Scott McClellan's confessions

Right, better to preserve the status quo.

I cannot make any connection between what Scott McLellan wrote and finding it hard to vote for McCain. President Bush and Senator McCain may both be Republicans, but their approach to governing has nothing in common that I can see. Senator McCain may have problems, but governing in "permanent campaign mode" is not one of them, nor is never changing his mind. If President Bush's personality is the problem (and I'd agree it is certainly a big part of it), then party affiliation to that extent isn't.

I take it that the hot buttons in this year's GOP campaign playbook will be abortion and gays. Maybe they can milk the religious right one more time and keep the financial plundering going a few more years.

From "Devil May Care" by Tucker Carlson, Talk, September 1999:

Bush's brand of forthright `tough-guy` populism can be appealing, and it has played well in Texas. Yet occasionally there are flashes of meanness visible beneath it. While driving back from the speech later that day, Bush mentions Karla Faye Tucker, a double murderer who was executed in Texas last year. In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, Bianca Jagger and a number of other protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Tucker. "Did you meet with any of them?" I ask.

Bush whips around and stares at me. "No, I didn't meet with any of them," he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. "I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with [Tucker], though. He asked her real difficult questions, like, 'What would you say to Governor Bush?'"

"What was her answer?" I wonder.

"Please," Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, "don't kill me."

I must look shocked - ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel, even for someone as militantly anticrime as Bush – because he immediately stops smirking. "It's tough stuff," Bush says, suddenly somber, "but my job is to enforce the law." As it turns out, the Larry King- Karla Faye Tucker exchange Bush recounted never took place, at least not on television. During her interview with King, however, Tucker did imply that Bush was succumbing to `election-year` pressure from `pro-death` penalty voters. Apparently Bush forgot it. He has a long memory for slights.

Which is part of the problem with Bush's presentation of himself as a man so "comfortable in my soul" that he hardly cares whether he wins or loses. Anyone who has reached the `Zen-master` level of self acceptance he describes would be unaffected by ordinary criticism. It's still pretty easy to get a rise out of Bush...

I'm just glad the republicans are running someone who has admitted that he doesn't care much about "those issues" or whatever he said.

The focus on both sides of the aisle on those issues gets in the way of any real progress we could make as a country.

The flip-side of what you wrote about milking the abortion and gays one more time can just as easily be applied to the Democrats - and gets us no farther along either.

Without reading the book, I wouldn't go by a newspaper review or excerpt, however long. A bump on an otherwise good complexion can be either a pimple or a cancer - i.e., without reading the whole book, it's hard to say how Bush comes out overall (i.e., does he have a few blemishes, or is he fatally ill), and I certainly wouldn't view a WaPo or NYT review/article as being unbiased.

I agree with Astorian. My reaction to this is the same as my reaction to all these retired generals who have "spoken out" over the past few years: Where was your sense of duty to the country -- as opposed to loyalty to a specific administration or specific president or the status quo -- when you were actually in a position where speaking your mind might actually have made a difference?

Yes, Gen. Shinseki was, in essence, sacked for telling the Administration something it didn't want to hear. Well, if you really have character, shouldn't you be willing to pay a price for doing your duty? Aren't the members of our general office corps supposed to set an example of duty and courage?

Isn't it chicken to wait until you can hide behind your retirement before speaking your mind?

***

Rod wrote: '"And yet," you say, "you're thinking of voting for McCain." Yes. The damn courts. Woe betide us all.'

It boggles my mind that in light of the calamitous Bush Administration some people still believe that liberal judges can do more damage than incompetent Presidents.

Not only that. Have conservative-dominated courts really done so much for causes that social conservatives believe in? I mean, will a court containing McCain appointees *really* do more, e.g., to end abortion than a court with Obama or Clinton appointees? I mean, really? Honestly? Does anyone *really* believe that?

Isn't it about time to give up this fantasy that one day there will a conservative president who will appoint conservative judges who will give social conservatives all the rulings they want? After all, the idea of changing the country is really a left-wing idea, isn't it? Judicial activism in the service of conservative causes is really no more acceptable than that in the service of liberal causes, right?

I just no longer buy this "what about the judges?" argument as a reason to vote for or against someone. It hasn't accomplished anything really substantive so far, and I don't think it will.

I agree with those who said that he should have said something when it might have made a difference. He's sharing yesterdays news.

It's amazing to me how so many on the right continue to excuse the Bush administration for misleading us into a disastrous and unnecessary war. If Al Gore and Joe Lieberman had plunged us into an ill-fated occupation of Iraq, with 4,000 dead and nearly 30,000 Americans seriously wounded, not to mention countless Iraqi civilians killed and maimed, the criticism on the right would be never-ending...and well-deserved.

But I must echo Astorian's question: Why have so many Republican officials under the second Bush administration turned out to be gutless?

Why didn't Colin Powell resign rather than allow his "Powell Doctrine" to be trashed for the sake of a war he didn't believe in? Why didn't Christine Whitman step down when Bush -- who had explicitly promised her and the American people to regulate CO2 -- turned "energy policy" over to Cheney? Why didn't McClellan resign honorably rather than stand up in front of the world and lie for a president he didn't trust?

Once upon a time, honorable, intelligent Republican officials who served under a mendacious President knew how to resign when push came to shove. Something happened in the decades between Nixon and Bush II. What was it?

Brian writes: "The flip-side of what you wrote about milking the abortion and gays one more time can just as easily be applied to the Democrats - and gets us no farther along either."

It certainly can, but currently within the Democratic party I think those issues are better balanced with issues like the economy, energy policy and the Iraq war.

The problem for the GOP is that it will field a Presidential candidate who is aligning himself with some of Bush's unpopular policies. That's going to be tough going given today's political landscape. The party can't possibly allow any of its 'faithful' to schism - ergo: the abortion and gays play. It will continue to work on people sentiments like Rod, but will it work with the independents who might not be so single-issue oriented? We'll see.

"- and gets us no farther along either."

Maybe the religious right will finally wise up. A sign of insanity is to keep doing the same thing and expect a different outcome. At least on environmental issues we've seen some movement away from the party line.

pyrrho asks: "What information do you possess that makes you so sure Obama would be more competent than McCain?"

Well, Obama has run a smoother campaign and hasn't flip-flopped as much, but those issues are beside the point. My original comment was simply refuting Rod's bizarre contention that liberal judges can do more damage than stupid Presidents. Apparently starting wars on deceitful bases, torturing people, and politicizing federal law enforcement are not as bad as legalizing gay marriage. Or something.

"Bush was succumbing to `election-year` pressure from `pro-death` penalty voters"

So much for the "We Republicans are the pro-life party" nonsense, eh?

watsy,

"I agree with those who said that he should have said something when it might have made a difference."

I would agree with that statement except McLellan wasn't "The Decider" (TM).

Reaganite in NYC,

"A Court dominated by the likes of a Ginsberg or a Souter would produce very different outcomes than the one we have now. To examine a different arena, a single vote switch by one of the 4 California s.c. justices voting recently to lealize homosexual/lesbian marriages would have doomed that effort."

I hate to burst you bubble, but 6 of the 7 judges on the California Supreme court were appointed by Republican Governors, including the one who wrote the majority decision.

Question: Were Sam Alito and John Roberts worth George Bush?

If you answer no, then the court appointee discussion this year should be moot.

If the only reason to vote for McCain is "the courts. the damn courts," isn't it time to bite the bullet and face the fact that we now longer live in a Republic? It doesn't matter if it's George III and his ministers or the Supreme Court giving you the hotfoot, your feet still get burned. Republican (small "r") government has been but a memory in the US for lo, these many years. "Liberal" judges curtailing my liberty? And how is that different from the Camp Runamuck of the Republican (capital "R") government of the past eight years, with the BS war on drugs, the surveillance of American citizens, the Executive orders that do end runs around the Constitution? My liberty exists for about as long as I choose to exercise it in ways that do not alarm or annoy some government functionary.
The Founders would not recognize the place.
Time for the Benedict Option.

LYONS: Can you post that rhetorical question to Rod one more time? He is a maturing male, but still young and cannot see that 'pick your poison' in the voting booth cannot be a crap shoot about a possibility of judges selected for the Supreme Court vs. the probability of a lackluster and tired redux disaster. At best.

Today's History Lesson Recall: I can remember hearing people when I was a kid...people who voted for Eisenhower because of 'the court'. And sure enough, Ike chose Earl Warren. Who surprised everyone by becoming the launching pad for Civil Rights, equal protection for those of color,....hardly then (or now) a Republican concern. So voting strictly (after 8 years of Bush?) for someone spearheading the (currently) disgraced party (all over again) because of one thing... and not at all a sure thing...is something I cannot grasp. It's like dating a corpse instead of a real live girl because 'she never says no'.

Have conservative-dominated courts really done so much for causes that social conservatives believe in?

David, unless your only information about the courts has been spoon fed by Nina Totenberg, the premise of your question makes no sense. When have we had "conservative-dominated courts"?

After all, the idea of changing the country is really a left-wing idea, isn't it? Judicial activism in the service of conservative causes is really no more acceptable than that in the service of liberal causes, right?

No one in the Federalist Society -- no one -- or anywhere else in conservative legal and judicial circles advocates using the courts to achieve substantive conservative goals. A Supreme Court consisting of 9 Antonin Scalias or Clarence Thomases would not try to proscribe sodomy or abortion, or require Bible reading in public schools. That would be judicial activism of the sort practiced by the Left, which frankly views the law in Marxist terms as a mere tool of whatever social class is able to wield power.

What conservatives seek is to preserve constitutional government. For example, at no point in American history have We The People created a constitutional right to abortion. Therefore, abortion is not a constitutional right. And therefore, your state legislature may permit all abortions, criminalize all abortions, or do just about anything in between. Same goes for sodomy, "gay marriage", religious displays on public property, and a host of other issues. If the legislature's decision is at odds with the deeply felt beliefs of most of the voting public, the legislators will be out on their rumps at the next election. That's what our whole system of government is about. And that's what the Left can't stand.

Sorry for the overheated rhetoric, Rawlins.

You are right that the ending of my post is over the top, and I retract it.

I'm no legal scholar in the formal sense, and while I tend to lean in that direction, I'm also not a legalist. So have a grain of salt handy...

The Constitution was born from the context of change, and it was designed to be a dynamic document in which future citizens could codify the changes they deemed necessaary.

As I see it, there are really two entities there.

1) Implied constitutional rights, applied in a social context and/or formalized via litigation;

2) Explicit constitutional rights, enacted by legislation and enforced in the usual ways.

Same-sex marriage proponents have valid claims under #1, but not under #2 in the absence of formally enacted laws. The Marriage Protection Act was an attempt to remove an implied right by excluding it under #2. The ERA was an attempt to codify gender equality inherent in #1 by placing it under #2.

As I see it, Recovering, your rhetoric is firmly based in #1. Claims to #2, in that light, are not valid until legislation makes it so.