Over the holidays, Time Magazine chose George W. Bush, "American Revolutionary," as its Person of the Year. Of course, our current President's preemptive war policy, or his consistent disregard for America's traditional allies, could be considered revolutionary.
Lately it has become clearer that President Bush's "revolutionary" foreign policy goes far deeper than syntactical blunders justifying the war in Iraq, such as writing "let freedom reign" on a napkin. In 2000, Marvin Olasky wrote a book entitled "Compassionate Conservatism: What It Is, What It Does, and How It Can Transform America." The book details how faith based initiatives can alleviate issues like rampant poverty by leaving them to religious charity groups. Religious groups, Olasky argues, instill "good moral values and conservative ideas into the thick of the fight for justice and opportunity," rather than merely handing out food and checks. The 2000 election year saw the birth of the buzzword, and political tool: "compassionate conservatism."
Today, Compassionate Conservatism has taken on an international focus. It is embodied in the President's campaign to "spread freedom and Democracy" in whatever areas of the world he deems fit. But Bush's "armies of compassion" have now spread far beyond the bungled campaign in Iraq. The Christian right has taken ownership of many issues Democrats used to wield heartily, and is now working closely with Bush administration to forge new programs and shut Democrats out.
The 2004 elections not only gave Mr. Bush a mandate to "finish the job" in Iraq; they now appear to have enshrined the President's Christian moralist rhetoric as the new justification for American human rights intervention. Acts that used to be justified by Wilsonian internationalist tenets of peace and human dignity are now being validated by divine right. The President maintains that "Freedom is not America's gift to the world, it is the Almighty's gift to everyone." The war in Iraq has shown that he believes America has a responsibility to make sure this gift is promptly delivered.
Consider Allen D. Hertzke's recent publication, "Freeing God's Children: The Unlikely Alliance for Global Human Rights." Hertzke argues that the 21st century push for human rights initiatives comes from religious groups that feel they are doing the Lord's work. For example, conservative Christians have led the charge in coming to the aid of victim's in Darfur while also pushing to crack down on North Korea's ugly human rights record. When the right wing evangelical Kansas Senator Sam Brownback traveled to rural Uganda to garner evidence of recent brutalities, he justified American intervention by saying to Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times: "It made me think, the things that the Lord would want done, let's do. His heart is with the downtrodden, so let's help them."
Thus, the Christian right's newest political movement has acquired a controlling interest in American humanitarianism. This does not bode well for the Democrats. Most of them risk political isolation in opposing America's apparent "moral values". But if they want to recover from their recent political thrashing, more on the left are going to have to work with such radical religious groups as Focus on Family, New Directions International, and International Aid that have been incorporated as a large part of Bush's official American Tsunami relief effort. And although these groups tend to dislike liberal Democrats, a successful partnership between Brownback and Kennedy on humanitarian initiatives should give Democrats hope of climbing back on the donkey. For only by regaining a stake in issues like human rights and foreign policy will Democrats ever be able to expand the terms of debate from divine inspiration to more general values of peace, human dignity, and prosperity.
For now, however, Time Magazine seems to have hit the nail on the head; George W. Bush is an American Revolutionary. He has changed the terms of political debate by firmly introducing a proselytizing ethic as substantive justification for military or diplomatic actions. When it comes to humanitarian aide, the ends may be justification enough for everybody when the world hears of successful American food and medical deliveries, but to give similar reason for U.S. force is truly disturbing. How can we possibly debate a future war if it's simply the Lord's will?
