The Sept. 11 attacks have divided the United States into a “war party” and a “peace party,” and both will be disappointed with the outcome of the Afghan conflict, Pat Buchanan told a crowd of about 300 people Tuesday night.
“Nothing justifies what (Osama) bin Laden did,” Buchanan said. “That’s mass murder and you ought to get him and kill him.”
Buchanan, a former Republican and the Reform Party’s 2000 presidential candidate, said Bush’s 85 percent approval rating will diminish as U.S. involvement in Afghanistan continues.
“The war party believes in finishing off al-Qaida and Osama bin Laden as only a first step,” Buchanan said. “The main target they want to go after … is Saddam Hussein. This is the constituency that wants the president to go after Iraq.”
The United States does not have the support of its allies or the military power to wage such a war, Buchanan said.
“I don’t think Mr. Bush is going to have the war all these people are clamoring for and, when he doesn’t, they’re going to go after him politically,” Buchanan said.
The peace party, he said, wants a solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. Judging from former President Bill Clinton’s efforts to secure peace in the area, Buchanan deemed the prospect a “mission impossible.”
“We all found out when the World Trade Center was hit that a lot of people in that area hate the United States,” he said. “The assassination of (Israeli) Prime Minister (Yitzhak) Rabin in 1995 — his murder — may have killed the last good chance for peace.”
Although Buchanan has long taken an isolationist approach to U.S. foreign policy, the events of Sept. 11 have strengthened his argument, he said, citing the appointment of Tom Ridge as director of homeland security.
“We ought to put homeland security first,” he said. “I’m one of those that thought that’s what the Defense Department was for.”
After serving in the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations, Buchanan left the Republican Party in 1999, following unsuccessful bids for the party’s presidential nomination in 1992 and 1996.
“I came in second for the nomination to a guy who has become a Viagra salesman,” Buchanan said of Bob Dole’s 1996 Republican presidential nomination.
Listeners remained calm throughout the lecture despite a tense atmosphere at the beginning of the evening after a Northwestern administrator read the university’s policy against the disruption of speakers. The Louis Room reached capacity before the lecture started, leaving scores of students in the hall and a silent protest against Buchanan outside the Norris University Center.
“I thought he would say something to the extent of anti-immigration and anti-foreigners,” said Kasim Arshad, a Weinberg freshman. “Instead he was quite funny and a lot of what he said made a lot of sense.”
Buchanan ended his speech with a story about his role in the 2000 election. After worrying night and day that his tombstone would proclaim, “Here lies Pat Buchanan. He elected Al Gore,” Buchanan said he prayed for a way to solve that problem. The answer to his prayers was the voting controversy in Florida.
“(God said to me,) ‘I’m going to have (Jews and blacks) go out to the polls and think they’ve voted for Al Gore and they’ll vote for you,'” Buchanan said. “‘But Pat, don’t ever try a stunt like this again.'”
