The 2004 Democratic primary campaign has produced one of the more depressing political phenomena in memory: the rise of the citizen pundit. With Howard Dean gone from the race, the last traces of passion--and, I fear, conviction--have been leached from the electorate. Instead of voters, we have handicappers. Ask a civilian why she likes Kerry or Edwards, and more often than not, you get dime-store Capital Gang: "Kerry can match up with Bush on national security," or "Edwards can win in the South." This is a form of pragmatism, I suppose. Democrats are desperate to beat George W. Bush. But it is also fresh evidence of television's ability to lobotomize democracy. With serious issues of war and prosperity at stake, horse-race punditry seems particularly vacant right now--and particularly useless in a year when we professional blabbers have demonstrated yet again the essential idiocy of political prognostication.
The punditry virus has even infected the candidates. John Edwards' sharpest attack on John Kerry in this campaign was a matter of commentary, not substance. It came in the Wisconsin debate, after Kerry offered not one but two gaseous responses to a simple question: Given your support for the Iraq-war resolution, "do you feel any degree of responsibility for the war and its costs and its casualties?" A small taste of Kerry's response: "The President had the authority to do what he was going to do without the vote of the United States Congress ... That's why we have a War Powers Act. What we did was vote with one voice of the United States Congress for a process ..." And on and on.
"That's the longest answer I ever heard to a yes-or-no question," Edwards said. "The answer to your question is 'Of course.' We all accept responsibility for what we did." And then Edwards wandered into the same pabulum swamp as Kerry, insisting that the effort in Iraq needs to be internationalized (as if the President weren't desperately trying to do just that). He too avoided the real thrust of the question: Do you believe the war was a good idea? This would seem a matter of some interest for Democrats, far more important than whether a war hero or a millworker's son is better positioned to beat George Bush. But punditry is less strenuous, and less dangerous, than clarifying a crucial issue. In this case, it may be the most important question of the campaign: Do you believe the President was right or wrong to go to war? No long answers, please.