Hammering the Ron Paul heretics

DavidTC, I'd disagree with both of your points. I don't think he's the only Repub who can win the general election, especially if Clinton is the Dem nominee, and if things in Iraq continue to improve.

There is no improvement in Iraq. This last June was a horrible month, and summer always has a dip in violence, so talking about a dip since June is idiotic. (I posted this on the discussion about that, but oddly that comment never seemed to show up. I don't understand the randomly triggering 'moderation' here that seems to disappear comments.) And, as people have pointed out, the numbers are being manipulated. The death toll is still as absurdly high as ever, it's just they aren't being counted as sectarian anymore.

But, anyway, come the election, we will have literally run out of troops a few months before, and will be out of Iraq, or huddled inside our bases, regardless of what anyone does politically. The administration might be denying it, or pretending the Democrats forced it, or they decided to withdraw, but the actual fact is we will be unable to wage as we will have no troops. We might be able to fake our way through next summer dip in violence, but that's it.

The war has an expiration date, and we're not going to win it before then. We are entirely likely to lose it in the most horrible way, by breaking every single soldier we have.

And although I don't think he has much chance of winning the GOP primary, I wouldn't rule it out altogether. If he keeps gaining momentum and other more prominent candidates drop out, it could get mighty interesting.

Well, yes, 'if other more prominent candidates drop out', um, yeah, of course he could win. And if all the Democrats and Republicans dropped out, the Constitutional party might win. I was speculating in the real world where presidential front-runners don't drop out. :)

If you're thinking that a GOP crackup will "destroy conservativism," you've got another think coming. What it will destroy is the sham conservativism of many in the GOP who put party first, principle second (or at least equate the two.) In theory, a GOP implosion could be the best thing that may ever happen for true conservatives.

No, a GOP crackup is what I don't think will destroy it. What is going to happen without Ron Paul is that it's going to splinter into four or five pieces, and then in 2012 or so, some of those groups will form back together. Hopefully the non-lunatic ones. Only if Ron Paul doesn't win.

I.e., you and I completely agree about both Paul and the GOP fakers, and we both agree that sham conservativism is what has destroyed the Republican party, at least in the short term.

Paul, however, will actually implement the policies of small-government conservatives. It's one thing to secretly cut back on social services while claiming otherwise, it's another to be blatant and almost gleeful about it, and cutting off the free cash for businesses while you're at it, which would generate even more hate from the media than Clinton got. If he gets into power, he will totally and utterly destroy the chances of Republicans holding ever office again, as people will discover how harmful actual conservativism is. (You are aware that a majority of Republicans are in favor of paying for poor people's health care even if it costs them more, right?)

So we are in total agreement about everything except that I think the American people, if subjected to four years of real conservativism, would hold their collective noses and run like hell, helped along by the media, who will leap the fence to the Democratic side, as they discover a Democratic Congress and a Republican president who vetos everything. (And I think the GOP agrees, which is why they are so desperately fighting Paul.)

Which, as I said, would be completely and utterly hilariously suicidal to watch, the Republicans finally, after decades of bitching about how they inexplicably keep electing 'fake conservatives', finally electing a real one and managing to drive that stake all the way into their heart, but we simply don't don't have time for it.

David, I'll disagree with you on the war -- the violence is way down, even to the point where the gravediggers are complaining. A correspondent of mine is a fairly high-up military analyst (and also a realist) and confirms this.

Claiming that the war is turning around because of a small lull in violence is a claim that literally could have been made a dozen times. It's just wishful thinking, helped along by the administration that desperately wants their 'Surge' to have produced something. See
http://icasualties.org/oif_a/CasualtyTrends.htm for troop deaths, a much more unmanipulatable statistic of violence.

And as I said, we're on a deadline no one's talking about, and it's not the 2009 elections. We. Do. Not. Have. Any. More. Troops. It's really next May or April we run out, but we might manage to coast through into summer. So even if our current troop levels are reducing violence, that's almost an entirely moot point, as our current troop levels will last until, I believe, this December, at which point we will have to start bringing some of them home and have no one to replace them with.

Personally, I'm not sure that Paul qualifies as a "real" conservative; he seems to lean too far toward the libertarian side of things to warrant that appellation.

conservative: adj., an attribute notable its ability to disappear immediately after election, so the bad things a Republican politician does doesn't count because 'he's not a real conservative'. Compare Reagan, who wasn't a 'real conservative' by any logical definition, but manages to keep the title because he's the only one that anyone liked.

I do admit, though, that real conservatism would be a hard sell for the current generation of comfort-seeking, irresponsible, entitlement-minded Americans.

Well, at least someone admits it. Although conservatives used to hide their elitism better, and just up and admitting that the American people do not actually like your policies somewhat dangerous. I like the use of 'comfort-seeking' though, I guess that's opposed to the right's 'comfort-having' and 'removing-comfort-of-others'.

The Republicans, for as long as I can remember, have promised the American people a strawberry-clam-bacon pizza called conservatism. (In addition to various other nasty flavors like theocracy and now fascist.)

Of course, no politician has actually offered this pizza, because it tastes horrible. They've had to modify it into 'compassionate conservatism' and whatnot. If they do actually offer it, they are shot down by other Republicans, because it's obviously suicidal to let the public taste that pizza.

Don't jump with joy because Paul is stepping in at a weak point for the Republicans and actually has a chance of providing that pizza. The Republican party requires a certain percentage of middle class people to vote slightly against their own interests. Take away their grandmother's health care, make it too much against their own interests, and you'll have a mutiny on your hands. If you think Bush is unpopular, wait until Paul vetos all of S-CHIP, not just additional funding.

Although hedging your bets about how he's not a 'real conservative' is a good idea, just in case he does win. However, you're not supposed to distance yourself before the election, that, obviously, would result in him being difficult to elect.

Ah, yes, 'The Conservative Mind'. Total abstraction, the last refugee of political philosophies. It doesn't really matter. It lost. You can believe it lost because no one really ever followed it, no one minds if it makes you happy. We've recently misplaced all the communists, so the 'X didn't fail, we never really tried it!' niche is nice and empty.

I was just pointing out that Ron Paul is close to bursting the bubble forever. It's like giving control of a country to Karl Marx...it's going to fall apart, and this time it can't be blamed on Stalin. (Please note I am in no way comparing the effects of conservativism and communism, just that both of them seem fairly dysfunctional in who they actually put in power, and their supporters are constantly having it distance themselves from the people they put in power.)

American people want progressivism, even if they are unaware of what it is. They want health care, they want social security, they want the government to regulate companies so companies don't step on them. You can think that's 'irresponsible' and 'entitlement-minded'. However, it is still true.