Category Archives: John McCain

McCain increasingly turns toward November

Here’s an excerpt from a McCain release that illustrates what we’re seeing more and more, which is the "presumptive" nominee starting the general election campaign:

The Washington Post this week clearly laid out one of the key differences at stake in the coming general election. The Post reported, "Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton helped secure more than $340 million worth of home-state projects in last year’s spending bills, placing her among the top 10 Senate recipients of what are commonly known as earmarks, according to a new study by a nonpartisan budget watchdog group." Barack Obama is no better; he requested and received over $91 million of our hard-earned tax dollars for his own special interests and earmarks.
What’s worse is that Senator Obama, who claims to be a candidate of "change," has refused to disclose the earmarks he requested prior to last year, when he started running for president. Washington needs change, but we will ever see it from someone who is part of the business as usual crowd in the Senate. How many earmarks did John McCain request last year? Zero.

This is a good place for him to start, since fighting pork gets him in good with those crybabies in his base we keep hearing about, and plays well with independents. Heck, even Speaker Pelosi has teamed up with Jim DeMint to fight earmarks.

One quibble, though: It makes no logical sense to say, "Barack Obama is no better," when in the same sentence you quantify the degree to which he was at least less bad: He sought $91 million worth of pork to Sen. Clinton’s $340 million. Assuming, of course, those numbers are accurate.

Huck Finn had a good rule of them that should be applied to political rhetoric: "Overreaching don’t pay."

More on Romney and McCain

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Just FYI, here’s the story on Romney backing McCain:

BOSTON — Republican campaign dropout Mitt Romney endorsed John McCain for the party’s presidential nomination and asked his national convention delegates to swing behind the likely nominee.
"Even when the contest was close and our disagreements were debated, the caliber of the man was apparent," the former Massachusetts governor said, standing alongside his one-time rival at his now-defunct campaign’s headquarters. "This is a man capable of leading our country at a dangerous hour."
"Primaries are tough," said McCain, referring to their earlier rancor. "We know it was a hard campaign and now we move forward, we move forward together for the good of our party and the nation."

Pictures, too. OK, go ahead. This is the cue for all you McCain-hating alleged "conservatives" to fulminate. Get it out of your systems. And don’t feel all alone — you are joined by McCain-haters on the left (OK, technically this one is a Bush-hating group, but it doesn’t mind hating McCain by association — how dare he occasionally agree with the guy?)

And neither group need feel lonesome, as once he sweeps by Hillary (which he will do if enough Democrats keep wising up), the Obama haters on the right will get good and geared up. That’s what partisanship is all about.

Mccain_romney

Looks like it might be over: Romney to back McCain

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Just got this e-mail alert from the WSJ:

Former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has agreed to endorse Sen. John McCain and is asking his national convention delegates to swing behind the party front-runner, according to officials familiar with the decision. If all of Romney’s 280 delegates switch, McCain could quickly reach the total of 1,191 needed to clinch the nomination and end rival Mike Huckabee’s chances.

Make of it what you will.

McCain now a mathematical certainty — so tell me again why should I give?

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McCain Campaign Manager Rick Davis has put out a release claiming that it is now, after Tuesday, mathematically impossible for Mike Huckabee to catch him. An excerpt from the release, which you can read in its entirety here:

Last night, after our strong victories in Virginia, Maryland and Washington, DC, I put together an analysis of the state of the race for the Republican nomination. Including the delegates won last night, John McCain is now close to securing the number of delegates needed to be the presumptive Republican nominee. In addition, it is now mathematically impossible for Mike Huckabee to win enough delegates to secure the Republican nomination; there simply aren’t enough delegates left at stake for him to win.

That’s cool. But something struck me: Mr. Davis sent this out within the context of asking donors for more money for the campaign.

Admittedly, I’ve never fully understood the power of the "bandwagon effect," but logically speaking (and logic IS an entirely different thing) this seems like a poor strategy for fund-raising: The battle is won! Give some more so we can continue the battle!

But if you think that’s a tough sell, how much less sense does it make to keep giving to Mike Huckabee’s campaign, as this release asks? Talk about your empty gestures.

But I’ll admit I’ll never be able to get into the head of the kind of person who gives this sort of money, because I’ll never have that kind of money to spare (totally apart from the fact that I am strictly forbidden to do so by newspaper policy). The very rich are different from you and me, Scott.

The good guys sweep the ‘Potomac Primary’

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Tuesdays are turning out to be especially fine in the year of our Lord 2008.

Another excellent result tonight, with these two headlines topping the WashPost‘s Web site:

I’ve been following politics professionally for more than three decades, and I’ve never seen go as well as they have this year, as my greatly preferred candidates in the Republican and Democratic contests both move from success to success.

I hope I’m not jinxing anything with all this joy, but I can’t help it. I’ve never had the chance to enjoy a presidential election like this in my adult life, and may never get it again, so I’m not going to play it cool by making this world a little colder (doesn’t quite work, does it, except in the song; logically, it should be "makes the world a little bit colder by playing it cool" — oh, well; just enjoy it).

Even Mike Huckabee, a candidate I sorta like also, is playing his part by making this McCain victory worth reporting. Those wins he had over the weekend help to make tonight more enjoyable. And the closer we come to Obama passing and beating Hillary — and he’s got the Mo now — the closer we come to that no-lose situation I’ve been hoping for, which goes like this:

McCain has always been the one Republican candidate who can win in the fall, and it is a tremendous blessing that he’s always been the one worthy of the office. So he could be president.
The so-called "conservatives" who hate him with an irrational, childish sort of spite will have to do one of two things: Line up behind him, or stay home and deny him the White House. This would be a tragic result except that …
If Obama is the Democratic nominee, the "conservatives’" petulance will result in electing HIM, the other very fine candidate in the race.

Either way, I get my way, but far, far more importantly, the nation is better served than it has been in many an election.

Anyway you look at it, Paul Simon’s gonna have to change the words to HIS song.

The only thing that can spoil all this is if Hillary Clinton manages to pull this thing out. That looks less and less likely, although at the same time I don’t EVER expect to see her bow out. She wants it too badly; the good of her party is nothing against that.

But that, you see, produces another wonderful result, because both of the following happen:

The "conservatives" get behind McCain as their only hope for heading off their worst nightmare, and
All of us independent swing voters who might have voted for Obama turn out strongly for McCain; she won’t get any of that vote to speak of.

Coo-coo-ca-choo, Mrs. Robinson. I do believe I see Joltin’ Joe coming back in from center field, on the run, the winning out in the web of his glove.

Obamapotomac

The real split in American politics

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By BRAD WARTHEN
Editorial Page Editor
LATE ON SUPER Tuesday, I was typing on my blog in one room while Hillary Clinton was addressing her supporters on the TV in another.
I couldn’t hear every word, but the ones that did cut through were telling:

Now, we know the Republicans won’t give up the White House without a fight. Well, let me be clear — I won’t let anyone swift boat this country’s future.

“Republicans.” “Fight.” “Swift boat.” Terms calculated to stir the blood of the Angry Faithful. Then, later: “Together, we’re going to take back America.”
There was kinder, gentler stuff (if I’m allowed to borrow language from that other side) in the speech, about health care for all and supporting our veterans and helping the powerless. But Barack Obama talks about that stuff, too. Since these primaries are about choosing one or the other, one listens for the differences.
Between Sen. Clinton and Sen. Obama, the difference lies in those fighting words. It’s a difference set out with great clarity in a recent letter to the editor in this newspaper:

…(W)hile Sen. Barack Obama is an incredible orator and inspires hope for a post-partisan future, the reality of American politics is partisan. Astute voters realize this and want the candidate who is best suited to fight the Republican Party. Hillary Clinton and her team have gone toe-to-toe with the Republicans and beaten them more often than not.

The reality of American politics is partisan. And Barack Obama is running on a platform of changing that reality. So, in his own way, is John McCain.
The Democrats to whom Sen. Clinton appeals don’t despise Sen. Obama (they save that for Republicans), but they don’t see him as having his blood sufficiently up for doing battle with the “enemy.” And they’re right.
Consider what Sen. Obama said in South Carolina on the night of his primary victory:

We are up against decades of bitter partisanship that cause politicians to demonize their opponents… it’s the kind of partisanship where you’re not even allowed to say that a Republican had an idea — even if it’s one you never agreed with. That’s the kind of politics that is bad for our party, it’s bad for our country, and this is our chance to end it once and for all.

In the Republican camp, Sen. McCain has done more than just talk about moving beyond mindless partisanship; he’s risked his political future repeatedly to work with Democrats to achieve goals that put country before party. Last week, he asked the Angry Faithful in his party to “calm down,” and defended his habit of working across the aisle. Self-appointed spokesman for the Angry Faithful Rush Limbaugh responded:

When did the measure of conservatism… become reaching out to Democrats?… If this were a war, what we’re saying is, “Enemy, come on in, and come be who you are when you get here.”… We view those people as threats to the American way of life, as we’ve always known it…. We view them as people who need to be defeated, not worked with.

The truly great irony here is that the Angries on the left and the right do work together. In their pas de deux of mutual loathing, they cling to each other so tightly that there’s no room for anyone who’d like to separate them and create a space for rational discourse, or — the gods of left and right forbid — agreement on issues.
Here’s an example of how the left’s Angries work with their counterparts on the right: The left emotionally demands stem cell research, as Sen. Clinton did in her speech Tuesday. The right cries, No, Never! Ignored are such facts as a) stem cell research is going on, just without federal funding in some areas; b) recent breakthroughs could make embryonic stem cells, the kind being fought over, irrelevant; and c) the man Sen. Clinton seeks to face in the fall, John McCain, favors broadened stem cell research.
Another example: Last week, the leftists of the Berkeley, Calif., city council dissed the U.S. Marines. Eager warriors on the right (such as our own Rep. Joe Wilson and Sen. Jim DeMint) practically fell over themselves rushing to denounce the Berkeley council. The Marines are a great bogeyman for the loonies in Berkeley; Berkeley is a rare, juicy steak to the right. Call me paranoid, but sometimes I suspect the two sides of working out these stunts between them ahead of time. Everybody comes out on top, except the Marines — and somehow I think the guys who took Iwo Jima will overcome this as well.
There is indeed a stark divide in this country, but it’s not between the Angry Left and the Angry Right. They just prop each other up. Collectively, they are both the Other Side to me, striving to distract us from realizing the central truth that we’re all in this together.
On the one hand are the Clinton Democrats and the Republicans who sincerely would rather see Sen. Clinton elected than Sen. McCain. They depend upon each other. They deserve each other.
The rest of us believe we deserve, for once, a presidential election between candidates who care more about solutions than whether left or right “wins.”
This is not about affirming some “mushy middle.” You can hardly find two positions farther apart that the McCain and Obama views on Iraq. They have very different ideas on how to fight America’s enemies abroad. But at least neither of them sees the main “enemy” as being their fellow Americans who happen to disagree.

Club for Growth to McCain: Do our bidding

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Finally, I have a moment to blog, and so I will now share with you the WSJ opinion piece that three people have pointed out to me today.

The Club for Growth, shocked that neither of the two remaining Republican candidates is the sort who will do their bidding, completely misses the point that, contrary to its own mythology, it is badly out of step with the Republican electorate. That means its last refuge is gone, just as it was prepared to take over the world. Nasty things, reversals.

Therefor the Club’s advice to the man who is getting nominated without it is that he simply must do its bidding in the matter of choosing a running mate. To wit, as set out by Club President Pat Toomey:

While congratulations are still premature, with Mitt
Romney dropping out of the race yesterday it is now very likely that
the Republican Party will nominate Sen. John McCain for president. If
that happens, the GOP will, for the first time since 1976, select a
candidate at odds with a large portion of its conservative members to
be the standard bearer. At the same time, the party is more estranged
from independent swing voters than it has been for decades.
This will pose a twin challenge for Mr. McCain. To
meet it, he will have to become the champion of the brand of economic
conservatism that has won national elections for Republicans since 1980…

To which I say, how come? He got past the hurdle that theoretically requires your favor without you. Your views don’t amount to diddly among the independents he has to win now. Sure, the really emotional types who are ticked over the existence of Mexican In Our Midst might stay home and give it to Hillary out of pique. But those fellas have nothing to lose. You are men of business. You may be crazy (politically speaking), but you’re not stupid. Are you?

Anyway, here’s where it really gets wild. Here is also where we find out why the economic libertarian extremists from Wall Street and other foreign parts have devoted so much of their ready cash to South Carolina politics. Obviously, this is the basket that holds 40 percent of their eggs. They have five veep suggestions to make, and two of them are South Carolinians: Mark Sanford and Jim DeMint.

Really. John McCain just wrapped up the nomination his way, with the support of such truly conservative South Carolinians as Bobby Harrell and Henry McMaster, and the Club says he should pick either the state’s most prominent advocate of Mitt Romney, who just proved his lack of appeal; or the guy who is such a nonteam-player, such an anti-team player, that he couldn’t be bothered to back anybody for president. A guy who is so obviously for nobody can expect nobody to be grateful enough to him to ask him to come along for the ride. Why would a candidate think he’d be helped by a guy who couldn’t be bothered to pick up an oar when it counted? Principled disagreement, a la DeMint, a ticket-balancing nominee might go for. But a guy who’s for no one but himself? Fuggedaboudit.

But why go for either of them when there’s an actually attractive candidate out there with vote-getting ability? Enter Mike Huckabee. But that doesn’t suit Mr. Toomey:

Moving forward, Mr. Huckabee on the ticket would be a disaster. The former governor has a record of raising taxes and increasing spending. Picking him would only make it more likely that conservatives will sit on their hands come November.

What could these fellas have against ol’ Huck? Could it be that he goes all over the country calling them the "Club for Greed"? Could it be that folks who don’t vote for McCain keep voting for the guy who calls them the — let’s say it again — "Club for Greed" (there’s video on this link)?, who says theirs is "a sleazy way to do politics"?

"Fortunately," breathes Mr. Toomey with relief, "there is no shortage of true-blue fiscal conservatives in the GOP" — meaning "guys like us," for the Club is one of those outfits out there that defines "conservative" as "guys who are true-blue to us."

But obviously, "conservatives" by this definition are indeed quite scarce. Out of 49 states, they can only come up with three. The other two they dig up from a state in which McCain and Huckabee won 63 percent of the Republican vote, and the only guy that either of the two guys they dug up supported got 15 percent.

Oh, heck yeah — that’s a BIG help. Thanks but no thanks, Club for Gree-, I mean "Growth."

Romney’s out

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Looks like Mitt Romney’s accepted the inevitable, which is a good thing:

WASHINGTON (AP) _ John McCain effectively sealed the Republican presidential nomination on Thursday as chief rival Mitt Romney suspended his faltering presidential campaign. "I must now stand aside, for our party and our country," Romney prepared to tell conservatives.

"If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and make it more likely that Senator Clinton or Obama would win. And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign, be a part of aiding a surrender to terror," Romney will say at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington.

"This is not an easy decision for me. I hate to lose. My family, my friends and our supporters… many of you right here in this room… have given a great deal to get me where I have a shot at becoming President. If this were only about me, I would go on. But I entered this race because I love America, and because I love America."

McCain prevailed in most of the Super Tuesday states, moving closer to the numbers needed to officially win the nomination.

Overall, McCain led with 707 delegates, to 294 for Romney and 195 for Huckabee. It takes 1,191 to win the nomination at this summer’s convention in St. Paul, Minn.

"I disagree with Senator McCain on a number of issues, as you know. But I agree with him on doing whatever it takes to be successful in Iraq, on finding and executing Osama bin Laden, and on eliminating al-Qaida and terror," Romney said.

Romney acknowledged the obstacles to beating McCain.

"As of today, more than 4 million people have given me their vote for president, less than Senator McCain’s 4.7 million, but quite a statement nonetheless. Eleven states have given me their nod, compared to his 13. Of course, because size does matter, he’s doing quite a bit better with his number of delegates," Romney said in prepared remarks.

Romney’s departure from the race came almost a year after his formal entrance, when the Michigan native declared his candidacy on Feb. 12, 2007, at the Henry Ford Museum of Innovation in Dearborn, Mich.

So Republicans, it looks like John McCain is your nominee. As for me, at least there will be one candidate on the ballot in November I will be glad to vote for. Still waiting to see whether there will be two.

Romney_2008_wartnnn

Republicans for Hillary

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As you know, I keep struggling with the terminology used to describe those Republicans who keep wanting to strike out at and pull down the man who quite obviously is going to be their party’s nominee, whatever they say or do.

"Conservative" is wholly inadequate for various reasons previously cited, and I’ll add another one here: No "conservative" would do something so reckless and destructive to his own cause. If a "conservative" would do that, the word means nothing at all. Actual conservatives are putting out releases such as this one, which I received this morning (the headline, in case you’re too lazy to click on the link, is "Reaganauts for McCain").

So let’s try this one on: "Republicans for Hillary." This fits in various ways:

Only those who want a Democrat to win the election would keep driving a wedge into their own party.
Only those who want a Democrat to win the election would do anything to try to delay or prevent the nomination of the only candidate with the independent appeal that is absolutely necessary for them to either Democratic nominee.
While Barack Obama could compete with John McCain among those same independents (and folks, we swing voters are the ones who decide elections), Sen. Clinton is far less likely to be able to do so. She alienates such voters. Therefor, if she is the nominee, she would love it if these alleged "conservatives" managed to pull off a miracle for Mitt Romney. But since that isn’t going to happen now, she depends on them to weaken McCain as much as they can — something they seem eager to do.
These folks are the natural GOP counterparts to the kind of Democrats who support Sen. Clinton — those who relish polarization and pointless partisan bickering, and put them above all things, certainly above the good of the nation.

Of course, if I get my way on the Democratic side, Sen. Clinton won’t be the nominee. But I don’t think "Republicans for Obama" fits these people; I don’t think they’d be as comfortable backing someone so post-partisan as he. It’s McCain’s very cross-party appeal that they hate about him; it seems unlikely they’d like it any better in Obama.

So "Republicans for Hillary" it is.

Another overused (and ill-defined) word: ‘Conservative’

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Having switched to PBS, where apparently they have a larger vocabulary, I’m not hearing "presumptive" so much, so that’s good.

What I am hearing to an absurd degree is the term "conservative," and always used either with no defining context, or with a contradictory context.

For instance — one of the talking heads was going on about how McCain had not yet been declared the winner of his home state some 90 minutes after polls closed (the irony was that McCain was declared the winner while this guy was talking), and saying that exit polls indicated it was because of self-described "conservative" voters.

And what do they mean by "conservative?" Well, apparently no one thought to ask them — which I would certainly do before turning around and reporting that they were conservative, because the word seems to be so malleable and subjective these days.

Anyway, we were told that Mitt Romney was leading among people who wanted to deport all the illegal aliens. Of course, those people are not conservatives — conservatives are sensible folk who don’t entertain fantasies — so that was apparently an unrelated phenomenon.

Then they spoke of voters who were opposed to abortion. OK, I thought, now we’re getting somewhere…. except that these voters were going, NOT for the senator who’s been strongly pro-life his entire public life, but for the ex-governor of Taxachusetts whose position on abortion depends upon what office he’s running for at a given moment. What on Earth is with these people?

Basically, I think newsfolk — so many of them being self-reported "liberals," whatever they mean by that — tend to be very gullible and just take people at their word when they say they’re "conservatives," sort of the way they tend to lump people into the realm of the unintelligible if they happen to be evangelicals (hence their constant surprise whenever Mike Huckabee gets a few votes).

Somebody give these TV people a thesaurus

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Here it is early on the night of Super-Duper-Pooper Tuesday, and I’ve already heard the word "presumptive" too many times. Can’t these networks afford a thesaurus?

Sure, I like what the word means — when applied to McCain — but enough is enough.

How about, instead of "John McCain, presumptive…" they were to say, "John McCain, by the grace of God…"

True, the connotation does change. The denotation too, I suppose. But it has a ring to it.

Meanwhile, over in the FREE media department…

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"I get by with a little help from my friends…"

Up against Mitt Romney and all his media buys, you have John McCain getting the kind of coverage no amount of money can buy. A bunch of busybody meddlers known as the "Project for Excellence in Journalism" (don’t organizations with cheesy names like that make you suspicious? they do me) announces today that it has determined the following:

With Florida winner John McCain getting about 75% more coverage than Mitt Romney, and with Mike Huckabee almost invisible, the press appeared conspicuously close to turning McCain into the presumptive nominee last week. In that Jan. 28-Feb. 3 period, which ran from the day before the Florida primary to two days before Super Tuesday, McCain generated more coverage than any candidate. And that coverage suggested a media “tiering” of the race, with McCain a heavy favorite over several also-rans. McCain had not necessarily put Mitt Romney away, but the press nearly had.

You can also see here that some rats in the MSM are actually treating this little bit of non-profit grandstanding as news. Ha!

But you know, when you’re caught red-handed, you just gotta own up and say we done wrong. I mean, what were we thinking, making a big deal over the one candidate in either party who may be on the verge of cinching his nomination? Under what stretch of the imagination would that be news? Some people; I tell ya.

You can still buy victory (maybe)

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Oh, yeah? Well, I’ll see that, and raise you another $7 million…

Those of you who despise John McCain over McCain-Feingold (and sorry, but I don’t think I’m ever going to buy the George Will theorem that Spending=Speech) should be resting easy today. Even though, all across the country, Republicans are accepting and even embracing the Arizonan as their presumptive nominee, Mitt Romney just might prove today that you can still buy your way to victory — even in the biggest market, or bunch of markets, in the country — if you’ve got enough do-re-mi on hand.

Here’s the latest from Zogby, showing McCain winning pretty much everywhere that matters other than California, where Mitt Romney was said to be spending oodles of his own cash.

There is, of course, an alternative explanation I’ve read as to why Romney is leading 40-33 in California is that California Republicans are particularly partisan and ideological. Maybe so. That would explain Reagan, although not Nixon. But why would just the Republicans be that way out on the Left Coast? If it’s in the water, why wouldn’t that rigidity manifest itself among Democrats as well? If it did, Hillary Clinton would be leading there. But she’s not.

Give me that old-time conservatism

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My regular readers will recognize this column as having been adapted from a post from late last week. Sorry to be repetitive, but increasingly (and conveniently) I find blog posts to be adaptable into columns. I’ve developed it a bit — cutting some here, adding some there (particularly, a new ending, and therefor a new point). But the inspiration was the same.

Aside from making my seven-day week a little more manageable, adapting a column such as this one at least exposes it to a slightly more friendly audience. The Blogosphere is more densely populated with the kinds of people who would take exception to the ideas expressed herein. I find that the newspaper’s readership contains more folks who harbor my notion of the best sort of conservatism. Every once in a while, even I would like to get a little encouragement, you know. Speaking of which, thank you, Chief Warrant Officer Libbon. It was good to get your message before the mob started screaming.

By BRAD WARTHEN
EDITORIAL PAGE EDITOR
THE IDEOLOGUES in the Republican Party — you know, the ones who don’t care who can actually become president, as long as their candidate thinks exactly the way they do about everything — don’t know whether to spit or go blind with John McCain as their presumptive nominee.
And I gotta tell ya, I’m loving it. My happiness will be complete once the “anger” faction of the Democratic Party is similarly discombobulated by having Barack Obama as its nominee. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves on that.
My other favorite candidate, John McCain (The State has endorsed both him and Sen. Obama), may not quite have the Republican nomination sewn up, but he’s close enough to it to give the more objectionable elements within his party considerable indigestion. True, Mitt Romney is doing everything he possibly can to stop the McCain bandwagon, spending $1 million on ads in California alone.
But while this moment of promise lasts, let’s savor it.
A colleague who listens to such things says right-wing talk radio is abuzz with apocalyptic rantings about the End Times for the GOP, which sounds lovely to me, UnParty adherent that I am. But I content myself with reading about it in the papers. Let’s take just one day (Thursday) of one newspaper (The Wall Street Journal) widely associated with Conservative Orthodoxy. Under the headline, “McCain Takes the GOP Lead,” we read:

Republicans have a clear front-runner in Arizona Sen. John McCain. By nearly all accounts, he is the candidate many Democrats least want to face, the one who would best remake his party’s battered image and draw independent voters needed to win in November.
But Sen. McCain still confronts a problem both in the remainder of the nomination race, and, if he wins, in the fall: He is simply loathed by many fellow Republicans, often for the very bipartisanship and maverick streak that attracts independents.

Under “Giuliani Fund-Raisers Sit on Fence for Now,” we learn that while Rudy Giuliani may have pulled out…

Mr. Giuliani’s well-heeled supporters might not throw their money behind the cash-strapped Arizona senator so fast. “We haven’t decided what we’re going to do,” says T. Boone Pickens, the Dallas tycoon who has raised more than $1 million for Mr. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, since late 2006…

Then, on the opinion pages, that font of oracular conservative wisdom, the very lead editorial of the hallowed WSJ itself, under the real-life headline “McCain’s Apostasies,” pronounces the following:

Mr. McCain’s great political strength has also long been his main weakness, which is that his political convictions are more personal than ideological. He believes in duty, honor and country more than he does in any specific ideas.
These personal qualities are genuine political assets…. But he is now on the cusp of leading a coalition that also believes in certain principles, and its “footsoldiers” (to borrow a favorite McCain word) need to be convinced that the Senator is enough on their side to warrant enthusiastic support…

By “ideas,” the Journal does not mean “removing the inordinate influence of money from politics,” or “restraining wasteful spending” or “believing the surge would work” or “life begins at conception” or “maybe we should secure our borders without totally alienating the Hispanic vote.” No, it means such lofty concepts as: “What do you always, always do with a tax? Cut it!”
Duty, honor and country indeed! What’s conservative about that stuff?
Speaking of the Gimme-Gimme wing of the party, another newspaper (conservatives should cover their sensitive ears before I name it), The New York Times, reported on Friday that “leaders of the right” have practically been doing backflips trying to adjust to the new reality. My favorite in this regard is Grover “Shrink Government Until You Can Drown it in a Bathtub” Norquist, who goes further than anyone to spin this into a personal victory:
“He has moved in the right direction strongly and forcefully on taxes,” Mr. Norquist says, adding that he’s been talking to Sen. McCain’s “tax guys” for some time. So you see, not only does this make everything OK, but Grover gets to take credit! Because, as anyone who has ever had cause to regret signing his “No New Taxes” pledge can testify, it’s all about Grover.
By now some of you think I have it in for all things “conservative.” I don’t. I just grew up with a different concept of it from that which has in recent years been appropriated by extremists. I grew up in a conservative family — a Navy family, as a matter of fact. To the extent that “conservative ideas” were instilled in me, they weren’t the kind that make a person fume over paying his taxes, or get apoplectic at the sound of spoken Spanish. They were instead the old-fashioned ones: Traditional moral values. Respect for others. Good stewardship. Plain speaking.
And finally, the concept that no passing fancy, no merely political idea, is worth as much as Duty, Honor and Country.

To learn more about the UnParty, go to http://blogs.thestate.com/bradwarthensblog/.

Ideologues try to come to grips with McCain’s ‘weakness’

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The poor ideologues in the Republican Party — you know, the ones who don’t give a damn who can actually become president, as long as their candidate thinks exactly the way they do about everything — don’t know whether to spit or go blind with John McCain as their presumptive nominee. And I gotta tell ya, I’m loving it. My happiness will be complete once the ANGER faction of the Democratic party is similarly discombobulated by having Barack Obama as their nominee.

Anyway, to see what I’m saying, read The Wall Street Journal. In today’s paper alone, you can read this story:

For the first time in a presidential campaign already a year old, Republicans have a clear front-runner in Arizona Sen. John McCain. By nearly all accounts, he is the candidate many Democrats least want to face, the one who would best remake his party’s battered image and draw independent voters needed to win in November.

But Sen. McCain still confronts a problem both in the remainder of the nomination race, and, if he wins, in the fall: He is simply loathed by many fellow Republicans, often for the very bipartisanship and maverick streak that attracts independents. His biggest, and perhaps final, test comes Tuesday, when 21 states hold contests — most of them open only to Republican voters….

Then there’s this piece, which observes:

All eyes were on Mr. McCain, who after winning three contests in the pivotal states of New Hampshire, South Carolina and Florida, is now considered the front-runner. He took his time in the spotlight to blast Wall Street. "There’s some greedy people on Wall Street that perhaps need to be punished," Mr. McCain said in response to a question about how to help people keep their homes and avoid foreclosure.

The emphasis is mine. That’s gotta hurt, if you’re a WSJ kind of guy, coming from the likely GOP nominee. Then there’s this piece about all the big-money guys who just don’t know what to do now:

Rudy Giuliani, the onetime Republican presidential front-runner, retreated from the race and backed John McCain. But Mr. Giuliani’s well-heeled supporters might not throw their money behind the cash-strapped Arizona senator so fast.
"We haven’t decided what we’re going to do," says T. Boone Pickens, the Dallas tycoon who has raised more than $1 million for Mr. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, since late 2006….

Then you get to the opinion pages, where pundits struggle to understand just why this iconoclast keeps winning:

John McCain beat Mitt Romney by 5.5 points in New Hampshire and by five again in Florida. Three months ago, Mr. McCain was a 10% cipher in Florida, with no organization and no donors. This week one saw why John McCain is basically five points better than Mitt Romney, or Rudy Giuliani, at the most fundamental job in politics — connecting.
When Mr. McCain took the stage in Sun City, the applause was polite. When he finished, he got a standing ovation. He has been at this game a long time, and his ability to sense and ride the emotional flow of an audience is astonishing.
It discomfits some, including me, that Mr. McCain seems like a live, capped volcano. But in front of an audience like this, and before a younger group two days later at the Tampa Convention Center, he stood with that tight, little upper body of coiled electricity and plugged his message of honor, commitment and threat straight into the guts of his listeners….

Finally, one must turn to the oracle itself, the very LEAD EDITORIAL of the hallowed WSJ, under the headline, "McCain’s Apostasies" (I am not making this up!), to learn this:

Mr. McCain’s great political strength has also long been his main weakness, which is that his political convictions are more personal than ideological. He believes in duty, honor and country more than he does in any specific ideas.
These personal qualities are genuine political assets, and they are part of his appeal as a potential Commander in Chief. Among other things, they help explain why he held firm on Iraq when the fair-weather hawks lost their resolve. But he is now on the cusp of leading a coalition that also believes in certain principles, and its "footsoldiers" (to borrow a favorite McCain word) need to be convinced that the Senator is enough on their side to warrant enthusiastic support…

You can just see them all thinking, Whaddayagonna DO with a guy who believes in "duty, honor and country" more than he believes in, I don’t know, some worthwhile idea like cutting taxes? How can you trust a guy like that? How can you turn your back on him?

The thing that gets me is that these people are dead serious. They think "duty, honor and country" are all very well and good in a Boy Scout, or a character in a movie or something, but a little bit dangerous in a Leader of the Free World.

I am so glad that for once we’ve got an alternative — and maybe by the time it’s over, two alternatives — to the greedheads on one side who think "Me First and the Gimme-Gimmes" is an "idea," and one to live by, and those on the other side who think what this country needs is somebody to FIGHT with Republicans, as though virtue is thus defined. Thank the Lord for John McCain and Barack Obama.

But can Ah-nold whup Chuck?

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Now that the GOP nomination has come down to a simple, pedestrian question of whether Mitt Romney can Mccain_2008_arnoldwart
spend enough on California TV ads to raise his chance of getting the nomination above snowball-in-hell status (I picture Ritchie Rich just shoveling the cash out of his swimming-pool full — or am I thinking of Scrooge McDuck?), all true, plainspoken, vicariously macho men find themselves wondering the following:

Maybe Mike Huckabee’s an also-ran in the pantywaist, artificial world of politics, but in nature, red in tooth and claw, couldn’t Chuck Norris whup Ah-nold without breaking much of a sweat?
Why has Jerry "The King" Lawler remained silent, letting Ric Flair hog all the glory?
If Gary Cooper were alive, and took on the whole lot of ’em, all by his lonesome (which you know he would if it came right down to it), would he prevail?
Is it just me or does Rudy Giuliani, who took on all Five Families and just missed getting whacked by a single vote on the Commission, actually look happier now that he’s given up? And what does that mean for America future, when a quitter is happier than a scrapper? Could Gary Cooper ever have been happy if he’d quit? I don’t reckon so.

Huckabee_2008_norris_wart

Romney outgunned McCain 10 to 1 in Florida, and still lost

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At least we don’t have to worry about whether pore ol’ Mitt Romney was able to get his message out in Florida. Check out this WashPost story, "After Romney’s Barrage, McCain Stands Tall:"

In Florida, as he did in other early states, Romney blanketed the airwaves with ads financed partly by his own fortune. According to Nielsen Co., Romney ran nearly 4,500 ads in Florida by Monday, compared with 470 by McCain.

How much longer do you suppose it will take Gov. Romney to get the fact that the voters aren’t buying what he’s trying to sell — or perhaps I should say, aren’t willing to sell what he’s trying to buy?

This was brought to my attention by McCain backer Bob McAlister, who observed, "It is absolutely stunning that our guy overcame such odds. I don’t know if that’s ever happened — being outgunned on the air 10 to 1 and still win convincingly. It just shows that character and integrity can still trump glitz."

Maybe this guy should do some McCain trading cards

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Back on this thread weldon VII observed,

That’s a really nice picture of McCain. Who took it?

The answer to your question is, an AP photog named Charles Dharapak. Here’s the caption that moved with the photo:

Republican presidential hopeful Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., smiles while speaking to reporters outside a polling station in St. Petersburg, Fla., Tuesday, Jan. 29, 2008, on the morning of Florida’s Republican Presidential Primary. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

Either that Dharapak guy is a great photographer and McCain should hire him, or the candidate himself is more photogenic now that he’s well on his way to the nomination. In any case, as evidence for both of these theories, I offer two more Dharapak images. Above, we have the "strong commander in chief" McCain. Below, we have "happy to win in Florida" McCain.

Maybe this guy should publish a serious of McCain bubble-gum trading cards. If he does, I get a cut for thinking of it — don’t I?

Mccain_happy

I can’t go home ’til McCain wins

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Having commandeered one of the HDTV receivers at a 5-Points bar, I’m running a tab on Yuenglings, trying to will McCain over the finish line in Florida.

Thirty-three percent of the vote in, and still neck-and-neck with that mannequin, Romney.

At least tonight will settle Rudy "Florida Strategy" Giuliani’s hash for good. Did you read that strong endorsement of McCain in The New York Times? Way brutal to our boy Rudy…

"…a narrow, obsessively secretive, vindictive man who saw no need to limit police power. Racial polarization was as much a legacy of his tenure as the rebirth of Times Square."

No more Hizzoner in his own country.

Holding my breath over Florida