In the endless to and fro about causes of electoral disaster in which the polling experts agree that the war made a normal defeat into a disaster, and partisans say it was their most important issue, I’ve heard it said that “no one is denying that the war was a factor.” And yet, here are Mark Penn and Andrew Stein, writing in the Wall Street Journal, trying mightily to downplay it: “It Was the Economy, Not the War.” Their piece contends that the people want more war!
Penn and Stein start by quoting Vance — “The reason we lost is the war” — and then try to argue against this. They say wars cause “major political shifts” only when they produce thousands of casualties. But this war produced “a temporary $1.50-a-gallon increase in the price of gasoline, which costs a typical household about $20 a week.” In their view, “if that’s enough to bring about a political sea change, then the electorate has lost all rationality.”
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