Those Unpatriotic Traitors on Capitol Hill

Time for a little quiz, kiddies. Take out your pencils and paper and follow along. Ready? Okay, guess who said the following about America's role in a recent overseas conflict:

1. The atrocities are America's fault.

2. The failure of diplomacy to avert the war is America's fault.

3. Congress should not support the war.

4. We can't win.

5. Don't believe U.S. propaganda.

6. Give peace a chance.

7. We have no choice but to compromise.

8. We're eager to compromise.

9. We'll back off first.

Okay, pencils down. Did you get:

1. Rep. John Murtha (D-PA)
2. Sen. John Kerry (D-MA)
3. Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA
4. Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI)
5. Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI)
6. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)
7. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY)
8. Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA)
9. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL)

Wrong on all counts. (If you said "John Lennon" for #6, give yourself a point.) They were said by, among others, Sen. Trent Lott (R-MS), former Sen. Don Nickles (R-OK), and former Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX). They were talking about Kosovo and Yugoslavia in 1999 when President Clinton, along with NATO, took out a brutal dictator and put an end to a horrific civil war. (Read the whole article by William Saletan in Slate here.)

The difference, of course, is that Mr. Clinton is a Democrat, which turned the Republicans instinctively into the anti-war party; anything Clinton did, the Republicans were against.

Saletan concludes the article with an interesting -- and accurate -- predicition:

Some* Democrats call Republicans who make these arguments unpatriotic. Republicans reply that they're serving their country by debunking and thwarting a bad policy administered by a bad president. You can be sure of only two things: Each party is arguing exactly the opposite of what it argued the last time a Republican president led the nation into war, and exactly the opposite of what it will argue next time.

(*Again with the "Some Democrats." Some things never change.)