PoliGazette’s Jonathan Wilson wonders what went wrong in the Middle East and what US policy should be. (more…)
Ron Paul has decided that since the Republican party won’t give him the light of day, he’s going to hold his own little party in St. Paul coinciding with the Republican National Convention. The idea would be to showcase that there are Republicans sick of the GOP and it’s straying away from small government (which is doubtlessly true) and that these people would rather see someone like Ron Paul in the White House (which is highly unlikely).
Dick Morris, in today’s Washington Post: Obama Has the Upper Hand. But McCain Can Still Take Him.
To sum it up: A candidate who cannot get elected is being nominated by a party that cannot be defeated, while a candidate who is eminently electable is running as the nominee of a party doomed to defeat.In this environment, McCain can win by running to the center.
A look at the money game of all three candidates. What? Don’t you recognize them?
I’m not sure Mike Huckabee could have received worse news than Mitt Romney’s endorsement of John McCain. Not because Huckabee had a chance to get the Republican nomination (that miracle ain’t coming) but because Romney suddenly looks like the man at the top of McCain’s VP list.
With John McCain having a basically unbeatable lead, it’s easy to forget that he’s still not officially the candidate. Huckabee added another state to his belt today, showing that he still has solid support despite John McCains all-but-assured victory.
As discussed here and here, the Republican Party consists of three wings.
First, there’s the Money! wing, whose guiding principal is: “Money. More.” Then the Bombs! wing, whose guiding principal is, “Grrrr! Rrrowf! Rrrowf!.” And finally the Jesus! wing which believes God made gays on the seventh day at a wild post-creation party. (During which God did several things even He can’t remember. And woe unto he who remindeth Him.)
We are down to three Republican candidates, and each is not only a representative of one wing of the party, but the mathematically precise representative of that wing. Each of the three is the perfect embodiment, the distilled essence, of his wing of the GOP. Quite frankly, it’s eerie.
(more…)
Mitt Romney is gaining in the Republican polls and that’s simply not something I understand. Yes, I know John McCain is not well-loved in his party but it takes some serious mental contortions to believe Romney is a better choice.
Let’s leave aside the fact that McCain is vastly more qualified and has shown a level of courage and leadership far surpassing whatever sits inside the well-tailored suit of Romney. Let’s also leave aside electability, which also greatly favors McCain. Let’s just look at what makes both these candidates unacceptable for Republicans. (more…)
The 2008 election season is already shaping up to be one of the most closely contested in history. Neither party is likely to produce a clear nominee in the short term, and one or both might wind up in the first contested convention in the United States in decades. But while there is not yet any winners, there is a clear casualty — the idea of the “big tent” party may be dying under withering factional fighting in both parties. (more…)
Ed Morrissey’s post “The Two Words That Strike Fear Into The GOP” has an interesting premise, that the RNC is afraid of the competition that’s going on now between the major Republican contenders:
Republican primary voters have sent a very clear message: they have not found their candidate. After a remarkable full-year, full-court press, the top five candidates remain bunched together closely enough to have a serious shot at winning at least one of the early states. No one has broken out of the pack on either a national or state-to-state basis, and all of them have serious obstacles to uniting the conservative coalition, fair or unfair.
What happens if Huckabee wins Iowa, McCain wins or comes close in New Hampshire, Romney wins South Carolina, and Rudy can’t close the deal in Florida? The other large states would normally take cues from early momentum, but instead, they will have no clear bandwagon on which to jump.
Drudge is reporting an interesting new theory behind Huckabee’s meteoric rise in the polls — a decision by Democrats to hold fire after polling data indicated that Huckabee would be the easiest Republican candidate to defeat. This Machiavellian idea carries familiar overtones of Clinton politics — choosing the “right enemies”:
“He’ll easily be their McGovern, an easy kill,” mocked one senior Democrat operative Tuesday morning from Washington.
“His letting out murderers because they shout ‘Jesus’, his wanting to put 300,000 AIDS patients and Magic Johnson into isolation, ain’t even scratching the surface of what we’ve got on him.”
It would appear that not only has the primary election cycle become far longer, but it is being increasingly subsumed by the general election cycle, as partisans in one party work to undermine the other party’s selection process to ensure their own chances. (more…)
Bad news for Rudy Giuliani: his presidential bid “has provoked a groundswell of opposition from disparate forces including conservative Catholics, remnants of Pat Buchanan’s presidential campaigns and regional political operatives seeking to break into the Republican firmament.”
The opposition is united in its determination to block Giuliani, a supporter of abortion rights and gay rights, from becoming the GOP’s standard bearer. But lurking just beneath the surface is another motive for these anti-Giuliani conservatives: cash. The groups hope to benefit from a large constituency of donors willing to write big checks to bring down the former New York City mayor. The donors include backers of Giuliani’s competitors as well as ideologues of the right.
The new organizations are relying on two fundraising models, both of which were highly successful in previous attacks. One is the drive in 2005 to force White House counsel Harriet Miers to withdraw her nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. That campaign, spearheaded by conservatives opposed to Miers, raised an estimated $2 million. The other is the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign in 2004, which began with a modest budget but ended up raising millions in an effort to destroy John Kerry’s reputation as a war hero.
One of the organizations involved is The Conservative Declaration, based in Michigan, but has supporters in over 30 states.
Paul Nagy, the group’s top-gun in New Hampshire, believes nominating Giuliani would be disastrous for the American conservative movement. Along with other activists, Nagy signed a letter seeking additional signatories to the anti-Rudy declaration. The letter states: “Rudy Giuliani is an unacceptable Republican nominee for President of the United States. He is pro-abortion, pro-partial birth abortion, pro-registration of handguns, and pro-homosexual rights. He is the most liberal Republican candidate for President in our nation’s history.”
The Republican Party really stands for a choice here. Will the Religious Right continue to set the agenda, or will traditional conservatives, libertarian conservatives and moderate Republicans take their party back?
I have expressed my belief that, if the GOP wants to be able to compete in the long run, it has to break with the so-called Religious Right. The reason for this is that I believe that the policies favored by the RR, divide America. They divide America into ‘good people’ and ‘ bad people’, into ’saints’ and ’sinners’.
Conservatism has the potential to appeal to a lot of people: conservatism stands for freedom, personal responsibility and limited government. I’d say focus on that and break with the conquer and divide crowd.
Joshua Trevino published a great post at his blog, in which he calls on traditional conservatives to reclaim their party.
I say this is obvious, but only from a moral standpoint: from a pragmatic stance, the Party may be extremely worthwhile in its own right, as a means of personal advancement or a source of sinecures for friends and allies. Serving a structure for its own sake is the time-honored career of apparatchiks through history, and the Republican Party assuredly has its own class. Fortunately, they are easy enough to pick out: they are the ones who pirouette and leap to defend whatever line is promulgated by the ruling elements of the party at any particular moment, independent of its veracity or sense. They do the hard work of shaping the narrative at the ground level, and they hew it so that it is impervious to principled critique — almost always with the protest that such critique merely weakens our own. The irony is that no critique weakens our own so much as their most profound absurdities, be it that Tom DeLay is worth fighting for to the bitter end, that Harriet Miers is competent to serve on the Supreme Court, that Alberto Gonzales is a fine Attorney General, or that the White House is doing a great job in Iraq. The cumulative effect of these things, and the concurrent abandonment of conservative principle in governance large and small, is why we now have a Congressional minority and a President with a 33% approval rating. The men of the party took the 1994 and 2000 victories won by the men of the movement, and squandered it all on — well, the party. Common sense tells us that it’s time to reverse the priorities and put conservatism ahead of Republicanism if we want to begin the climb back.
In this light, it is the dictates of that common sense that led RedState’s Erick Erickson to “declare war” on the GOP House leadership, to keep the latter from installing corrupt solicitor of prostitutes Ken Calvert on the Appropriations committee. This is truly an act of a friend toward a friend, albeit a sort of “tough love.” Having lost their way — and lost the Congress — the Republican leadership desperately needs this sort of attention from the grassroots who support and elect them. Unfortunately, just as every addict has enablers, so too does the party apparatus have the men of the party to defend and sustain it in its path toward moral and electoral oblivion. True conservatives know who that Ken Calvert must not assume his place in leadership: and true conservatives know that this is merely the beginning of a long and sustained effort to reclaim the Republican Party for principle and the movement.
Joshua goes on to quote two conservatives - both from the conservative TownHall(.com); Matt Lewis and Dean Barnett who accuse people like Red State’s Erik of “being too much like leftists.”
I agree completely with that and, it has to be said, it seems to be happening, at least to a degree. Ron Paul, for instance, is clearly building momentum (although Paul is, of course, a libertarian conservative, not a traditional conservative, but it’s close enough for now).
H/t Joe Gandelman
I consider it to be quite unlikely, despite Hagel’s criticism of the GOP.
Hagel: “I am not happy with the Republican Party today. It’s been hijacked by a group of single-minded almost isolationists, insulationists, power-projectors.”
Bloomberg and Hagel had dinner, but no deals were made between the two: “We didn’t make any deals, but I think Mayor Bloomberg is the kind of individual who should seriously think about this. He is the mayor of one of the greatest cities on earth. He makes that city work. That’s what America wants.”
Rudolph W. Giuliani directly challenged Republican orthodoxy on Friday, asserting that his support for abortion rights, gun control and gay rights should not disqualify him from winning the party’s presidential nomination.
He said that Republicans needed to be tolerant of dissenting views on those issues if they wanted to retain the White House.
Some quotes:
- “If we don’t find a way of uniting around broad principles that will appeal to a large segment of this country, if we can’t figure that out, we are going to lose this election.”
- “The mere fact that I am standing here running for president of the United States with the views that I have, that are different in some respects on some of these issues, shows that we much more adequately represent the length and breadth and the opinions of America than the other party does.”
- “Where people of good faith, people who are equally decent, equally moral and equally religious, when they come to different conclusions about this, about something so very very personal, I believe you have to respect their viewpoint. You give them a level of choice here.”
Rudy Giuliani could lead the non-social conservative part of the Republican Party. Many people seem to believe these days, that the very core, the true base of the Republican Party is social conservative. This is, I argue, not true. The Republican Party has, for decades, been a coalition of all sorts of conservatives and, yes, moderates. Many more fiscally conservative and moderate Republicans are upset with their party which has, in their opinion, been taken over by the Religious Right. Barry Goldwater even, spoke out against this development: so should Goldwater conservatives today.
A fascinating article at the NYT:
As they gather Thursday night at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library for their first debate, the Republican presidential candidates are thrilled at the chance to associate themselves with Reagan. But they may not be able to escape the challenge created for them by the current president.
As much as Iraq or health care or any other issue, the question of how to deal with President Bush is vexing the Republican field. Do they embrace him as a means of appealing to the conservative voters who tend to decide Republican primaries? Or do they break from him in an effort to show that they will lead the nation in a new direction? Do they applaud his policies or question his competence — or both?
Already, the leading candidates are showing clear divisions on that score. In formally announcing his candidacy last week, Senator John McCain of Arizona, without naming Mr. Bush, attacked the performance of the White House at home and abroad. In doing so, he separated himself from his two main rivals, Rudolph W. Giuliani and Mitt Romney, who have chosen to stick close to Mr. Bush, or at least to avoid breaking openly with him.
Aides to the candidates, who spent Wednesday in Southern California preparing for the debate, said they expected Mr. Bush and his record to be present in spirit when they began taking questions. Mr. McCain’s advisers said their candidate, who spent the day at his condominium in Coronado Beach, expected — and welcomed — an opportunity to expand on his differences with the White House.
“It’s always difficult — and we recognize this — to elect someone to a third term from the same party,” said John Weaver, a senior McCain adviser, in a break from debate preparations. “We know that to be the case. John is going to express his views as he see them: in some cases he and the president have shared the same position, but in some cases they don’t.”
Mr. Weaver argued that making a distinction with Mr. Bush was essential for any Republican who wanted to break the historical pattern and keep the White House in the same party for a third term. “Ultimately, if we’re the nominee — knock on wood — there will be a clear choice with Democrats, and I don’t think having a Republican administration will be a hindrance to us winning,” he said.
It is a balancing act, and quite a difficult one (even for such an act): they have to, yes, make clear that they are no Bush (for, another Bush will not be elected by the American people) but they cannot criticize Bush too openly or too directly. Criticize Bush, but do it indirectly. Criticize Bush but do it mildly, with moderation.
Who will be able to do that? Perhaps better said, who will have the courage to do that? One mistake and you’re in big trouble. For now, McCain seems to be the only one courageous enough to criticize Bush. Perhaps that is due to the fact that he is not exactly popular with the conservative base anyway.
I don’t know about you, but I am looking forward to the Republican debates.
Two interesting posts got published at The Impolitic recently. The first one by Libby Spencer:
September seems to be the unofficial timetable on rank and file GOP patience. So what to do now? Maha Barb articulates my current leanings. We have a president run amok who is so stubborn he will never back down, no matter what the cost. It’s time to reframe the battle from Democrats vs. Republicans to Congress vs. the White House.
Stone Soup Kathy spoke to that as well in comments to another post. It’s time to hold the Republicans accountable for their man. They put him into office. They gave him carte blanche and now it’s not only costing the party, it’s endangering the country. It’s time for Republicans who still believe in the rule of law to take control from the extremists who would create a monarchy and destroy their party in the process.
Later Jim Martin published this post:
Although I understand Jim’s frustrations, he is overdoing it a bit in my opinion. Yes, moderate and traditional and libertarian conservative Republicans have let the right-wing of the party, better yet the social conservative and authoritarian wing of the party, set the agenda for too long, but to pretend that there is no room for moderates in the Republican Party is, quite simply, nonsense. One of the reasons: the political parties in America differ per state / region. The Republican Party in, say, Massachusetts is quite different from the Republican Party in, say, Texas.
Besides that, it seems to me that less authoritarian and less social conservative Republicans are already reclaiming their party. If there were no room for them, they would already have left the GOP and / or they would at least not make a comeback. Also important to note is that I know more moderate Republicans myself: they oppose Bush, but they still feel at home in the Republican Party.
Perhaps people like Jim M. want the Republican Party to become a bullwark of the religious right, so that the Democrats will win just about all elections, but, if we look at the GOP, I do not see that happening.
Besides, the Democrats have their own problems with the progressive, anti-semitic, anti-capitalism and, yes, in many ways anti-american base.
The US Senate approved the Iraq war spending bill, calling for US troops to withdraw from Iraq as soon as July 1.
I am still waiting for the Democrats how they think a mass slaughter can be prevented once the US withdraws.
It seems that Democrats and Republicans are working towards a compromise.
Senior Democratic and Republican lawmakers began to weigh alternatives to the legislation’s most contentious provision, the binding withdrawal terms. The goal is to be more flexible but still restrain how Bush conducts the war…
The provision most likely to survive the next round is a set of political and diplomatic benchmarks for the Iraqi government. The language all but certain to be dropped, or at least diluted, would require troop withdrawals to begin as early as July 1 and no later than Oct. 1. Another sticking point is the bill’s $21 billion worth of domestic spending, which Bush and some Republicans have protested as pork.
A significant number of Republicans support the benchmarks — possibly enough to override a second veto, should Bush resort to that. The measures would prod Baghdad officials to build up military forces, crack down on militias and sectarian violence, protect minority rights and manage Iraq’s extensive petroleum reserves.
Meanwhile, General Patraeus said that “espite an increase in troop levels, the overall violence in Iraq has not declined, and he warned that U.S. casualties may increase in the coming months.”
He added: “This effort may get harder before it gets easier. It is an endeavor, again, that is going to require enormous commitment and commitment over time.”
There is one major problem: the ‘enormous commitment’ isn’t there. Democrats, and quite some Republicans, and the majority of the American people so it seems, do not want to be in Iraq for much longer.
I wish that the debate would be about what’s best for Iraq. They are talking about “getting our troops out,” okay, fair enough, I understand that, but… what about all those Iraqis who do not want the violence to continue but cannot stop it all by themselves? What about those Iraqis who did not ask the US to invade, but the US - leading a coalition of the willing - did so anyway? What about them? Are these people suggesting abandoning them?
“Our troops can’t get in the middle of a civil war,” is one of the things one hears quite often. Perhaps it is time to remember those who say this that without US intervention there would be no civil war. Whether you opposed the war or supported it… one has to look at the situation today.
I am repeating myself, I am aware of that, but the reason for that is that I find it increasingly worrisome and frustrating. They are talking about the US troops, about the US military, about the US deficit… but they are not talking about the Iraqi people anymore. My point? The tone of the debate is wrong. They are leaving one important aspect out of the entire debate.
Meanwhile, E.J. Dionne wrote an interesting column about the war in Iraq for today’s Washington Post. Dionne writes:
This is not really an argument over the “surge” of troops into Iraq. It is a fight over whether we want to make an open-ended commitment to keeping combat forces in Iraq for many years or whether we anticipate pulling most of them out within a year or two.
Even if the surge succeeds in a narrow sense — by reducing the number of Iraqis killed in sectarian violence in Baghdad — there is no guarantee that the overall situation in Iraq will be any better, no guarantee that Iraqi leaders will take the political steps necessary to end the internecine killing and create a stable government, no guarantee that we will make progress against al-Qaeda.
Very, very true and ‘we’ should way the risks against the potential for success very carefully, ‘we’ should include all major factors, but one of those factors that has to be included is… yes, the Iraqi people. Dionne too, does not mention them in his column.
Also read this article at NRO by Joseph Morrison Skelly.
David Broder wrote a very interesting column for the Washington Post about… Harry Reid. Broder’s thesis: Reid is just as incompetent as Alberto Gonzales.
Here’s a Washington political riddle where you fill in the blanks: As Alberto Gonzales is to the Republicans, Blank Blank is to the Democrats — a continuing embarrassment thanks to his amateurish performance.
If you answered ” Harry Reid,” give yourself an A. And join the long list of senators of both parties who are ready for these two springtime exhibitions of ineptitude to end.
President Bush’s highly developed tolerance for egregious incompetence in his administration may have met its supreme test in Attorney General Gonzales, who at various times has taken complete responsibility for the firing of eight U.S. attorneys and professed complete ignorance of the reasons for their dismissal. This demonstration of serial obfuscation so impressed the president that he rushed out to declare that Gonzales had “increased my confidence in his ability to do the job.”
[…]
On “Fox News Sunday,” Schumer offered this clarification of Reid’s off-the-cuff comment. “What Harry Reid is saying is that this war is lost — in other words, a war where we mainly spend our time policing a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis. We are not going to solve that problem. . . . The war is not lost. And Harry Reid believes this — we Democrats believe it. . . . So the bottom line is if the war continues on this path, if we continue to try to police and settle a civil war that’s been going on for hundreds of years in Iraq, we can’t win. But on the other hand, if we change the mission and have that mission focus on the more narrow goal of counterterrorism, we sure can win.”
Wait - so the war is lost but can still be won? That means that it’s not lost then, is it? If something is lost, one cannot possibly win it anymore.
Broder:
Everyone got that? This war is lost. But the war can be won. Not since Bill Clinton famously pondered the meaning of the word “is” has a Democratic leader confused things as much as Harry Reid did with his inept discussion of the alternatives in Iraq.
Broder then gives some examples of other, umh, slips of the tongue from Reid, like, o, say, calling George W. Bush a “loser;” Alan Greenspan, “one of the biggest political hacks we have here in Washington” (looks who’s talking); and saying that Frist has “no institutional integrity”, because Frist planned to leave the Senate to fulfill a term-limits pledge.
Of course, Reid later had to apologize for these remarks.
Josh Marshall rightfully points out that Gonzales is - still - much worse than Reid (for one thing, Gonzales has probably been lying about certain matters), but Broder’s main point still stands: Reid is incompetent. He is causing too much controversies, he is not careful enough, he is pandering to the base about matters like abortion, when exposed he contradicts himself and makes no sense whatsoever… He says things that do not just hurt him, but the Democratic Party as a whole…
I do not quite understand why the Democrats elected Reid to be their leader in the Senate. Surely there must be better candidates out there?
(Of course there are - the Dems also have some great politicians)
Also read this post by Ed Morrissey: he exposes and debunks, what he calls, “the five myths of Reid. In his update, he links to this story: Republican Duncan Hunter called on Reid to resign as Senate Majority Leader.
Boy o boy, how the Democrats are hurting themselves. It is unbelievable. Whether one agrees with what Republicans are saying and doing right now or not, one has to admit one thing: Reid has caused this problem himself by acting stupid.
I once heard that if the Democrats can be trusted to do one thing, it is to lose, when it seems impossible for them to do so. Is that what we see happening right now? Granted, the Republican noise machine is in full swing and jumps on everything that the Democrats do, but point is: the Dems should not provide political opponents with so much ammunition.
A great article at The American Conservative by W. James Antle III about the current state of the Republican Party and its presidential candidates:
Litmus tests must go. That is the rallying cry of those who believe Republicans should drop their insistence that the party’s 2008 presidential candidate toe the line on taxes, abortion, guns, or immigration. Wartime, the argument goes, is no time for conservatives to demand ideological purity. Or, as Noemie Emery put it in an emblematic essay for The Weekly Standard, “in a time of national peril, the test is a luxury [conservatives] cannot afford.”
Antle then goes on to compare Giuliani with McCain and states: “Between the two of them, they make virtually the entire conservative domestic agenda—lower taxes, limited government, gun rights, the pro-life cause, and the defense of traditional marriage—negotiable. Yet on one issue, Giuliani and McCain are both unflinchingly orthodox: the war in Iraq.”
All of these views fit comfortably within the conservative foreign-policy mainstream. But what about the frontrunners’ heterodox positions on domestic affairs? In 1990, George H.W. Bush irreparably damaged his relationship with the conservative base by backsliding on taxes. And at least his motives were consistent with that of a conventional Republican deficit hawk. McCain’s rationale for opposing the second President Bush’s tax cuts sounded much like Ted Kennedy’s. The Arizona senator said, “I cannot in good conscience support a tax cut in which so many of the benefits go to the most fortunate among us at the expense of middle-class Americans who need tax relief.”
Of course there is also Giuliani’s stance on abortion. Giuliani is, still, the frontrunner in the polls, while, “since Ronald Reagan, the conventional wisdom has been that no pro-choice Republican could win the party’s nomination.”
This new flexibility about staple conservative issues like taxes and abortion is far from unanimous, however. The anti-tax Club for Growth has pilloried McCain’s economic record, and the Arizona senator has been equally hostile to them. James Dobson, a leading religious conservative, has said flatly that he would not vote for either Giuliani or McCain in the general election. A high percentage of Republicans don’t know the full extent of Giuliani’s social liberalism. A Wall Street Journal poll found that a majority of the former mayor’s own supporters would have reservations about backing a pro-choice, pro-gay unions candidate.
It is this discomfort that has many Republicans scanning the cast of “Law and Order” to find a more conventionally conservative candidate. So far, the search has been unsuccessful. The yearning for Fred Thompson and Newt Gingrich has yet to officially lure them into the race. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has tried to fill the void with rhetoric that doesn’t match his record, encountering skepticism that may account for his low standing in the polls. But many Republicans want their nominee to be more than just a hawk. The New York Times found that nearly six in ten were dissatisfied with the current field…
So why not let the hawks have their way? It is a question their coalition partners should ponder carefully. The conservative domestic agenda is already stalled under a president who supposedly agrees with most of it. Territory ceded to leaders who don’t may be impossible to reclaim. Moreover, the foreign-policy thinkers who helped the Right win the Cold War were far more diverse and open to debate than those trying to lead the movement today. To say that conservatives can compromise on first principles but cannot disagree about how best to wage the war on terror is to urge the abandonment of the issues that built the Republican majority in favor of the issue that tore it down. Conservatives who surrender on every other fight in exchange for the single-issue hawks’ promises of victory are accepting a fool’s bargain.
BooMan links to this column by David Ignatius, which, in essence, deals with the same subject. BooMan also links to and comments on the column by Antle:
What we’re witnessing here is quite frightening because it amounts to a fairly massive display of false consciousness. Fear of Muslims and fear of terrorism is becoming a raison d’etat, which will inevitably lead to the loss of civil liberties, along with increased xenophobia/racism, and militarism. George W. Bush has failed in everything, but he has succeeded in turning the GOP into a proto-fascist party. Those that Antle quotes are merely the intellectual vanguard of a nationalist front party.
Well, that is overdoing it quite a bit, in my opinion, but I do agree with those who say that it is quite dangerous for Republican voters to focus solely on the war on terrorism / Iraq / foreign policy (just as it is stupid for Americans in general to focus solely on this issue and vote, therefore, for the Democrats). Conservative voters should, in my opinion, demand more. Now, I am quite ‘liberal’ on certain issues like, say, euthanesia, so I do not agree with the social conservatives on everything, but if I vote for someone, I want that person to share - not all since that’s not realistic - but at least most of my beliefs. Just “well they agree on the war” isn’t enough. A communist might agree with you on the war, but that doesn’t mean you should vote him or her into office.
As a matter of speech of course, I am not suggesting that Hillary Clinton is a communist (bad joke yeahyeah, busy days for me right now).
NewsMax (yes, NewsMax) reports that another Republican leader has called for Gonzales’ resignation:
Rep. Adam Putnam of Florida, chairman of the Republican conference in the House of Representatives, said it was important for the head of the U.S. Justice Department to have “unwavering” credibility.
“For the good of the nation, I think it is time for fresh leadership at the Department of Justice,” Putnam said in a brief telephone interview. He said a lack of credibility by the Justice Department chief puts in jeopardy the president’s legislative agenda.
Putnam is joining a growing list of U.S. lawmakers expressing a lack of confidence in Gonzales a day after he testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee on the firing of eight U.S. prosecutors last year. The dismissals raised concerns among Democrats that they were politically motivated.
Normally, if a president would continue to support an Attorney General who is as incompetent and, now, unpopular as Alberto Gonzales it would be astonishing. It would surprise everyone. With Bush it’s not. Bush demands loyalty of those close to him, in return he’s loyal, Bush is stubborn, refuses to give up, no matter how difficult the circumstances… all, normally, virtues, but - I am afraid - what would normally be virtues are, with Bush, developing into vices because he is exaggerating them. Aristotle wrote that true virtue is always ‘the middle’ option; moderation. Bush, seemingly, disagrees with that.
The result: a loss of credibility, a loss of support and, quite frankly, mismanagement and incompetence on more levels and in more departments than one.
Limbaugh defended Alberto Gonzeles today saying that “he might be an idiot”… “he might be a weak attorney general”, but Republicans should “circle the wagons” around him nonetheless. He also said that “whatever happened to Gonzales is beside the point.” Listen Limbaugh say it at Think Progress.
This is amazing. Rush is actually saying that competence is irrelevant: what matters is that the one under attack is a Republican. Republicans should defend Republicans no matter how incompetent they are.
I am right of center, of course, but I do not have any sympathy for Limbaugh. Limbaugh cares more about the Republican Party than about America, or so it seems.
TMV co-blogger Pete Abel had the pleasure, and honor, to interview the executive director of the Republican Leadership Council, Kate Whitman, last Friday. The RLC, of course, is “working with other moderate Republican Groups to return the GOP to a party that is ‘unified by the basic tenets of fiscal responsibility and personal freedom, but that allows for diverse opinions on social issues by its members’.”
It is a very interesting interview.
CS: What’s on the horizon for the RLC, near-term and long-term? Put another way, what are the organization’s major goals between now and November 2008?
KW: This year is definitely a re-building and re-focusing year. We’re spending a lot of time on building a slate of candidates, some of whom could be announced in the next several weeks. To be clear, we’re not endorsing Presidential candidates for the primaries next year. Instead, we’re focusing on the city, county, and state levels – on recruiting candidates at those levels; building a farm team, if you will. That’s what really distinguishes us from other groups like Main Street, which is largely focused on federal-level candidates. We’re also working with other groups to help their members and ours become delegates to the 2008 Republican Convention. Finally, we’re helping our California chapter conduct a leadership weekend in July, which will feature candidate and campaign training sessions along with issue and policy presentations. If that’s successful, we’ll look to replicate it elsewhere, with other state chapters.
That is quite interesting: the RLC focuses on changing things on a local level first, at a federal level later.
Why is that interesting? Because that is exactly how social conservatives got to power as well.
CS: Do you think there’s a “moderate majority” today within the GOP, or will you need to build that majority by recruiting Independents and/or right-leaning Democrats? What would you say to prodigal Republicans, to convince them to return to the Party?
KW: I don’t know if there’s a moderate Republican majority today, but there are many of us. It all hinges on getting out the message that we need to get back to where the Party started. I have friends who claim they’re Democrats, but they’re really not. They just don’t agree with what’s going on in Washington today. In short, if you support candidates who can have a constructive discussion about social issues but don’t demand adherence to one point of view or another on those issues, who instead demand adherence to the core principles of lower taxes, less intrusion in people’s lives, etc., then you’re a Republican. That’s the message we need to get out there.
I agree completely with that view. If Republicans want to appeal to more moderate and independent minded voters, they cannot allow social conservatives to set the agenda much longer. Many moderate Republicans I know feel that their party has been hijacked by the far right.
America is becoming increasingly conservative, of that I am quite sure, but that does not mean that the majority of Americans share the views of social conservatives who oppose government regulation of economical matters, but not of what most consider private matters.
Also, congrats to Pete for a job well done.
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