FOR TWO years, liberals like myself have been frustrated about the state of the union. September 11 made President George W. Bush invincible. Critiques of the president became not only "wrong" in the eyes of the right, but also immoral and unpatriotic. When the media challenged the president, it was a demonstration of "liberal bias." If CNN, Fox News or MSNBC decided to not obsess about the war (and thus make it seem inevitable and right), they would lose ratings. It made a president who vowed to avoid nation building start a preemptive war to destroy and rebuild a nation. September 11 certainly did change the world -- and liberalism suffered.
But this summer, liberalism came back. I finally had hope that I could have a politician in office who actually shared views consistent with progressives like myself. Perhaps the president that sleeps more than any college student could actually be defeated. The tide has changed this summer, and liberalism is finally becoming legitimate again.
At the beginning of the summer, all the news channels had pundits analyzing and Republicans bragging about how Bush could never be beaten. They said that unlike the case with his father, a poor economy would not be enough to send a president home early. September 11 changed the world, and as long as Republicans are more popular when it comes to national security, they cannot be beaten. Or so the theory went.
The tide is changing. The summer went on, and the topic on the cable news shows changed from how invincible Bush was to asking the simple question: "Where are those pesky weapons of mass destruction we were so afraid of?" As the summer went on, a much more perilous question emerged: "If we were so confident Hussein had weapons, and we can't find them, who does have them?" A political dilemma is now a policy dilemma -- Hussein's weapons could now be lost and available to any madman to use against the United States and its allies. More and more soldiers continued to die, and Iraq was a bigger problem than most Americans imagined.
At home, Howard Dean, the long-shot anti-war Democratic candidate, surged to the top of the polls in New Hampshire and Iowa, contrary to all the pundits' beliefs that a dove could not be nominated to become president. Dean was able to raise record amounts of money -- more than Bush-Cheney for one weekend -- from small donors. His success let the country know he didn't need to bow down to the special interests of the rich to be able to compete with the big name "Democrats" such as Lieberman, Kerry or Edwards.
Dean was then able to ride in on the charges of the Bush administration exaggerating evidence about Iraq's nuclear program. The conservatives tried the normal charge that the liberal media -- the same "liberal" media that pushed the Clinton impeachment -- was making a scandal out of a mistake. But the media, for once, took a stand and said: "Being critical of the president is not evidence of a liberal bias." They dug deeper, and found out it wasn't a CIA mistake; it was a "mistake" within the administration.
But then came Arnold Schwarzenegger. Iraq became a saner and less interesting place than our own California. A man with no platform was suddenly leading the polls to become the next governor of California. His promises of after-school programs for every school during the fiscal crisis somehow seems feasible to California voters. Schwarzenegger became the distraction Bush needed. He could enjoy his month-long vacation because the media had a pumped-up Austrian to drool over. Tough questions could wait about national security and the still stagnant economy, and allegations of cover-ups can wait until California picks another idiot who has no idea how to undo California's economical and political mess.
But I am confident that Bush's free ride is over; Bush will not win with a landslide despite all the natural advantages he received because of September 11. Liberals can no longer be accused of being unpatriotic or out-of-sync with most Americans. Granted, liberals have a long way to go. Dean, if he wins the primary, would have to convince America that he is not a pacifist or too far left. The media, or at least cable news, will continue to think with their wallets rather than for the pursuit of the truth. But at least Americans are entertained again by criticism of the president. So perhaps the "summer of liberalism" will continue through the school year, and maybe, just maybe, we will not have to put up with Mr. Bush for another four years.
(Patrick Harvey is a Cavalier Daily associate editor. He can be reached at pharvey@cavalierdaily.com.)
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