JOHN LEO RESPONDS TO ANDREW SULLIVAN:

But consider the background music here. “Even within the Democratic Party” is an acknowledgment that a good many Americans don’t trust the Democrats to run a war on terror. “Has to be a bipartisan affair” blinks the message that the Democrats, as a national party, often seem detached from that war, not just from the campaign in Iraq.

Many of the doubts that hover over Sullivan’s case for Kerry are rooted in the value system widely shared among Democrats: Most people are basically good; wars are caused not by evil motives but by misunderstandings that can be talked out; conflict can be overcome by more tolerance and examining of our own faults or by taking disputes to the United Nations. As a personal creed, these benign and humble attitudes are admirable. As the foundation of a policy to confront terrorists who wish to blow up our cities, they are alarming.

These doubts explain why Kerry’s two oddest verbal slips–“nuisance” and “global test” –have resonated.

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