EVER SINCE the Bush administration embarked upon its Iraq venture, it has taken a strict, inflexible line on the past: Forget about it.
Given the unending string of catastrophic misjudgments by President Bush and his national security team, future generations will be aghast to learn that the first member of the president's inner circle to leave this administration -- White House Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. -- was one unassociated with a war that has dramatically weakened America's standing, America's economy and America's security.
The administration's desire to avoid drawing attention to Iraq is not surprising. Children fib to cover their tracks; Catholic bishops juggle their priests to do so; and corporate executives shift the focus to next year's profit forecasts to avoid this year's bottom line. It is the rare individual in public life who acknowledges responsibility for error without being forced to do so -- John F. Kennedy on the Bay of Pigs and Dwight Eisenhower in anticipation of an unsuccessful Normandy landing are two examples that come to mind.
But even more remarkable than the administration's convenient amnesia these last two years has been the seeming reluctance of foreign policy veterans in the Democratic Party to challenge it. Democratic critics of the administration, for the most part, have been cowed into making either "constructive," forward-looking comments or none at all.
There are many understandable reasons for the Democrats' relative quiet; opposition parties have a notoriously difficult time finding an appropriate voice in wartime. But these reasons must be overcome, or both the United States and the Democratic Party will suffer the consequences.
On the occasions when critics have challenged the Bush administration, of course, its officials have done a brilliant job of turning defense into offense. They argue that those who insist on looking back -- which is derided as "rehashing" and "dwelling on the past" -- are undermining U.S. security.
Those who dare question whether Bush's doctrine of spreading democracy around the globe is working out as planned are caricatured as longing for a return to an era of torture and tyranny.
