Podhoretz: Daschle's breakdown ["Trembling with rage and shouting in a bizarrely hoarse voice, Daschle seemed like he was channeling the spirit of the now-jailed lunatic Rep. Jim Traficant"]

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DASCHLE'S BREAKDOWN

September 27, 2002 -- SENATE Majority Leader Tom Daschle just made American politics a lot more interesting with his fascinating floor speech Wednesday, during which he demanded an apology from President Bush for saying Democrats didn't care about national security. "We ought not politicize this war," said Daschle.

This was an odd sentiment for a man whose entire mission these past nine months has been to find a Democratic approach to playing war politics as the midterm elections approach in November.

"We ought not politicize the rhetoric about war and life and death," said the very same man who created a firestorm on Feb. 28 by going public at a press conference with all manner of negative comments about the administration's conduct of the war on terror.

On that day, Daschle even implicitly endorsed the bizarre notion that the Pentagon was consciously manufacturing reasons to stay in Afghanistan permanently. Only hours after he spoke, U.S. forces found themselves engaged in a bitter battle with Taliban forces outside the city of Gardez - which indicated that the U.S. military's work in Afghanistan was actually quite far from over. Daschle immediately beat a hasty rhetorical retreat.

Normally, Daschle acts in a very prudent and calculating manner. He's among the most controlled and careful people in American public life.

Certainly, he satisfied many partisan Democrats on Wednesday. (A hilarious Wednesday-night bulletin issued by The Borowitz Report, the brilliant satirical Web site, suggested that Daschle was only able to give the speech because he and his fellow Democrats had found their missing testicles in the Senate cloakroom, where they'd checked them at the beginning of the war on terror and forgotten them.)

But I don't think there was anything prudent or calculated about Daschle's words on Wednesday. He sure didn't look like he usually does when he issues his careful jibes. Trembling with rage and shouting in a bizarrely hoarse voice, Daschle seemed like he was channeling the spirit of the now-jailed lunatic Rep. Jim Traficant.

His speech was profoundly imprudent, given that his indictment of Bush came directly from a single front-page story in Wednesday's Washington Post - an article that contained two glaring misrepresentations.

The glib and sloppy Dana Milbank, who wrote it, managed in a single piece to mischaracterize words spoken both by Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney. What set Daschle off was Milbank's distorted editing of a standard-issue political remark about how the Democrats who oppose his homeland-security bill care more about "special interests" than they do about "the security of the American people."

The president garbled his words a bit, as we all know he is wont to do. But his meaning was clear, as was Cheney's.

Daschle attacked Cheney for politicizing the war effort based on a detail from Milbank's piece. Milbank quoted a headline in a Kansas paper about a Cheney appearance on behalf of congressional candidate Adam Taff: "Cheney Talks About War: Electing Taff Would Aid War Effort."

But here's what Cheney actually said: "President Bush and I are very grateful for the opportunity to serve our country. We thank you for your support not just for our efforts, but for candidates like Adam Taff, who will make a fine partner for us in the work ahead."

That's hardly "outrageous."

Spending a year on the defensive against George Bush has taken its toll on Tom Daschle, who is geniunely baffled about how to conduct partisan political warfare at a time of real war. He is genuinely concerned that as America moves ever closer to war with Iraq, the country will begin to identify more strongly with Republicans. And that means his days as Senate majority leader may come to an end once the votes are tallied in November.

If he sticks close to Bush, he offends partisan Democrats - and threatens to depress loyal Democratic turnout at the polls in November.

But if he goes against Bush, he is taking a manifestly unpopular stand, which is something no politician wants to do.

Here's my admittedly simplistic contribution to the why-did-Daschle-do-it debate: Tom Daschle got up Wednesday morning, read the Washington Post . . . and totally lost it.

E-mail: podhoretz@nypost.com

-- Anonymous, September 27, 2002


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