Teasing

Most of us have met an incorrigible teaser. The kind of person who,
when you ask for something, smiles and speaks encouragingly, but isn't
quite ready to do it -- and turns out never to be. He'll tell you
there's just one, small, itsy-bitsy thing you have to do before he's
ready to help you out, but then after you do that small itsy-bitsy
thing it turns out there's another small, itsy-bitsy thing he didn't
think worth mentioning before. . .

Or, you didn't quite do the itsy-bitsy thing quite right,
so there's just one, small, itsy-bitsy correction you need to make. . .

And so on. Sometimes it can take a while to realize you're being
teased. That you're not ever going to be able to come to a meeting of
minds, that the teaser has no real intention of ever handing over his
quo for your quid, but that holding you hostage to your hopes can be a
very useful way of manipulating you.

I thought of teasers I'd known while pondering the recent debate over
whether Mr. Kerry can be trusted to use military force in the
interests of the United States when it's really necessary. Many folks
seem to feel that this is a bottom line issue in deciding whom to
support. The argument seems to go like this: Mr. Bush has done X and
Y which I don't like, but I completely trust him to use military force
when necessary. Mr. Kerry seems like such a nice man, but he's said
some troubling things about military force, and I worry about those
terrorists. I don't like war, but I just wonder: can Mr. Kerry really
be trusted to actually use force when it really must be used?

Mr. Kerry has resolved, if that's the right word, the discrepancy
between his statements and actions over the past 30 years and the
current national needs by saying that, well, yes, it's true he opposed
every other significant projection of American force from Vietnam to
the Cold War to 1980s Central America to the first and second Gulf
Wars -- but that was just because the conditions weren't quite right.
Certain small, itsy-bitsy, preconditions weren't satisfied. Other
countries weren't properly consulted, the legal arguments for action
weren't quite right, certain ultimatums weren't given, war was used as
the second-to-last resort instead of last resort. . .

And so on. A familiar pattern, if you're a middle-aged cynic like me.
So, you know what? Mr. Kerry is a teaser. At least on this subject.
If you step back a bit, and take the long view, look at the whole
broad sweep of his 40 year adult career, you can see that. He isn't
really ever going to see the necessity for taking a national stand, is
he? He isn't ever going to get to place where he says to hell with
being a nice guy, and to hell with the rest of the world; this spot is
where the United States stands fast and will spend her sons' and
daughters' blood to defend.

Why he feels that way, I don't know. But his whole career is a
testament to the fact that he does, whatever his speech of the moment
may be.

Why Mr. Kerry is a teaser on the subject is, however, perfectly clear.
He wants very badly to be elected President, and it's obvious he can't
be unless Americans can talk themselves into believing that he might
be willing to use force on our behalf.

Fortunately, he is telling us that he is. He is willing to use force
on our behalf. Just so long as one, small, itsy-bitsy thing gets done
first. . .