who writes publicly for a
famous conservative magazine, and who therefore invites commentary on his (many
bad) opinions. Daily Beast Senior Editor Andrew Kirell (a friend)
mocked French, but mostly mocked Kristol for being wrong about everything,
and for being a warmongering creep. This was outrageous to people who think
French is somehow virtuous because he’s a Christian, and because he joined the
military.
I have no idea what French is like in person, or how he treats his friends.
The same with Kristol. Perhaps they are kind, charming, and intelligent at parties.
And though French and his wife’s bizarre-sounding agreement about her keeping
off of social media while he was in Iraq sounds icky – and commentary on your
marriage is invited when you publicly write about your marriage – it is not
my concern. Friends of French are forgiven for being annoyed by the portrayal
of this apparent agreement as some kind of abusive one, even if, again, this
was not private information leaked.
The larger point, however, is that it is
not only politicians who deserve scorn and backlash. We needn’t wait for
a person with dreadful opinions to win power before expressing horror that they
are even considering trying to gain it. The empire’s most ardent fans are not
clean, simply because they haven’t signed any drone strike orders personally.
Kristol’s first dream of an anti-Trump ticket was Dick Cheney and Tom Cotton,
which literally could not be more social conservative and hawkish. So if someone
comes Kristol-endorsed, run the other way.
Now, French is sometimes capable of sounding more nuanced about war than Kristol,
who has imploded into self-parody, as his twitter feed attests. But he is the
same breed of creature in the end. War is tough, war is important, and nuking
Japan must always be
stressed and overstressed as a good thing.
Soldiers are a mixed crew. For every Robert
Bales, there is a
Hugh Thompson Jr., and a hundred thousand bit players in the production
known as American empire. For every soldier who came home sure he or she was
right to be there, another becomes a radical antiwar activist. It does no good
to say soldiers are the only ones to blame for war, but it would be be dishonest
to suggest that they play no part in it.
And it’s not condescending to say that some people have fewer
options, some people truly don’t know how bad a war is until they get there.
And…