This Election's 'Vet Factor'

[one...two...tree 2,762]

By Michael Slenske, SMITH Magazine

Of the 1008 candidates running this election, six have a credential the others can't match: they've served the U.S. armed forces in the war on terror. Among these, you'll find an ex-Recon Marine whose unit rescued 31 wounded men during a firefight with Fedayeen militiamen, a Black Hawk helicopter pilot who lost both her legs to a rocket-propelled grenade, and a former vice admiral of the Navy. And if the "Iraq Factor" is as big a factor as the pundits and political strategists would have us believe, the incumbents facing these vets, none of whom have served in the military, should be hard-pressed to retain their seats in the midterm elections. But will serving on the front lines in the war on terror really offer anyone a political advantage this fall?

"Definitely," says pioneering Netroots political strategist Joe Trippi. "The Democrats have been positioned as soft on terror and weak on defense since 9/11. It takes the Republicans' core argument and pulls the rug out from under it. I think they've got a huge advantage." And with Iraq mired in civil war it would appear that Democrats own the "Vet Factor." Why? According to Trippi, Republican vets -- much like the president -- simply can't extract any more mileage from "stay the course" rhetoric. "There's a combination of failed policy and things going badly in Iraq, so it doesn't benefit a Republican to defend the president's policies just because they've served in Iraq."

Author and Iraq vet Nathaniel Fick isn't so sure. "I'm not of the school that says you have to have served in uniform in order to be a good commander in chief," says Fick, who wrote One Bullet Away, about the Marine Recon platoon he led in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2003. "Look at Lincoln and FDR -- both exceptional wartime presidents who didn't serve in the military but made a point of surrounding themselves by people who had." As a member of the board of advisers for the PAC VoteVets.org, Fick works to get vets elected from both parties, though he stresses that these candidates need to connect with voters on more than just the war if they want to win. "I think their constituents care more about jobs and healthcare than they do about Iraq. But combat service should mean something. Senior leaders are grown over decades -- if we want to have people with credibility to stand up and make or question strategic decisions in 20 or 30 years, then we need to start grooming them now."

http://alternet.org/module/printversion/43773