For the first time in over 100 years, the 23rd District of New York will be sending a Democrat to Washington. The vaunted Conservative Party insurgent, Doug Hoffman, lost the race he was expected to win. What does this mean? I'll give my view in a moment, but let me say that Jonathan Tobin makes a weird and unpersuasive point here:
The loss of this seat ought to cast a shadow on what was otherwise a big night for Republicans. But the villains here aren't the tea-party rabble-rousers who sunk Scozzafava, but a local and state Republican leadership that imposed an incompetent candidate on a Republican electorate eager for leaders who could offer an alternative to the Democrats, not someone who would be a halfhearted supporter of Obama's agenda. ... The lesson here is not the danger that the right poses to the future of the Republicans but rather that a party leadership that is insensible to the interests of its voters is doomed to defeat. Had the Republicans chosen a candidate who could have counted on the support of the party's base to start with, the seat could have been held despite the changing demographics in the district. It was Scozzafava's dismal campaign that lost the seat, not the fact that it was impossible to convince most Republicans that they had no reason to support her.
Huh? Granted, the GOP bigs who put Scozzafava up for this seat made a bad choice, Q.E.D. She was driven out of the race. We've been told over and over these past couple of weeks that Hoffman, the Palin-Beck candidate, was giving NY23 voters "a choice, not an echo." Well, guess what? Voters chose Democrat Bill Owens -- which is to say, they rejected Hoffman. Blaming the New York GOP for Hoffman's loss strikes me as an attempt to dismiss evidence that challenges the dogma that running to the Tea Party right is a winning strategy.
Now, it could well be that NY23 voters rejected Hoffman because of his demonstrated inability to articulate a position on key local issues. That would speak to his being a flawed candidate, not necessarily a rejection of Palinista Republicanism. Or it could mean that people aren't necessarily against Palin-Tea Party-ism, but that it's simply not enough to win a majority of voters. Or perhaps this traditionally Republican district simply found Hoffman to be too ideologically conservative for them. Whatever the real reason, there's no justification for assuming going forward that the kind of conservatism Doug Hoffman represents is the future of the GOP. That's not to say that social liberalism is the future either. From where I sit, the most sensible lesson for Republicans to take out of yesterday's defeats is that economic anxiety and a related concern about competent governance are the issues that most determine voters' choices.
A colleague of mine who's an independent voter with conservative leanings asked me if I'd seen Tim Pawlenty on "Morning Joe" today. I had not. Colleague said that Pawlenty, a big backer of Doug Hoffman in NY23, was repeatedly asked about his litmus tests for who gets to call himself or herself a Republican. Specifically, he was asked four or five times directly if he thought Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine was a RINO -- and he punted each time.
It's true -- here's the transcript and video. Unbelievable. You watch: Doug Hoffman, who calls Glenn Beck a "mentor," is going to win this thing, and it's going to lead all Republican comers to conclude that the way back to power is to go hard-right, and drive anyone who looks even faintly like what they call a RINO out of the party.
UPDATE: Megan McArdle:
In the long term, the Republican party still has big problems. But as devoutly as I would like to believe that their problem is loudmouthed television and radio hosts who just aren't sophisticated about public policy . . . well, I've yet to see any evidence that the American polity is avid for more sophisticated public policy discussion. Frankly, they seem a lot more interested in plausible enemies and improbable free lunches, which is the level on which both parties are mostly campaigning.
Hear freaking hear Joel Kotkin:
You would think, given the massive dissatisfaction with an economy that guarantees mega-bonuses for the rich and continued high unemployment, that the GOP would smell an opportunity. In my travels around the country -- including in midstream places like suburban Kansas City and Kentucky -- few, including Democrats, express any faith in the president's basic economic strategy.
Ask a local mayor or chamber of commerce executive in Kentucky or Kansas City about the stimulus, and at best you get a shrug. Many feel the only people really benefiting from Obamanomics are Wall Street grandees, public employees, subsidized "green" companies and various other professional rent seekers.
It's not surprising, then, that most Americans -- upward of 60 percent -- feel the country is headed in the "wrong direction." Most of these malcontents are not zealots such as those you might find at a tea party. They are more akin to villagers watching in horror as two armies, each fighting in their name, wage war on each other, leaving desolation in their wake.
Yet it's unlikely that the independent-minded will move to the GOP until the party comes up with a credible economic plan that addresses popular concerns. One big problem lies in the very nature of the Republican Party. Since Theodore Roosevelt, the party has devolved into a de facto shill for large corporate interests. One notable exception, to some extent, was Ronald Reagan, whose rise challenged the hegemony of some in the corporate establishment, first in California, when he was governor, and later nationally.
Republicans may now find it convenient to rail against the Troubled Asset Relief Program, but it's something many supported under George W. Bush. Even now, most are loath to fight excessive pay and bonuses at places like Goldman Sachs. Instead, it's populists like North Dakota Democrat Byron Dorgan and Vermont independent Bernie Sanders who seem most outraged by the massive rip-off of taxpayers.
Republicans also do not seem sympathetic to proposals by former Fed chief Paul Volcker and others to break up "too big to fail" banks or reimpose distinctions between investment and mainstream banks. If anything, this illustrates that for all the rhetoric about self-sufficiency and small business, they remain more attuned to Wall Street and K Street than Main Street.
Read the whole thing. I agree too with his conclusion.
In the end, economic populism, not social conservatism, can transform Republicans into something other than a scarecrow party. And they could make this strategy work, if they only had a brain.
Say "populism" to a Republican, and they'll think you're talking about social conservatism. But economist Luigi Zingales says Republicans have an opening to become market-oriented populists, if they can wake up and quit being the party of big business. Excerpt:
The question is not whether this populist pressure will have a strong influence on policy decisions, but how: Will it work to destroy, or to improve, the market system that has brought so much well-being?
If Republicans ignore popular anger, as the party establishment did last autumn, they leave a powerful and potentially disruptive force in the hands of Democrats. The majority of the Democratic establishment does not believe in the American dream, in the importance of providing incentives for economic growth, or in the market as the best mechanism to allocate available resources. The Democrats could channel popular anger into protectionism, 90% tax rates and onerous new market constraints.
In Republican hands, though, populism could become a strong force for positive change. At the beginning of the 20th century, facing similar conditions of rising income inequality and popular anger, President Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican, approved a series of fundamental reforms that turned the United States into a modern country. From creating the Food and Drug Administration to trust busting, Roosevelt used public anger to counterbalance the power of large companies (and monopolies) and create a more efficient and popular form of market capitalism.
The Republican Party today must follow a similar strategy, updated for present circumstances. It has to move from a pro-business strategy that defends the interests of existing companies to a pro-market strategy that fosters open competition and freedom of entry. While the two agendas sometimes coincide--as in the case of protecting property rights--they are often at odds. Established firms are threatened by competition and frequently use their political muscle to restrict new entries into their industry, strengthening their positions but putting their customers at a disadvantage.
More good Zingales ideas about saving capitalism from the capitalists here.
The former House speaker can't believe conservative knotheads are trying to override the local GOP's choice of candidate in a New York Congressional district. Excerpt:
Recall, the 1994 victory was in part because Republicans swept the 1993 elections. Three of the four Republican winners that year were moderates - significantly to the left of the conservative Republican base: Riordan was elected mayor of Los Angeles, Whitman as governor of New Jersey, and Giuliani as mayor of New York. George Allen, a conservative, was elected as governor of Virginia.
Furthermore, many of the Republicans elected in the 1994 landslide were moderates, including Nancy Johnson, Tom Campbell, Jim Leach, Chris Shays, Jan Myer, and Jennifer Dunn. They all signed the Contract with America and this coalition of Republicans passed Welfare reform, sealed the fate of HillaryCare, supported NAFTA, passed the first tax cut in 16 years, an increase in defense and intelligence spending, and (despite a Clinton veto that shut down the government) a four-year balanced budget.
In other words, support from moderate Republican elected officials enabled conservative governance, it did not prevent it. This is a lesson conservatives should keep in mind to counter the impulse to force out from the Republican Party anyone who is to the left of us on some issues.
Meanwhile, here in Texas, the state GOP just elected a hard-right social conservative as party leader. When last heard from, Cathie Adams e-mailed her associates to warn them that Obama's speech to schoolchildren made her think of Hitler. The Dallas County party chairman, who has been unfairly dogged by social conservatives for wanting to include Log Cabin Republicans in the conversation, and who has been trying to make party regulars understand that young city-dwellers who are Republican-friendly are increasingly turned off by the hardcore stuff, says picking a RINO hunter to run the state party sets the Texas GOP back five years. Excerpt:
Dallas County GOP chair Jonathan Neerman says the party needs "serious leaders with serious ideas," and Adams apparently doesn't fit that description. "She has been part of an issue group that has gone after Republicans, and I don't know how she can shift gears and go from being an issue-group leader going after Republican candidates and elected officials to now being one where she has to try and grow the party."
Neerman says there's "a crisis of confidence" in the state party, claiming elected officials don't feel like the party has been there for them or has been working for them to win elections. "You've seen the state party take positions on issues where there's no uniform agreement amongst Republican elected officials. So what they've done instead of trying to grow the party is formed a circular firing squad to go after Republicans."
I had heard that a couple of South Carolina Republicans had gotten into hot water for making anti-Semitic comments in a letter to the editor. What on earth had they said? I wondered. Here it is, something that could have...
New ABC/WaPo poll out finds that only 20 percent of Americans claim to be Republicans, a 26-year low. Additionally, while a majority believe the country is on the wrong track, 49 percent trust Obama to make the right decisions for...
This was a good letter to Camille Paglia in her current Salon column: The purpose of this message is to express my outrage at the frequent criticism of Sarah Palin for having gone to five schools before she graduated from...
The Gingrichissimo gave an interview to National Review, in which the following sentences appear: Gingrich laughed. Although he and his wife, Callista, had in theory come to NR to chat about the impressive new documentary they co-host, Rediscovering God in...
Tom DeLay was asked who are the GOP up-and-comers for leadership. He said: "No one," he replied in exasperation. "It's all the same old guys who were in leadership with me, and those old guys aren't the leaders the party...
Wow, Eric Cantor, this is going to to turn the Becketeers, Dittoheads and Tea Partiers against you. Excerpt: The Richmond area lawmaker wouldn't have had any trouble riling up the people in the audience, many of whom wore "Tea...
There are no words to describe this, though Tom DeLay's line about "getting in touch with [his] feminine side" are pretty dadgum great: UPDATE: The part with the pre-dance "feminine side" quote was taken off the web, but there's this...
Stephen Chapman says the Republicans really do have some good ideas on health care reform ... but they had them back when the GOP was in power, and could have enacted them. But they didn't. Excerpt: The truth is Republicans...
One of our US Senators from Texas, Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison, has announced that she will resign her seat this fall to concentrate on running to unseat incumbent GOP governor Rick Perry. Paul Burka, probably the most plugged-in political commentator...
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by anything we learn about the way the Bush administration carried on, but today's news from Tom Ridge that Team Bush tried to strongarm him into jacking up the national terror threat alert just...
Jim Antle observes that the Republicans, without doing a thing to reform themselves, are bouncing back from their thorough smashings in 2006 and 2008. It looked as if they were going to be marooned on a desert island for a...
This Palin smackdown from Peggy Noonan is definitive, and you should read the whole thing. Here are some excerpts: Sarah Palin's resignation gives Republicans a new opportunity to see her plain--to review the bidding, see her strengths, acknowledge her limits,...
From Camille's latest Salon column, in which she answers letters from readers: I am conservative politically, yet I see the profound weaknesses in the movement. One thing from the liberal side of thinking that I struggle with is the concept...
The former US Attorney General has at long last landed a job. He will be teaching a political science class at Texas Tech in Lubbock this fall. The former leading light of the Bush 43 administration will also be helping...
John Podhoretz tells fellow conservatives an inconvenient truth: Last week, the day Palin made her bombshell announcement, Jonah Goldberg wrote her an open letter urging Palin to bone up on issues and become fluent before taking the big jump into...
Stanley Fish argues the public statements and actions of Sarah Palin and Mark Sanford are so puzzling and unusual that maybe, just maybe, they are exactly what they seem to be. Here's Fish: Maybe he should look at the video...
A reader from Alaska sends in the following, which I post with permission: Hi Rod, Thought you'd like to know that all the talking guys on the local radio up here in AK are saying that the cost to the...
In his best Times column yet, Ross Douthat -- who, like me, was an early Palin enthusiast, but was later disillusioned and disappointed -- reflects on how Palin ruined her national political career by accepting John McCain's bid to join...
Steve Waldman says that if Sarah Palin is planning a 2012 run for the GOP presidential nomination, only Mike Huckabee can stop her from locking up the religious conservative base. That sounds about right to me. Strangely enough, the fact...
The optimist in me -- the guy who first thought Sarah Palin was a fantastic choice, before things went swiftly downhill last fall -- hopes that Reihan Salam and Mark Steyn are correct, and that her bizarre leaving of office...
A shocker. No word about whether she intends to run for president in 2012, but it seems unlikely now, don't you think? But on second thought, perhaps she's thinking that the time she needs to spend traveling the lower 48...
The governor of South Carolina digs himself in deeper. For some odd reason, he's elaborating with the media on his eventful erotic life. Excerpt: In an interview with The Associated Press at his Statehouse office, Mr. Sanford said that those...
From one of his love letters to his Argentinian mistress: "One, tomorrow leave at 5 a.m. for New York and meetings. Will think about you on its streets and wish I was going to be there later in the month...
You knew, you just knew, that there was some monkey business going on with South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford and his mysterious Father's Day weekend disappearance, which turned out not to be a hiking trip on the Appalachian Trail, but...
So what, exactly, should the Republicans do? They're without a clear leader, a clear message, or a clear mission (aside from "win elections," which is pretty hard without the other components) and it doesn't look, from the article I quoted...
It may have taken a little while; certainly no one expected it to take Republicans this long into the Obama administration to discover what it is they most oppose. Unfortunately, no one expected it to be themselves: Nearly half (47...
Texas Sen. Bob Deuell is a Republican, a social conservative, and a physician. He Here's how he reacted to it. The other day in the legislature, his bill to facilitate needle exchange as an HIV-fighting measure was shot down by...
I cannot believe I'm agreeing with Judith Warner, but, well, stranger things have happened. Today, Warner writes that even a liberal like her can't help feeling sorry for Meghan McCain, who's making a national fool of herself. Excerpt: You can't,...
The new Gallup numbers showing an across-the-board Republican loss in all demographic groups are pretty catastrophic. The Bush years were a disaster for the Republicans; Gallup finds that the great decline began in 2005, after Katrina and Harriet Miers (which...
Jack Kemp has died. He was certainly influential in his time, a leading policy light of the Republican Party in an age of GOP ascendancy. But reading his name again after so long, and under current political circumstances, one may...
...and so soon! The New York Times reports that Wall Street pay this year is headed back to pre-crash levels. Excerpt: The rest of the nation may be getting back to basics, but on Wall Street, paychecks still come with...
In the UK, the Tories are taking a new line. Excerpt: Prisk is at the center of a new political movement in Britain launching an assault on the conformity of branded big-box stores in favor of small, locally owned businesses....
Madre de Dios, Newt Gingrich will be received into the Holy Roman Church this weekend. Lapsed Catholic Christopher Buckley is amused. Excerpt: His Web site's motto--"Real Change Requires Real Change"--seems quite apt to the present occasion, even if it sounds...
Laura Ingraham, who didn't like John McCain's daughter's criticism of Republicans, thinks so. I don't have an opinion about Meghan McCain, but I sure did like her piquant response to the ridiculous criticism. UPDATE: Here's a link to the Laura...
Here's an illuminating GQ interview with Michael Steele, the controversial Republican Party chairman. I'm pretty sure he shouldn't be running the Republican Party now. He really doesn't seem ready for prime time. But he's easy to like, and something of...
Eeeevil Republican Bobby Jindal has the gall to reject an idea to build a Chicken Empathy Museum? You know what comes next. First they came for the Chicken Empathy Museum, and I did not care, for I did not empathize...
Michael Steele didn't let the sun go down before he apologized to Rush Limbaugh. Think of it! The head of the Republican Party apologized to a talk radio host for uttering a mild criticism of him. This must be the...
Kathleen Parker knows the real Bobby Jindal isn't the man America saw the other night, the one who made Mr. Rogers sound like Winston Churchill. She's right, and I'm glad she's said so in her column. Jindal can recover from...
I've been meaning to blog on John Derbyshire's excellent American Conservative cover story about how right-wing talk radio hurts conservatism, and now, here comes Rush Limbaugh today to serve as the best imaginable example of what Derb's talking about. Rush...
David Brooks, last night: You know, I think Bobby Jindal is a very promising politician, and I oppose the stimulus because I thought it was poorly drafted. But to come up at this moment in history with a stale "government...
Bone-tired and not up to much analysis of the two speeches tonight, which just concluded. But I want to open the comments for your analysis. Quick reaction, though? Obama was masterful. There wasn't a lot of new policy there, but...
Reader Turmarion writes: I read yesterday or the day before that Governor Bobby Jindal has stated that he is not going to accept federal bailout funds earmarked for extended unemployment benefits. The rationale, I think, is that it would oblige...
So says the Daily Telegraph columnist Janet Daily. Excerpt: Mr Brown has also indicated that he would like to see a corresponding revival of old-fashioned virtues such as prudence and personal responsibility among ordinary borrowers. (In Margaret Thatcher's day, these...
I think I am on record, going at least back to my initial enthusiasm for the Huckabee campaign, as favoring the Republican Party going in a more populist, Main Street direction. But if they choose the nitwit populism of Joe...
In today's Wall Street Journal, Juan Williams wrote what I thought was the best and most important commentary of all the Obama opinion-mongering. Excerpt: It is neither overweening emotion nor partisanship to see King's moral universe bending toward justice in...
The Economist's valedictory assessment of Bush, whom they call a "frat boy," is brutal but not unfair. Excerpts: He leaves the White House as one of the least popular and most divisive presidents in American history. At home, his approval...
John Avlon writes about what happened when he left his job as a speechwriter for Mayor Giuliani in 2002, and applied for a job in the State Department. Excerpt: "Who did you vote for?" she asked. "I don't think I...
Alex Massie says the Republican habit of deifying Reagan is hurting the party. Excerpt: But it is an iron truth of politics that prolonged success sows the seeds of future downfall. Revolutions run out of steam. They cannot be permanent....
Alberto Gonzales, as we know and love him: Alberto Gonzales, who has kept a low profile since resigning as attorney general nearly 16 months ago, said he is writing a book to set the record straight about his controversial tenure...
This just in: the Republican Party is set to rip into President Bush for embracing "socialism." What a model of political courage this is, sticking it to the least popular president in American history with only three weeks left to...
Well, it looks like we'll have to wait awhile before my political man-crush on Bobby Jindal can be validated. It appears that the Jindal administration is now having to make major budget cuts because the price of oil, upon which...
Some people just don't know when to leave well enough alone. Like Kathleen Parker, who decided to add insult to her "There's too much of God in the Republican Party" injury: Despite its sudden popularity, oogedy-boogedy is nonetheless causing some...
A shocking new survey of registered Texas voters by a Houston-based GOP pollster finds that the Texas Republican Party is in very serious trouble -- and what was once the reddest of the red states is in imminent danger of...
Sorry, but I can't agree with my Big Cheese Boss Steve Waldman, who says "religious conservatives are being scapegoated in an almost grotesque way." His latest example is Kathleen Parker's column in which she complains that the Religious Right is...
In her great popular work "The March of Folly," the late historian Barbara Tuchman wrote about the habits of mind of six Renaissance popes that helped provoke the Reformation. Note the part I've highlighted below: Illusion of permanence, of the...
The South used to be the most influential political region in the country. Not no more. We're now pretty much where New England has been for the past generation. I'd say this makes the possibility of a Jindal run in...
Obviously I don't agree with everything in this hilarious P.J. O'Rourke deconstruction of the GOP defeat last week, but it's hard to improve upon his lede: Let us bend over and kiss our ass goodbye. Our 28-year conservative opportunity to...
David Brooks sees things getting darker for the Right in the short term, for structural reasons. The conservative Old Guard (called "Traditionalists" by Brooks) sees the way forward as continuing to do the same thing, only with greater gusto. And...
Hoo boy, now the knives are out in the McCain camp. Via Andrew comes this Fox News report in which Carl Cameron reveals a claim from inside Team McCain that Sarah Palin didn't know which countries were in NAFTA, and...
Here's an excellent, highly detailed piece of explanatory journalism from the Wall Street Journal, pinpointing how McCain's performance during the October economic crisis did him in. Excerpt: For all the ads and debates and focus groups, voters also got a...
So say I on National Public Radio's website. Excerpt: Think about it: the most left-wing presidential candidate since George McGovern ran on tax cuts! Yes, he was against the war, but he did not campaign on taking U.S. foreign policy...
That was one of the most elegant, eloquent and generous concession speeches I have ever heard in my life. Tragically, it was easily the rhetorical high point of John McCain's campaign. I'll post a YouTube of it as soon as...
Consider these two things: 1. The modern conservative movement began with the crushing defeat of Arizona Sen. Barry Goldwater in the 1964 presidential race. The modern conservative movement ends with the crushing defeat of Arizona Sen. John McCain -- who...
Pat Buchanan says that George W. Bush's foolish policies led to this GOP massacre tonight, but he asks -- as well he should -- where are the Republicans who are blaming Bush's policies instead of merely faulting the man? Excerpt:...
Obama took Pennsylvania, and now he's got Ohio. McCain's done. Let the drinking commence, either in celebration or in despair....
Why does this prominent conservative describe himself tonight as "the happiest man on earth"? I feel his joy....
He won the PA white working class by five points, ABC reports. Kerry lost them by three. One reason: the economy. He carried the wealthiest voters, Obama did, and carried the poorest voters. Having lost Pennsylvania, McCain is in serious...
If there's one Republican senator whose loss tonight would be just desserts, it's Liddy Dole in North Carolina. I've always thought of her as pretty much a place-holding hack, but when she ran the "godless" ad against her opponent, I...
Alan Jacobs says his Christian faith makes him an uneasy fit in either party, and that made it hard for him to choose this year. And he doesn't get why other Christians voted with ease this year. Excerpt: I don't...
Many readers knew a long time ago for whom they were going to vote for president, and have never wavered. Others -- including Your Working Boy -- changed his mind at least once. There's been a lot of discussion in...
Well, Julie and I just got back from voting, and I'm pleased to say that a) I was wrong about it not being possible to do write-in votes for president in Texas, and b) Mr. Wendell Berry of Kentucky will...
ReaganiteNYC sends along this intriguing interview from NRO with Peggy Noonan, in which she expands at length on why she's voting for McCain, why she hates how stupid and petty conservatives have become, and how conservatives ought to think about...
Ross Douthat, in a melancholy mood. Excerpt: I had a succession of meals last week with smart conservative friends, and I found them all relatively sanguine about the defeat that's almost certainly about to be inflicted on the American Right....
Historian Simon Schama lays it on thick this morning. Excerpt: Where, O where are you, Dubya, as the action passes you by like a jet skirting dirty weather? Are you roaming the lonely corridors of the White House in search...
John McCain and Sarah Palin (Tina Fey) were hilarious last night doing the QVC opener on SNL. But they weren't as funny as Ben Affleck's brilliant takedown of that insufferable blowhard Keith Olbermann:...
NYT poll finds that growing and serious doubts about Sarah Palin have taken their toll on the McCain campaign's popularity. Contrariwise, people who blame her for bringing down McCain are wrong, says David Donadio; the problem is him. Thoughts?...
From her intriguing column today, it's hard to tell, but I'd guess probably not. But she clearly admires Obama for some things, worries about him on other things, but overall thinks Obama's going to win this thing. There are plenty...
I'm sorry, but this from last night's Daily Show is seven and a half minutes of the funniest political TV I've seen during this entire campaign:...
Seen this McCain ad?: Man, they're letting it all hang out, aren't they? Telling white working-class people that Obama's going to take their money and give it to the nigras. There's good ol' Joe the Plumber at the start of...
Here's Tom DeLay on "Hardball" last night. Some day, historians will examine this as an example of how the Republican Party lost its mind -- and its hold on power. Behold, an American political grotesque at his grotesquiest: I only...
The conservative blogger Cunning Realist comes out for Obama -- for reasons that will be of interest to sympathetic conservative readers of this blog. Excerpt: Related, a broad swath of this country has been turned off to conservatism and the...
Politico reports that unnamed top Republican and conservative leaders are headed to the Batcave after the election to figure out how to save the party and the movement. This doesn't look promising: The meeting will include a "who's who of...
Daniel Larison says that Rush Limbaugh loyalists are in fact what's wrong with the conservative movement. Excerpt: Part of what has been wrong with the GOP is that its rank-and-file members take their political advice and insights from radio entertainers...
The American Conservative has just posted its election symposium, in which they asked various traditionalist and trad-minded conservatives for whom they're planning to vote. Your Working Boy was a contributor. Interesting to see how many of the group aren't planning...
Ross Douthat is right (and right again here, in an expansion of his remarks; both posts are well worth reading): if the Republicans want to dig deeper into irrelevance, they should do exactly what Rush Limbaugh is suggesting. Take a...
David Frum argues that there's no hope for a McCain victory now, and that the GOP ought to throw what resources it has left behind salvageable Republican members of the Senate. Excerpt: We need a message change that frankly acknowledges...
How bad are things with Team McCain? It appears that Sarah Palin is "going rogue," trying to break free of her handlers and do her own thing. It seems that she's more looking out for herself than her running mate...
Oh man, this is hilarious -- and very well done! http://view.break.com/592648 - Watch more free videos (H/T: Trey Garrison)...
The McCain volunteer who claims to have been attacked by a black man over her McCain sticker? I say it's b.s. -- and you know why? Because of the "B" carved into her face. It was backwards -- which is...
Patrick Deneen puts his finger on something I've been noticing for a while, but haven't quite been able to articulate: that even though conservatism is about to suffer an epic and deserved defeat, it's not at all clear what that...
I hate smoking, but you know that anti-smoking crusading has gone too far when the fact that John McCain, who had just been shot out of the sky and taken prisoner by the communists, was filmed smoking while talking...
This is quite a turnabout: ABC's Jake Tapper reports that Sarah Palin is increasingly more available to local and national media ... but that Joe Biden has gone incommunicado? How come? Tapper suspects it's because ol' Joe tends to have...
Clyde N. Wilson provides a helpful guide. Excerpt: Democrat. Someone who believes that when people who have enjoyed a wealthy life but behaved badly get into trouble they should be rescued by non-wealthy people who have worked hard and played...
You know that tough GOP abortion platform plank that Dr. James Dobson lurvs? Steve Waldman points out that the McCain-Palin ticket is, in fact, not standing on it....
I agree with Lisa Schiffren. Palin is governor of Alaska, and not well off financially. She was suddenly elevated to a national presidential ticket. If she was going to dress the part, she would have had to have gone broke....
Daniel Larison, citing poll results showing that Sarah Palin has become a pretty unpopular figure, safely predicts that if she has a political future, it's in Alaska. Which leaves who as the candidate for social conservatives in 2012?: It seems...
Well, it's hard to argue with libertarian Radley Balko's contention that the GOP has forfeited its right to govern. Excerpt: While I'm not thrilled at the prospect of an Obama administration (especially with a friendly Congress), the Republicans still need...
Earlier this year, I predicted that we'd all be hearing a lot about Rev. Jeremiah Wright come September. But September came and went and ... no Revvum Wright. And now October is winding down without a peep about His Holiness....
Steve Waldman has excerpts and a link to the audio of a rather amazing interview that Sarah Palin did with Dr. James Dobson on his radio show. Here's the quote that stood out especially to me: "I've always had near...
I wish to associate myself with Ericka Anderson's post. I saw the video today of those that one McCain voting jerk, and the Muslim guy for McCain standing up to them. Good for him. And God bless the sacrifice of...
Did y'all see Sarah Palin on SNL last night? She was terrific. Two skits, both worth watching. Here's her cold open. And below is the Palin Rap on "Weekend Update." A real howler. Palin was a great sport:...
Ross tries valiantly to explain reality to Mark Steyn. Excerpt: Just to clarify: Sarah Palin's Alaska is not the conservative cocoon. Neither is Tim Pawlenty's Minnesota, or Mike Huckabee's Arkansas, or any other place out in flyover country where a...
I speculated below on how I thought the left would behave if Obama lost. It only seems fair to open up the same line of inquiry about the right in the event of a McCain loss. I don't think the...
So says John McWhorter, the African-American scholar and commentator, who argues that black folks are far too quick to blame prejudice for failures that are explainable in more reasonable ways. Excerpt: I find myself unable to trust that more than...
It's all true what Noonan says today about Palin, and how she represents a vulgarization of conservative politics. Excerpt: But we have seen Mrs. Palin on the national stage for seven weeks now, and there is little sign that she...
Drudge is teasing big to a Gallup poll of likely voters showing McCain only down by two, which is within the margin of error. I think that's about as credible at the NYT/CBS poll showing Obama up by 14, but...
Ramesh Ponnuru, seeing parents in his neighborhood encouraging their kids to be Obamatons, rightly says he doesn't get people who delight in politicizing their children. Completely agree. For some reason, though, my two boys -- ages nine and four --...
I'm getting lots of heat from conservative readers who think McCain clearly won last night's debate, because he hit Obama hard on the stuff conservatives care about. The polls show that most people scored it for Obama. John Podhoretz explains...
I'm going to open a thread for readers who are watching the McCain-Obama debate. I'm here at the office tonight watching the debate and writing tomorrow's editorial about it, so I can't liveblog. But you all feel free to have...
I'm back! Beliefnet's redesign process has been going as well as the McCain campaign, and all of us bloggers have been on forced vacation for a couple of days. But we've just been informed that the poor old Movable Type...
Reader Chris W. sends this in as "the worst prayer of all time." I'm inclined to agree. Check this invocation offered before a McCain campaign stop in Iowa yesterday by a local divine: "I would also pray, Lord, that your...
According to a new Fox News poll, Sarah Palin has gone from being a big boost to the GOP ticket to being a significant drag on it. See full results in PDF here. Well, we all knew that picking Palin...
Houghton, one of our most prolific commenters and an ardent McCain-Palin supporter, posts this in the comboxes: This is probably going to surprise some regular readers here who sometimes follow my comments, but as this economic situation has continued to...
I almost hate to post this, because I know it'll bring out of the woodwork the folks who have nothing to say but how awful, horrible, no-good Sarah Palin is, and how the Republicans are evil and should die. But...
And now, as we say our nighttime prayers and prepare for bed, having seen that the Japanese stock market lost 10 percent of its value on Friday, let us turn to Ross Douthat for a melancholy meditation on the flailing...
Dow Jones just closed down nearly 700 points, at just south of 8,600. Holy cow! General Motors' stock declined to levels not seen since 1950. Nothing is working to stop this slide. The Dow has lost nearly 40 percent of...
It seems like forever ago, but before the economy began to crater last month, John McCain was actually slightly ahead of Barack Obama. Now, though, the election looks unwinnable. Even top Democrats say today that Obama's not so much winning...
Er, wow. Harsh! Here's what David Brooks had to say in an interview about Sarah Palin today. Video below. Excerpt here: [Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party. When I first started in journalism, I worked at...
George Packer reports on how this campaign is playing out in Ohio and environs. Heavy stuff. If these folks are having such a tough time now, God help them if we go into severe recession or depression. Excerpt: Barbie Snodgrass...
I don't say this often, but Tom Friedman is right. The worse the economic news gets, the more bizarre the idea of a Palin vice presidency becomes: How in the world can conservative commentators write with a straight face that...
I cannot believe that this country is in the critical condition that it's in, and these are the politicians we're asked to choose from as our next leader. Neither McCain nor Obama spoke with any credibility or seriousness about our...
Steve Waldman makes the case that a Democratic plan to reduce abortions could do more than the typical Republican strategy -- but that Barack Obama is not on board with this plan. Read Steve's entire post and let us know...
Where the Dow Jones average stood on this day in 2007: 14,066 (it was a Sunday; that was the previous Friday's close) Where it stood today: 9,447 Down 4,619 points in one year. Boy, wouldn't you hate to be a...
Reader Ryan F., a conservative, sends along this five-minute video clip of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher tangling with a British subject over the Falklands War. It's astonishing to watch and to see what its like to see a politician who...
All along I have believed, and have said in this space, that the Rev. Jeremiah Wright matters. As far as we can tell, no single person had a greater influence on Barack Obama's thinking than did the radical, race-baiting Wright....
Sarah Palin said in the debate the other night: "But even more important is that world view that I share with John McCain. That world view that says that America is a nation of exceptionalism. And we are to be...
Here's SNL's take on the Biden-Palin debate. I swear, they should just give Tina Fey the Emmy right now. She's completely brilliant at this. Every time I see the Alaska governor on TV these days, I think she's Sarah Palin...
My column for this Sunday's Dallas Morning News is already available online. I've written the speech I think John McCain should give if he wants to turn the election around, a speech that highlights his particular strengths in a time...
In a seemingly self-contradictory column, Peggy Noonan raves about how great Palin was last night, but then crawls McCain's backside over phony populism. Excerpt: We saw this week, too, a turn in the McCain campaign's response to criticisms of Mrs....
Read it and punch the wall. It's the story of the 2004 Securities & Exchange Commission rule change -- a regulatory move that wasn't even covered by the media -- that let the big five investment banks throw caution to...
Palin's confident, chirpy performance last night was appealing at first, especially by comparison to Joe Biden's stuffiness. But it did not wear well with me. In the debate's second half, I found myself responding more to Biden's gravitas as they...
Shockingly, Sarah Palin didn't lose this thing. She came across as energetic and spirited, if annoyingly chirpy and colloquial at times. I thought Biden was much better on substance, but Palin was a far, far cry from the Quayling goof...
John Mark Reynolds and I have been sparring over Palin, and we just did a couple of rounds together on the Hugh Hewitt Show. I asked JMR on the show, as I've done here, what Palin could possibly say that...
Ross Douthat has an insightful reflection on why Sarah Palin's failure to perform well on TV substantively matters -- but also how that discredits the way we do politics today. Excerpt: In the process of performing very, very badly on...
(Big shout out to the Eighties with that subject line!) Beliefnet has up a fascinating political analysis of the "Twelve Tribes" on the American religious landscape, and how they're behaving this election season. (The "Twelve Tribes" concept comes as a...
Too much Palinblogging for ye? Apparently not. In September, the month of Palin, this blog's traffic increased by 80 percent. We were well into record territory even before this week's national media appearances. Love her or hate her, people love...
At the risk of overblogging on Palin, I wanted to reflect for a second on how identity politics are at work here. When she was first named to the ticket, much of the liberal criticism on her was based on...
Kathleen Parker, the syndicated conservative columnist who called on Sarah Palin to step off the national ticket, has been inundated with hate mail -- Palin fans telling her she ought to have been aborted, she should kill herself, she's a...
Culture11 has a couple of dueling Palin essays up today. In his piece, Conor Friedersdorf calls on Palin to leave the GOP ticket, or to be tossed off. Excerpt: So long as she remains on the ticket, her candidacy dooms...
This is utterly moronic. You cannot parody this. If Tina Fey used this word-for-word, it would bring down the house. Here's the full clip, after this part of the transcript. This point comes at the 3:50 mark: COURIC: And when...
Read the transcript of Sarah Palin's interview yesterday with conservative radio talker Hugh Hewitt (H/T: EricW). It's a fascinating piece of work. There wasn't a serious, probing question about what vice presidents actually do, or would do if they became...
So I was on Larry King Live last night for one segment, talking about my doubts about Palin. Opposite me was the radio talker Lars Larson, who kept robotically repeating the line that he trusts Palin's "judgment," and that she...
Among some Republicans who admit that Sarah Palin has more or less blown her interviews to this point, there's developing a sense that the McCain people are screwing Palin up by cramming her head full off factoids and talking points....
Remember when Newt Gingrich engineered a shutdown of the federal government because Bill Clinton was mean to him on Air Force One? Remember how well that turned out for Republicans. You can't help but think back to that vanity and...
Somehow, this doesn't inspire confidence. As K-Lo puts it, it looks like Palin "went back to the principal's office with her dad.":...
Your Working Boy appeared for all of 10 seconds on Good Morning America this morning, talking about the Palin thing. Don't blink or you'll miss me, and you know how painful that would be....
That's the contention of an LA Times blogger, who notes that the left's unfettered attacks on her both put her in the position of being a sympathetic underdog going into Thursday's debate, and dramatically lowered the bar for her success....
Andrew Halcro, an Alaska politician who has debated Sarah Palin in the past says that Joe Biden's going to have his hands full. In this excerpt from his Anchorage Daily News essay, the emphases are all mine: On April 18,...
Well, here we are. I'll be liveblogging this sucker. Please chime in with your comments in the comboxes. (8:12) Both candidates made their opening statements, neither of which answered Lehrer's question about how they stand on the proposed bailout. So...
In tonight's installment of Jew vs. Jew, Jeff Jacoby and Samuel Freedman square off on whether or not the Almighty is a Republican or a Democrat. Both men concede the obvious -- that you cannot speak of the Creator meaningfully...
John Mark Reynolds, whom I criticized at the end of the Kathleen Parker post below for crawling on Parker's back over her anti-Palin column, takes the argument to Your Working Boy. Excerpt: [Dreher] seems to believe that Governor Palin has...
Conservative columnist Kathleen Parker thinks Palin should quit. Excerpt: No one hates saying that more than I do. Like so many women, I've been pulling for Ms. Palin, wishing her the best, hoping she will perform brilliantly. I've also noticed...
It's a minor thing, really, but I was put off by Sarah Palin's answer to Katie Couric about why she (Palin) didn't get a passport until last year. To be sure, it's not a serious question, but Palin didn't acquit...
to be a hero ... and it's not really working out for him. The NYTimes takes us inside the White House for the extraordinary meeting: "We're in a serious economic crisis," Mr. Bush told reporters as the meeting began shortly...
A beaut from Daniel Larison: You don't just walk into Washington, unless you're a maverick like John McCain, who walks the walk and has been reforming Washington all along, which is why it's so desperately in need of reform. Its...
Philip Giraldi, at the American Conservative's blog: I don't understand much about economics and even managed to sleep through most of a Milton Friedman introductory course as an undergraduate, though I probably do know more than Governor Palin, who has...
Watch the Couric interview here. Couric's questions are straightforward and responsible. Palin is mediocre, again, regurgitating talking points mechanically, not thinking. Palin's just babbling. She makes George W. Bush sound like Cicero. This is one of the more coherent passages:...
James Poulos thinks it's responsible for McCain to have suspended his campaign to work on the economic crisis. But overall, Mac's move stinks. Excerpt: John McCain's September surprise -- suspending his campaign, pending resolution of the massive bailout bill conundrum,...
McCain has gone to Washington today to help work on the bailout crisis. Obama is on TV right now, saying he's planning to stay on the campaign trail, and stay in touch with Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi by phone....
New poll's out: McCain is tanking, and independents are much less impressed with Palin today than they were when she debuted. In a combox thread below, Rawlins Gilliland, the Oscar Wilde of Dallas, has the best explanation yet for the...
I agree with Larison: the Republicans' keeping Sarah Palin in media purdah is ridiculous. Yes, the press doesn't have to be coddled. But good grief, this woman wants to be the vice president of the United States! If she can't...
This is shameful. Both McCain and Obama say they support the proposed mega-bailout, with caveats, but see no reason why they can't continue to live in La-La Land: But Mr. McCain said in an interview here with CNBC and The...
Sigh The WaPo reports: When Gov. Sarah Palin flew home to Alaska for the first time since being named the Republican vice presidential nominee, she brought along at least half a dozen new advisers to conduct briefings, stage-manage her first...
Peggy Noonan asks if after this week, deep down, you fear that neither McCain nor Obama is really up to the job that's required of the next president? And if, deep down, you don't wonder if this presidential election matters...
Barry Ritholtz, on historical irony: I am having a hard time keeping up with all of the bailouts and special facilities created for dealing with this crisis. Am I missing any? - Bear Stearns - Economic Stimulus progam - Housing...
David Frum analyzes the Times Palin story yesterday. Excerpt: Anyone who has ever covered a school board or worked in municipal politics will recognize the pattern. A network of long-term incumbents settles into comfortable patterns of self-dealing and nest-feathering. Periodically...
My DMN column this week takes the measure of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's performance in handling Hurricane Gustav. Excerpt: In a state where people are accustomed to slow, stupid governance, Mr. Jindal was aggressively competent. Dealing with one of the...
Did you see Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on SNL this weekend? Oh, she killed! She absolutely has the Palin impersonation nailed, especially that grating nasal voice. You can watch it below (good luck connecting; over a million people have...
At Commentary's blog, Jennifer Rubin is unimpressed by the big Times story on Palin. Excerpt: Then on page four of this eye-popping account, we learn as Governor she had the temerity to have "surrounded herself with people she has known...
Bear with me on this. I want you to do a thought experiment. There's a story in here that I think is the most important thing I've yet read that explains the electrifying impact Sarah Palin has had on the...
Ironically, this kind of dirty trick will end up being a lot more helpful to the McCain campaign than it will to Obama: When The Atlantic called Jill Greenberg, a committed Democrat, to shoot a portrait of John McCain for...
This, from a new piece in the New Republic, is what I hope Sarah Palin is all about: "A lot of liberals don't understand: Real Republicans are disgusted with the Republican Congress because it was corrupt and it was cowardly,"...
National Review's Rich Lowry is correct in his assessment of the Palin interview. He's also right about how many on the right are misleading themselves about how she came off: I understand how we all want to be protective of...
Let me start by saying I could be wrong about this, but it looks to me like P.J. Gladnick of the MRC is up to his old tricks. When last I saw his stuff, he was moronically trashing John Schwenkler...
All hail James Poulos for coming up with the week's most memorable phrase in this call for a ragtag Palinista guerrilla army to arise and save the GOP from its own damn self: Which plays immediately and powerfully into the...
On September 3, he posted a culture-war-based strategy for McCain-Palin to follow. He wasn't recommending it, only saying it makes sense for them to do it. They've stuck to script uncannily. Jay thinks my outrage is phony, or at least...
Just saw Palin talking about domestic issues on ABC World News Tonight. Depressing. Programmed, just like last night. Charlie Gibson asked her twice what she and McCain would do about the economy different from Bush. Answer: not much. Here's the...
Ross is fed up with the unimaginative McCain campaign's trying to overmanage Sarah Palin. Excerpt: I know that the people who've decided she's Monica Goodling with a shotgun aren't going to be persuaded by me on this point, but I...
Mollie Hemingway at Get Religion has jumped Charlie Gibson's case -- with complete justification -- for mangling Sarah Palin's videotaped prayer request in which she discussed with her church members the need to pray that US troops were following God's...
Patrick Deneen is on a roll. Today, on the 9/11 anniversary, he writes that neither John McCain nor Barack Obama ever challenge the American people to make any kind of meaningful sacrifice for the greater good. We were told in...
Did you see the excerpts on World News Tonight? I did, and was not impressed. She didn't make any mistakes, but she came across as scripted and overprepared, regurgitating talking points that had been drilled, baby, drilled into her head....
I know this because Wendy Doniger, professor of the history of religions at the University of Chicago Divinity School, tells me so on a Washington Post blog. To wit: Her greatest hypocrisy is in her pretense that she is a...
Oh my. Oh my. This is really something. On HuffPo, Deepak Chopra exhales a breathy broadside against Sarah Palin, and it's just ... well, read it for yourself, in all its supercilious, nitwit New Age glory. As they say, you...
We all admire the hell out of John McCain for what he endured in the Hanoi Hilton, but I'm glad Camille Paglia (naturally) said what needs saying about the Republicans continuing to wallow in the tale, thereby turning it into...
Michael Gerson today writes about Trig Palin as a symbol of the civil rights of Down syndrome patients -- 90 percent of whom are aborted in utero. I remember when Julie was pregnant with our first, her ob/gyn in Manhattan...
Where would we be without Camille Paglia? Well, we'd be without someone who'd write sentences like this: Now that's the Sarah Palin brand of can-do, no-excuses, moose-hunting feminism -- a world away from the whining, sniping, wearily ironic mode of...
Hitch can't abide the Republicans, but the liberals are making him crazy with this anti-Palin stuff. Excerpt: I could well be wrong, but I think something similar is involved in the attempt to paint the Palin family as if it...
Newsweek looks into allegations made against Sarah Palin. Read the results here. In short: + She did not try to ban books in the Wasilla library. + She did not support Pat Buchanan in 1996. + She did not cut...
I wish to bring to your attention this really insightful comment from one of the comboxes below, by Richard, who says that to understand why Sarah Palin doesn't fit neatly into settled political and cultural categories, you need to understand...
So says feminist Judith Warner, on her New York Times blog. She describes the Sarah Palin nomination thus: Could there be a more thoroughgoing humiliation for America's women? Because, you know, women like Sarah Palin are embarrassments to all women....
No, says Jim Manzi, in a sharp piece analyzing her convention address, which he rather liked. Manzi compares it to William Jennings Bryan's famous "Cross of Gold" speech, a magnificent example of populist rhetoric, but one voiced by a candidate...
Conor Friedersdorf writes that some forms of culture-warring are understandable and defensible, but that politicians and parties that engage in them should be aware that any victory won on substanceless grounds (e.g., "He eats arugula!") will prove Pyrrhic. Excerpt: It...
Here's a slightly enlightening short dispatch from Philip Gourevitch in The New Yorker, based on a conversation he had with Sarah Palin two weeks ago in Juneau, before, you know. She kind of digs Obama's appeal in Alaska, identifying with...
Today at work I got a hate-Palin e-mail that was so filthy, deranged and threatening (to her, not to me) that I shared it with federal authorities, who, it would seem from our subsequent contact, are taking it seriously. It...
David Frum is a conservative who is unimpressed with Palin -- and he knows something about the kind of skills it takes to be a president, having worked in the Bush White House. A reader of this blog sends in...
New ABC News poll shows that before the GOP Convention, Barack Obama led John McCain among white women voters, 50 to 42 percent. After the GOP Convention, with Palin's speech as the highlight? The numbers have more than flipped: McCain's...
I know, I know, I blog incessantly about Sarah Palin. But she is the most interesting political and cultural phenomenon to come along since ... well, since Barack Obama began his rise. Though Daniel Larison (for example) and I are...
Ross Douthat has a thought experiment: What if social conservatives hadn't rallied to defend Bristol Palin in her pregnancy crisis? How would the left have responded? I think we all know the answer to that question. For many on the...
Which of the two presidential candidates would be most likely to clean up the disgusting mess that is Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac? From the Wall Street Journal's news section: Republicans have long pushed for a structural overhaul of Fannie and Freddie....
So, where does Your Working Boy stand on Gov. Palin's candidacy today? Let's get caught up for those who had better things to do over the weekend than read this blog and its comboxes: 1. I'm pleased she was put...
Larison has a sharp critique of conservatives who have rallied to Palin's side in a spasm of identity politics. He says this is exactly what Bush thought would happen with his Harriet Miers pick, which conservatives rightly rejected. Excerpt: When...
A friend who's an entertainment journalist (and Obama supporter) e-mails to say how excruciating the MTV Video Music Awards are. Half the jokes are about the Jonas Brothers' virginity, he said, and most of the rest are making fun of...
Daniel Larison is, unsurprisingly, against the McCain-Palin ticket because he believes that the GOP ticket would represent little if any substantive change from the Bush administration, at least in the areas that most concern those he identifies as "dissident conservatives."...
Well, more evidence has emerged this afternoon that Sarah Palin is a Christian extremist who sees her role as an official in our secular Republic as in some sense related to the will of God. She actually recently petitioned the...
John Podhoretz read that front-page New York Times article about Sarah Palin's church, and finds it to be "an act of secular aggression against a believing Christian." You have to read his blog entry on it. Excerpt: One sentence [from...
Scott Richert, on the traditionalist conservative Chronicles (their website), says Catholics ought to be wary of voting for McCain just to get Palin. Excerpt: t's hard not to like Sarah Palin. Her accent may grate even on my Midwestern ears;...
Incidentally, Alex picks up a smart Virginia Postrel essay that zeroes in on Palin's Western appeal. Virginia went to the National Cowgirl Museum once upon a time, thinking it would be silly, and was surprised: ...the Cowgirl Museum showcased women...
I saw the same clip of Joe Biden campaigning Friday that Alex Massie did, and I agree with him: Biden is tough as nails here, and awfully impressive (follow the link to Alex's site to see the clip). I'm still...
The New York Times pays a visit to Sarah Palin's church, the Wasilla Bible Church. I'm sure there will be more to come, but for the life of me I can't see what the big deal is. She believes the...
If Sarah Palin crashes and burns this campaign season, it will be a pity for many reasons, not least because we will no longer have the opportunity to read clarifying missives like the one Mark Steyn received today from a...
Here's a very short clip of Sarah Palin speaking to a church audience, asking them to pray for some Alaska pipeline deal. Watch: Here's the key line: "I think God's will has to be done in unifying people and companies...
Some smart observations over at Culture 11's blog, on the cultural aspect of this race. Peter Suderman, on the mark: Conservatives respect McCain, but they don't love him. He makes them take off their hats, but he doesn't make them...
It's not because filmmaker Michael Moore is a nice guy, but because he's a pragmatic one: But before everyone gets all smug and self-righteous about the Palin selection, remember where you live. You live in a nation of gun owners...
Oprah Winfrey is refusing to have Sarah Palin on her show until after the election. She says she doesn't want her show to become used as a political forum -- this, even though she's had Barack Obama, whom she openly...
Patrick Deneen really liked the Palin speech, but now he wants to know: where's the beef? Er ... moose? Excerpt: I actually remain dubious that Sarah is the savior of conservatism any more than Obama is the actual savior. My...
An interesting insight from David Brooks: And what was most impressive was her speech's freshness. Her words flowed directly from her life experience, her poise and mannerisms from her town and its conversations. She left behind most of the standard...
He loves Sarah Palin, but is not voting for McCain-Palin on principle. Excerpt: I love Sarah Palin as a human being. I love her Capra-esque career. I think that, unlike so much of the GOP leadership, she's actually serious about...
Categories: Republicans,
War
One of this blog's most longstanding and consistently interesting commenters blogs from Iraq under the name AnotherBeliever. She's serving in the US military there (she really is; we've had some e-mail contact, and recently one of our other distinguished commenters,...
I've written before in this space about friends who have more than three kids -- the guff they routinely have to take from strangers for choosing to have big families. One friend, a Catholic scholar and gentleman, finally got so...
Suann Therese Maier has a terrific, terrific essay on the First Things blog about why she's fired up for Sarah Palin. There's a reason why this woman has singlehandedly turned this race around, and Suann speaks to it. A lot...
McCain didn't give a great speech, but he never really does. This wasn't special, but I think McCain did well enough. What stood out is not policy -- there wasn't much of interest there -- but his intense desire to...
For all my excitement over Sarah Palin, there is a part of me that can't commit to voting McCain-Palin yet. Last week at this time I was almost certainly not going to vote for McCain. Now I'm likely to do...
Well, Sarah Palin has done it. She's taken a hell of a beating in the past few days, and she came out tonight and returned fire with astonishing poise and good cheer, and took the fight hard to her opponents....
Sarah Palin needs to spend as much time as she can in Pennsylvania and Ohio over the next 63 days. She will own those states, and their swing voters. You think Obama wishes now that he'd chosen Hillary Clinton?...
OK, here we go. She's poised. She looks fearless. You give 'em hell, girl! UPDATE.1 To special needs parents: "I pledge to you that if we're elected, you'll have a friend and an advocate in the White House." Bless her....
1. Peggy Noonan clarifies her "It's over" off-mic commentary. She says the "it's over" didn't refer to the McCain campaign, and so on and so forth. Having listened to the audio, this is plausible, given the mumbling. 2. Mitt Romney's...
I'm with Ross Douthat, who's getting ever angrier about the way the left is treating Sarah Palin. Ross highlights this mighty blog post from law prof Kenneth Anderson. Excerpt: The issue is finally about class, yes? But class defined in...
Peggy Noonan, bringing it: And when you forget you're a Bubblehead [Noonan's term for media people and politicos who live inside the DC-NYC bubble -- RD] you get in trouble, you misjudge things. For one thing, you assume evangelical Christians...
Just back in Dallas from St. Paul. On the flight back, I sat next to a woman I'll call Jane. She was 55, a resident and native of a small Minnesota town north of the Twin Cities, and headed to...
It was comforting to learn that Sarah Palin has entrusted her first make-or-break speech to my friend Matthew Scully, the former Bush speechwriter (maybe he can slip in a line vowing to take on the factory farms!) What are the...
Just so you know, I'm watching all this from a brew pub across the street from the XCel Center, drinking beer with a Crunchy Con reader. I like this vantage point much better! Beer goggles make Dubya look better. By...
I'm listening to three young blogger-radio reporters from a lefty Canadian radio program (lots of "aboot" in the air) talk about their day. They're on the other side of the blue curtain here, so I don't know what they look...
Got some up-close video this afternoon of Huck defending Sarah Palin, and laying into the media for what he calls its sexism. Watch the short clip after the jump. The brief presser followed a panel Huck moderated on the arts....
The s**tstorm from the left reaches Gustavian proportions. From HuffPo: Speaking before the Pentecostal church, Palin painted the current war in Iraq as a messianic affair in which the United States could act out the will of the Lord. "Pray...
In the comboxes, Daniel continues to flack a line we're hearing a lot from the left re: Palin: Did Gore put his family and family moral decisions front and center in his appeal to voters? The idea here is that...
Yesterday's firestorm against Sarah Palin over her daughter's pregnancy focused on the bogus issue on whether or not this means she was a bad mother. Certainly I, and no doubt others, fought back on her behalf against this baseless and...
Obviously I've been as energized by McCain's Palin pick as have many other conservatives, hence my logorrheic blogging about it. I must say, though, that I have concerns. May as well get them out here: 1. Her lack of experience....
I'm sorry, but you cannot make me care that Sarah Palin might have been a part of the secessionist Alaskan Independence Party (the news account is here). So what? I hope she does have something to do with them; it...
At the convention, NR's Byron York has been talking to folks about Bristol Palin's pregnancy: I spoke this morning to Marlys Popma, who is the well-known Iowa evangelical leader who is now the head of evangelical outreach for the McCain...
Sitting here in the XCel Center with Joshua Trevino, who was out in the protest melee today, but took off when the anarchists started breaking windows. He took the great shot above. The thing is, Josh says that the...
A few questions: Some are asking whether or not it's responsible for Sarah Palin to get involved in public life when she has problems at home to deal with. Funny, they don't seem to ask this question of male politicians...
I'm honestly shocked, appalled and really disappointed that even after the new photo of Sarah Palin has surfaced, and even after the news about Bristol Palin's pregnancy has surfaced, Andrew Sullivan continues to puff the disgusting rumor about Trig Palin's...
Well, that's kind of a bombshell: Sarah Palin's daughter is pregnant. Guess that absolutely positively shoots down the weird pregnancy smear. Will this hurt her politically? I'm thinking not. Nor should it. Unplanned teen pregnancy is not unheard of in...
I have not blogged about the ugly smear some on the Left have floated regarding Sarah Palin's pregnancy with Trig, because even if it were false, dignifiying it by mentioning it struck me as revolting. I decided last night not...
Good morning from St. Paul. We're just starting a live conversation about religion, politics and public life. It's being broadcast live on the web from the Univ of Minnesota. I'll liveblog it, but you can watch it live here. On...
Everybody go to the Daily Mail and see the photo of the GOP's vice presidential nominee with the bloody caribou she killed. I certainly hope the left-liberal blogosphere will rise up in one to condemn this hideous expression of violence,...
Steve Waldman foresees that some liberals won't be able to keep themselves from making fun of Sarah Palin's views sympathetic to intelligent design, thus leaving Obama's outreach to people of faith in tatters: In fact, this is almost inevitable that...
I made a new friend on the flight up: Rob Schlein, head of the Log Cabin Republicans of Dallas County. Rob and his partner flew up as guests of the GOP. As he explains in the short video interview below,...
Spoke with former Sen. Phil Gramm in DFW Airport this morning. He was last in the news for saying America has become "a nation of whiners" for poormouthing the economy. That caused him to exit the McCain campaign as an...
Greetings from BFE, Minnesota, where I've staked out some territory for my Big Cheese Beliefnet editor Steve Waldman, en route to the RNC. We're miles and miles from the convention hall in St. Paul, and the shuttle bus doesn't start...
Jody Bottum at First Things has been looking in on Daily Kos. He found some shocking remarks, to wit: I am prepared to do whatever is necessary to destroy the Republican Party as it exists today as well as everything...
A dissenting view from the conservative writer Heather Mac Donald: Thanks a lot, John McCain. With his selection of an unknown, two-year female governor as his running mate, he has just ensured that the diversity racket will be an essential...
It's hard to say. People say she's an Evangelical, but what does that mean, really? Is she a Pentecostal? A Bible churcher? Christianity Today reports that she was baptized a Catholic as an infant, but her parents raised her in...
My family is being torn asunder by this election. Here's actual bedtime conversation between me and my four year old. I started it by taking in hand the little stuffed sled dog wubbie I brought him back as a gift...
...it will be because what Michael Brendan Dougherty brings up here -- that you fall hard for the trophy wife, but in the end, you have to go home with the cussed old buzzard -- finally sinks in. Michael writes:...
Sorry to overwhelm with all this stuff, but it's been so long since I've had anything positive to say or think about the Republicans this year that I'm going to take this opportunity to kvell. A paleo populist friend writes...
A fellow conservative who hasn't been excited at all about the GOP race this fall just e-mailed to say: Dude, I am so freakin' happy with the pick of Palin. My wife called to inform me that we have now...
This from Richard, in a Palin combox thread below. Lots to consider in this balanced consideration: As a former Alaskan, my first reaction is purely and simply tribal. Wow. Some random thoughts. I have met Sarah Palin (n.b. Alaska is...
There she is. Call me a big old sap, but looking at that Palin family, including little Trig Palin, the Down syndrome baby that Sarah Palin could have aborted, but chose to welcome into this world in April, brings me...
John McCain has chosen Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate! I'm out the door to the office now, so more reax later. Real quick: 1. What a bold, even electrifying choice -- exactly what McCain needed, but it...
The New Yorker's Ryan Lizza, reporting from Colorado, foresees the Democrats trending away from the New Deal coalition. This bit is fascinating: There is an irony in the party of the downtrodden becoming the party of America's economic winners, but...
Word is that McCain's settled on a vice president; the name will reportedly be released late tonight, after Obama's speech. Who should it be? I confess I haven't a clue. I know it should not be Joe Lieberman, whose name...
Having thought about it overnight, it seems clearer to me that those who complain that Michelle Obama's speech was vapid Brady-Bunchery are badly mistaken. It was Brady-Bunchery, but it needed to be that. She successfully, I think, relaunched her brand....
The young Evangelical minister Cameron Strang, editor and publisher of Relevant magazine, a Christian who describes himself as a pro-life Republican, has been talking for some time to the Obama campaign on issues important to him. He accepted an invitation...
Steve Waldman points out that we really don't know what McCain's position is on abortion, despite his recent public statements. As someone pointed out the other day in the comboxes here, McCain waffled on abortion during his 1999-2000 run for...
In an election year in which the economy is the No. 1 issue on people's minds, it's really stupid to be caught not knowing how many houses you own. Jeez, McCain's blunder makes George H.W. Bush's 1992 recession-era failure to...
As regular readers know, I've been particularly affected by John McCain's response to Russia's invasion of Georgia. It has reminded me of how temperamentally eager McCain is to resort to war, and how little the country can afford a Commander...
According to the new Reuters poll, John McCain is beating Barack Obama by five percentage points. Who would have predicted that? Turns out that the McCain camp was smart to go after Obama's celebrity image. Suddenly, Obama's decision to make...
Earlier this week, I wrote an editorial for The Dallas Morning News containing the following passage: To be clear, Russia's invasion of Georgia is deplorable, and we support every effort to make Moscow pay a diplomatic and economic price for...
I started a post the other day about the Jerome Corsi anti-Obama book, after Roger Kimball posted a blog entry mocking the New York Times for examining the lies and distortions in the book, thereby helping to make the book's...
I'm rethinking my initial reaction that the Saddleback forum was largely a waste of time, because it broke no new ground. I'm partly rethinking my view because I'm a journalist and a political junkie, and what for me is "no...
Categories: Republicans,
War
You know, it's stuff like this that deflates me regarding McCain. It's the NYTimes story today about how gung-ho he was about the Iraq war, and how gung-ho he still is for a foreign policy that's aggressive and crusading. Excerpt:...
I like Warren's question about the candidate's greatest moral failing, and America's. McCain did a pretty good job with it. When he said, "The failure of my first marriage is my greatest moral failure," there was a real moment of...
Whatever you're doing this weekend, I invite you, I implore you, to sit down and read, and re-read, this transcript of an interview Bill Moyers just did with Andrew Bacevich, author of the forthcoming book "The Limits of Power." It's...
Chicago Tribune reports on a church riot in a Vietnamese prison camp. John McCain participated: In Vietnam, McCain's fellow prisoners say their faith was a matter of life and death. "We knew we had to have some belief greater than...
"We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands." -- George W. Bush, 2005. "The security and well-being of each and...
Writing on the First Things blog, Ryan Anderson faults Mike Huckabee for failing to make a case for socially conservative values in language that makes sense outside of church circles. Excerpt: So one lesson learned from the Giuliani and Huckabee...
The latest news from the Russia-Georgia front finds the Russians pushing past the disputed regions, and further into Georgia itself. Looks like they're trying to overthrow, or at least powerfully damage, the Saakashvili government, which provoked this crisis. The Georgians...
As I've been saying here, if I vote McCain this fall, as seems likely to me right now (check back in a couple of weeks), it will strictly be a vote against Obama and having one-party rule from both ends...
Nuked the fridge? Whatever. New Pew Center poll finds about half of Americans are sick and tired of hearing about the Lightworker. Half that number say they're sick of hearing about McCain. You know those McCain ads poking fun at...
Daniel Larison makes an excellent point about the naivete of certain journalists now disappointed that the noble John McCain they loved has turned into -- wait for it -- a politician. Excerpt: Of course, the "fiercely independent" McCain spent the...
Why is this presidential race tied? Gallup finds Obama leading by two points -- a statistical dead heat. I'm serious. Obama has run a smooth campaign so far, while McCain has been all over the map. Obama's supporters adore him;...
OK, this one is funnier than the celebrity one. Not great, but funny. The Moses part made me laugh out loud: I showed it to a couple of colleagues just now, and they thought it would hurt McCain. I don't....
That's the choice some Democratic bedwetters are putting to us in the wake of John McCain's Britney/Paris/Barack commercial. Let me stipulate that I think it's a stupid ad. I think it's perfectly normal and legitimate to attack Obama as...
That's a good description of the Bush Justice Department, which denied employment to qualified applicants for non-political jobs, and reserved them for GOP loyalists. Excerpt: A longtime prosecutor who drew rave reviews from his supervisors was passed over for an...
John McCain supports the Arizona ballot initiative to outlaw racial quotas in most instances. Barack Obama, by contrast, supports racial preferences to the hilt. In other words, McCain supports efforts to prevent my children from being discriminated against because of...
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal says he doesn't want to be considered for the No. 2 spot on the McCain ticket. Excerpt: " I look forward to continuing to be governor of Louisiana. This is a once in a lifetime chance...
Via Clark Stooksbury, is this a sign of a healthy party? Is my fellow religious conservatives shoving one of their state's REPUBLICAN senators out of the convention delegation, presumably because he led an investigation of allegedly shyster TV preachers, a...
Novak quotes McCain camp sources saying his VP pick will be announced this week to steal thunder from Obama's overseas trip. ABC reported earlier that McCain will be in Louisiana on Wednesday for a reason he won't disclose. It's Jindal....
I wish to associate myself with Kara Hopkins' remarks on Phil Gramm, sparked by a conversation she had with a friend in Maine, who reports that Mainers are deeply worried about how they're going to pay heating bills this winter....
Via Andrew, it's hard to argue with Robert Stacy McCain's observation: None of these young [McCain] staffers really believes in John McCain and none really expects him to win, and the honest ones don't mind saying so -- privately. Most...
Governor Bobby Jindal has signed into law an education bill that has taken some criticism: The law will allow schools if they choose to use "supplemental materials" when discussing evolution but does not specify what the materials would be. It...
From the Washington Post comes a look at one of the problems plaguing the McCain campaign: the message problem. By this point in the campaign you'd think that the focus would be on getting the candidate's message out, not defining...
I know a lot of Democrats, most of whom are really excited about Barack Obama. I know a lot of Republicans, but I don't know a single one who's excited about John McCain. In fact, I don't know many Republicans...
Will slaps McCain for grandstanding on the Boumedien decision. McCain called it one of the worst SCOTUS decisions ever. Will retorts, in part: He who wants to reassure constitutionalist conservatives that he understands the importance of limited government should be...
Details magazine has a lengthy profile of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal. Whatever else he is, the man is not an underachiever. Excerpt: As an undergrad at Brown, Jindal interned for Jim McCrery, a Republican congressman from Shreveport, Louisiana. One week...
Ross Douthat chews over the pros and cons. Excerpt: If the first rule of picking a running mate is to risk as little harm to the ticket as possible, then Mike Huckabee shouldn't be John McCain's first choice for veep--or...
Bob Dole has described Scott McClellan as a "miserable creature." Well. Whatever you think of Scott McClellan, I'm not sure that a distinguished elder statesman who mortgaged his hard-earned dignity by going on TV as a pitchman for boner pills...
David Frum has a good column up about how the virtue of loyalty became a devastating vice in the Bush White House. Excerpt: That early team was recruited with one paramount consideration in mind: loyalty. Theoretically, it should be possible...
Mike Huckabee, continuing to stir things up on the Right, this week had this to say about the future of the GOP: Republicans need to be Republicans. The greatest threat to classic Republicanism is not liberalism; it's this new brand...
Well, it turns out that "Bush lied, people died" is not too far from the mark -- so says his former press secretary. From today's WaPo account of McClellan's new book: McClellan stops short of saying that Bush purposely lied...
Stark evidence for why disgusted conservatives like me who don't want to vote McCain this fall might have to bite the bullet and do it: Obama's plans for the Supreme Court and the judiciary, which include the second coming of...
Byron York, on National Review Online: One of the main reasons John McCain is facing such an tough job today is that we are now in the sixth year of a war that the president of his own party started...
Ruh-roh! John McCain has repudiated Pastor John Hagee, who withdrew his endorsement, after it emerged that Hagee had once said God used Hitler to help bring the state of Israel into existence. I liked this: “Obviously, I find these remarks...
NYTimes reporting that John McCain is going to meet Friday with Florida Gov. Charlie Crist and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal as possible running mates. Romney may be flying in on the weekend. What think ye? Crist is only 51, but...
Who says Daniel Larison is a pessimist? Here the Dark Paleocon Lord sees the upside in the recent GOP House losses: One thing about the Mississippi election that has puzzled me is why so many conservatives have expressed some form...
First hubris; now, nemesis. Peggy Noonan wails and gnashes her teeth over the moribund state of the Republican Party. I know just how she feels. Excerpts: They are also – Hill leaders, lobbyists, party speakers – successful, well-connected, busy and...
I just spent an hour in an editorial board meeting with Jonathan Neerman, the new head of the Dallas County Republican Party. He's 35 years old, and, like any GOP official this year, has a pretty thankless task. He was...
Ruh-roh! The Republicans just lost a third House seat in a special election -- this one in Mississippi. When they lost Denny Hastert's seat in Illinois and Richard Baker's seat in Louisiana, they blamed weak candidates. Whose fault is this...
I'm convinced now that Andrew Sullivan's right, and McCain's being slimy by saying that obviously Obama doesn't share the priorities of Hamas, but hey, the terrorists say they like him. So ... what does McCain want people to conclude from...
David Brooks writes today that the GOP has a lot to learn from the way the Conservative Party in Britain has revived and renewed itself. Excerpt: This has led to a lot of talk about community, relationships, civic engagement and...
Trust me, young people, when I tell you that once upon a time, Newt Gingrich was one of the most brilliant political tacticians in the land. I was in Washington when he masterminded the GOP takeover of the House in...
A friend e-mails this striking account of a meeting Deal Hudson had with the Rev. John Hagee to discuss the latter's views of the Roman Catholic church. It was very eye-opening, and I highly recommend reading it for clarification. This...
Frank Rich says the fact that nobody's saying much about John McCain's having been endorsed by the influential fundamentalist pastor John Hagee shows that there's http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/04/opinion/04rich.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print">a double standard being applied to Obama and his (former) pastor Jeremiah Wright. To which...
My friend Wick Allison, a magazine publisher here in Dallas and formerly a publisher of National Review, read this op-ed in the Dallas Morning News today, by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, and hit the ceiling. I completely concur with his...
"So what are you thinking about November?" my friend asked me on the walk to Chipotle today. "Well, Obama's going to be the Democratic nominee, and I can't see voting for him," I said. "He's just too liberal on abortion...
I wish to associate myself with the things that crazy Christianist and madcap Huckabeean Joe Carter says in this "Open Letter to the Religious Right" (which is an address he delivered to a law school audience at Regent University). I...
Ross Douthat, Andrew Bacevich, pro-life, Republicans, Obama, McCain
Writing in The American Conservative, Prof. Andrew Bacevich, the military historian, makes a conservative case for voting Obama solely on the war issue. (As an aside, whether you agree with it or not, this kind of challenging essay is one...
We discussed for a long time in our editorial board meeting this morning what John McCain's position on waterboarding is. McCain voted the other day to sustain the president's veto of the Congressional bill banning waterboarding. Here's where McCain comes...
John Zmirak concedes that pro-lifers have no business voting for either Hillary or Barack, but points out that overturning Roe v. Wade -- the prospect of which makes many of us vote Republican no matter what -- would do nothing...
A few minutes ago, Mike Huckabee formally withdrew from the Republican race and endorsed John McCain. Good for him. He got blown out in Texas tonight -- exit polling showed that more Texas Evangelicals voted for McCain than for Huck....
Got this e-mail from a reader in the Dallas suburbs: Just some anecdotal information as Tuesday approaches. Both of my parents and brother, all of whom are staunch Republicans, voted early on Friday and they all voted for Barack Obama....
The fundamentalist pastor John Hagee has endorsed John McCain. Hagee is red-hot against Catholicism. The point is being made that Hagee = Farrakhan, ergo McCain must distance himself from Hagee as Obama has been expected to do from Farrakhan. But...
I think I've come back around to voting for Huckabee in the Texas primary, instead of strategically voting for one of the Democrats. I like Huckabee, and I can vote for him in good conscience. Ain't gonna win, and it's...
A reader of this blog and a fellow north Texan wrote me yesterday to tell me he's a Democrat and an Obama supporter, and asked me to consider taking a Democratic primary ballot -- which is allowed in Texas --...
Doug Kmiec, the orthodox Catholic law prof who worked for Reagan, makes a sort-of case. Maybe my head's just full of goo, but I can't follow his logic. I think the guy just loves the feeling Obama gives him. Ramesh...
Just talked to my mom and dad, who said a friend of theirs was watching TV news coverage of a Huckabee rally the other day, and espied a sign in the crowd: "Crunchy Cons For Huck." Heh heh heh. Like...
Georgetown political theory prof Patrick Deneen, whose blog is a daily must-read, drew my attention to an essay by Peter Augustine Lawler taking the measure of The Warrior and the Preacher, which is to say, McCain and Huckabee. Lawler has...
An absolutely delicious parody of the Obama "Yes, We Can" video, this one made about John McCain. (Hat tip: Larison)...
This is bee-zarre ... and lots of fun: Mike Huckabee playing air hockey with Stephen Colbert: "Governor, why do you think the people of Texas will vote for you?" "Because I understand barbecue." Bless his little Razorback heart!...
I was in the middle of something and only got to see bits and pieces of McCain's speech at CPAC today, but it certainly looked and sounded like he did well. JPod thinks so: What John McCain delivered at the...
So, now that Mitt Romney's campaign is no more, let's talk about what role his Mormonism played in his failure. Our big cheese editor Steve Waldman points out that according to a Bnet survey, a sizable number of conservative Evangelicals...
Mitt Romney drops out of the GOP race. Good. Can we stop for a moment and think about how extremely unlikely it was six months ago that the last two candidates left standing would be John McCain and Mike Huckabee?...
This is anecdotal, so one should be careful about drawing too many conclusions. I'm just offering this up for what it's worth. But it's this. I've been in on editorial board meetings with candidates running for Congress in Democratic and...
1. Fire up the colortini and join the Super Tuesday open thread! I'll update this entry as we go through the evening (so keep refreshing your browser). You know, the one thing I miss about not having John Edwards around...
Dr. James Dobson says if John McCain is the nominee, he's not going to vote for president. Here's his statement: "I'm deeply disappointed the Republican Party seems poised to select a nominee who did not support a Constitutional amendment to...
The innovative Christian crunchy-con farmer Joel Salatin, a star of "Crunchy Cons" and a major hero of "The Omnivore's Dilemma," has come out for Ron Paul -- as has the iconoclastic front-porch anarchist Bill Kauffman. Read all about it. Here's...
I'm with Ross: I sure would have liked to have seen and heard more from Janet Huckabee this campaign season. Some wonderful highlights from Slate's profile of Mike Huckabee's wife: Because back home, the Huckabees' empathy for the luckless is...
I love Derb, now and forever. Here's his comment to conservatives about last night's Florida results: Oh, stop whining. So what if the likely GOP nominee believes in restraints on free speech, higher taxation, bigger government, open borders, and 100-year...
Best political commentary you're likely to read today is James Poulos's explanation of why he's endorsing Mitt Romney for the GOP nomination and Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination (and why he's not going for Hillary Clinton and John McCain)....
I know, it's mean to bring it up again, but I just can't get enough of hip Hoppy keepin' in real with the people:...
I love this: Dr. Paul said his efforts to overturn Roe vs. Wade aren't at odds with his libertarian philosophies. "I honor and respect the notion that our homes are our castles, and I don't want the government in...
I've said before that I think Huckabee, assuming he doesn't get the GOP nomination this year, would do well to spend the next four years doing a lot of thinking and organizing, thereby positioning himself well for the 2012 race....
Another good column from David Brooks today, this one touching on the revolution underway among conservatives -- one that's dramatically undermining the movement's leadership. That is, they're trying to lead, trying to act like Reaganism is still relevant and viable...
Oh dear sweet lord, Uber-Yankee Mitt Romney demonstrates that he's got no Elvis in him. On behalf of all white people, I tuck my chin in, bite my finger and laugh through my nose, hoping not to be noticed. This...
Dan Larison has a eureka moment: "Romney is Al Gore." Great call. How on earth did we not see it before?...
I speak, of course, of the presidential primary campaigns. Last night when the returns from SC came in, I thought this would surely be the end of the road for my man Huckabee. If he can't win outright in SC,...
Huckabee's still very much in this race, but if he drops out, Rich Lowry's column today will be a great place for him to begin to analyze what went wrong. I was thinking last night that whoever the Republican candidate...
Now Huck is promising to deport every illegal alien -- all 12 million of them. Nobody believes that's going to happen. As hard a line as I take against illegal immigration, I don't want to see federal agents apprehend an...
Check out Beliefnet's interview with Mike Huckabee. He elaborates on his remark that the Constitution should be amended to conform with "God's law": I probably said it awkwardly, but the point I was trying to make– and I’ve said it...
Incidentally, Larison explains here his views on self-reliance, and why he thinks Huckabee is a phony populist. Excerpt: Fundamentally, all of this comes back to the question of whether dependent people can be the governors of those upon whom they...
I've had an e-mail exchange this morning with a couple of smart conservatives, one of whom has a popular blog, so I won't quote him here, in case he wants to blog his own comments. The point of the conversation...
A conservative Republican reader who is also a Catholic sends this in from the Corner: Huck: There's a World of Hurt in America [Andy McCarthy] This is the Republican primary, right? The reader adds, sarcastically: Because, you know, Republicans aren't...
Give the man his due: that was an impressive victory. He'd taken it on the chin hard, twice. And now he's won one that wasn't even close. I had hoped Huck would do a lot better than a distant third....
Run for your lives, it's a theocrat! At a Michigan campaign event last night, Mike Huckabee gave an interesting reason for why he wants to amend the Constitution to ban both abortion and gay marriage: Otherwise, the Constitution would be...
Frank Beckwith, a leading Evangelical scholar who returned to the Catholicism of his youth last year, explains in a combox below why he's not offended by Protestant pastors like John Hagee who strongly reject Catholicism. In fact, he'd rather stand...
Mark Levin on The Corner: I spoke to the Arlington Group on Thursday. This is a group of leading conservative Evangelicals from across the nation. I asked how many of them supported Huckabee. Less than 50 percent raised their hands....
According to Marc Ambinder, Huckabee's the victim in Michigan of an e-mail campaign to portray him as an anti-Catholic bigot. It's a foul piece of work. It tries to damn Huckabee, a Baptist pastor, by his association with Protestants who...
Jonah Goldberg had a good "state of conservatism" piece in today's WaPo. It begins like this: Well, this wasn't the plan. As pretty much everyone has noticed, the Republican race hasn't exactly followed any of the scripts laid out for...
NYT reports that young Evangelicals are getting excited about Huckabee, to the chagrin of the old guard. Two young Evangelical adults, Brett and Alex Harris, have founded a pretty great online site called Huck's Army, to network grassroots Huckabee supporters:...
No doubt about it, says Larison, Mike Huckabee has a problem getting Catholic support. I find this a little hard to understand, given that of all the Republicans, Huckabee is the closest to the ideal of a social conservative/economically moderate-to-liberal...
Now this press release that just flopped over the e-transom from the Huckabee campaign is interesting: LITTLE ROCK, AR -- James P. Pinkerton has become a senior advisor to former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee's presidential campaign, it was announced today....
Looks like it -- Ross has the goods. A lot depends on the Democratic and independent vote, which can cross over. Presumably they'd go for McCain, but perhaps Huck can appeal to them. It is hard to see how Huck...
Marc Ambinder puts up this latest McCain flier for North Carolina: It's smart politics, not least (as Marc alludes) because it pre-empts the disgusting rumor-mongering among Republicans in SC eight years ago that had McCain as father to a "black...
A Detroit News columnist says both parties' presidential candidates make Michigan an afterthought: Who, exactly, in that crowd is worried about leaving behind Michigan, which has more unemployed citizens (370,000) than Iowa sent to its caucuses (334,000) last week? You...
Anybody watch the Republicans debate last night on Fox? Me, not. The glorious Time Warner cable Basic package has no, repeat, no, cable news channels. Which is probably just as well; the wife and chirren are sick and tired of...
I'm going to amaze everyone here -- not -- and say that I'm endorsing Mike Huckabee for president. I know, you're shocked, shocked, given how much I blog about Huckabee, and how favorably. I got a phone call yesterday from...
When people think of Mike Huckabee and food, they think about all the weight he lost. But they should also think about his ideas on agriculture, including these, from his website: We must be able to feed ourselves as part...
Former Reason editor Virginia Postrel says that her fellow libertarians (and presumably non-libertarians like me who were at least nominal Paul supporters) must have fallen off the turnip truck yesterday. This is a killer quote: When you give your political...
If you were a Michigan Republican, and your state was struggling economically, what would you think of this ad? It's soft, it's sympathetic, it's magnificently anti-Romney, and it strikes the right message and tone. I just did a Bloggingheads.tv episode...
Stanley Kurtz sees it coming: Of course Giuliani has a problem on the social issues, but Giuliani would likely run a far more conventionally conservative presidency across the board than McCain. McCain delights liberals and loves to work with them....
If there's one lesson so far in this political year, it's this: pay no attention to conventional wisdom. When I see that CW portrays next Tuesday's GOP primary in Michigan as a Romney vs. McCain contest, I wonder just how...
Lemonade from lemons over at The Corner....
OK, you're Mitt Romney. You get your clock cleaned in Iowa, a state where you spent massive amounts of time and money. You chalk up your loss there to Evangelical enthusiasm for Mike Huckabee. But what happens when you get...
I'd been somewhat enthusiastic about Ron Paul's candidacy because of his stances on the war, on abortion and on immigration, but I never managed to work up much enthusiasm for his campaign. Mostly, I think, because I knew he'd never...
Remember when the media and blogosphere paranoids thought Mike Huckabee was sending a coded message to Iowa voters with his eerie floating cross in the background of his "Merry Christmas" ad? Joe Carter, who was on the Huckabee staff at...
You know how some Huck haters call him "Hickabee," as if the only people who support him are red-state Evangelicals who are poor, uneducated and easy to command? This just in from a reader I hadn't heard from since my...
Huckabee is the only GOP candidate anybody can seem to muster much passion over right now. James Poulos -- who is always a smart read, even if he didn't invite me to his Christmas cocktail party and make me a...
Russell Arben Fox is a close observer of populism, and though not a conservative, he has put together a rich and intelligent analysis of the Huckabee campaign and what it could mean for the future of conservatism and American politics...
Andrew Sullivan says this disingenuous bit from a Wall Street Journal editorial that criticizes Mike Huckabee shows why "fundamentalism" is destroying conservatism. Here's the bit from the Journal: Mr. Huckabee is also only now being discovered by most Republican voters....
Here's National Review's Rich Lowry on the Huck effect: I only could stay for Huckabee's 15-minute opening remarks at a packed—I mean packed—event at a gym in a Londonberry middle school this morning, but it was brilliant, absolutely brilliant. It...
First off, I thought this was probably the best debate I've seen, because the candidates gave extended answers, and mixed it up. There was no obvious winner. McCain should have put away Romney, but he didn't. He didn't do badly,...
The only truthful and meaningful thing I heard on this topic was Romney saying that we're not going to get to energy independence in 10 years, though we do have to get on that track. I didn't hear a single...
Question: In the general election, why should people vote for you and not Barack Obama? Romney nattered on about "change." And McCain was waiting for him. "We disagree on a lot of issues, but I agree that you are the...
Illegal immigration is McCain's Achilles heel, and he came off as weak on this issue (well, weak to this conservative). Man, the emerging theme from tonight's debate is, Let's kick the crap out of Mittens. Romney is making substantive, credible...
I confess that I am pretty confused on health care policy, but it does seem like Mitt Romney is more on top of this issue than anybody else -- and it's kind of too bad that the mood in the...
Word is that McCain is really surging in New Hampshire, and as an anti-Romneyite, that pleases me. But he sure looks tired tonight in the debate....
I'm going to blog throughout tonight's ABC debates. The Republicans just got started. First question: will you run on the Bush foreign policy, or away from it. It sparked a pretty interesting extended discussion among the candidates about terrorism. I...
I didn't get to see Huck's victory speech last night, but I love this quote from it: G.K. Chesterton once said that a true soldier fights not because he hates those who are in front of him, but because he...
We conservatives have spent at least two decades chortling over how the Democrats have got to change to better relate to the American people, and exulting over how the Dems, at least at the leadership level, are for the most...
Just got a phone call from a friend on the road near Houston, who says he's listening to Rush Limbaugh on the radio ripping into Huckabee and McCain. "He's saying that the people who think government can help you are...
Conservatives have to read David Brooks this morning. I'm convinced that he really understands what Huckabee's win means for conservatism. Right-wingers who are convinced it reflects nothing more than the enthusiasm of Evangelical voters are missing something deeper. Excerpt: Huckabee...
Yes, Huckabee is getting a bit more respect this morning from the pundits after that huge Iowa win -- and Matthew Continetti of the Weekly Standard seems curiously alone among conservative commentators in recognizing that Huck's victory was really, really...
A reader sends a clip from an August GOP debate in Iowa, in which Huckabee is asked if he supports Bush's foreign policy goal of exporting democracy. He strongly opposes it, and says we ought to mind our own business...
John McCain told a crowd in New Hampshire today that he's "fine" with the US military occupying Iraq for a hundred years: God help us, I completely believe him. I don't know that Huckabee is any better on this point,...
Look at this entrance poll chart from CNN. No, really, look at it, especially if you are tempted to rack Huck's victory up to a "Christianist" surge. He won just about every Republican demographic -- especially, please note, the middle-income...
Dang, but it's a really hard night for K-Lo, who's swooned over Mitt since forever. I 'spect Lisa Schiffren has taken to the bed with a bottle of gin. Sooooeee!...
Big win for Obama tonight too. Terrific! I think Iowa's results tonight show a big vote for change. Mind you, the Huck victory will be framed by some as nothing more than a sign of religious conservative devotion, but couldn't...
I don't have cable news at home, but I see that NBC and CBS are both projecting Huckabee the GOP winner, based on entrance polling. That says to me that it must be a solid win. Six in 10 Iowa...
I told a conservative friend this morning that I couldn't really articulate what it was about Mitt Romney that put me off him so strongly. On paper, he seems decent enough. I am certain he's smart, sane, upright, competent, and...
Well, look, I thought he did great. He seemed like a normal person: funny, likable, real. Before the show, I read Terry Eastland's Weekly Standard report from the road in Iowa, where he'd been following Huckabee around. I learned things...
Over on the Dallas Morning News blog, I note that my Dallas friend (and D Magazine publisher) Wick Allison gave a campaign contribution to Mike Huckabee, but asked for (and got it) back after Huckabee spoke at the anti-Catholic fundamentalist...
Maybe Mike Huckabee's decision to pull the negative attack on Romney wasn't Eddie Haskell-like cynicism, but genuine, if utterly ham-handed. The Politico reports that the abrupt strategy change cost the cash-strapped campaign $150K. The Politico's reporting backs up early reports...
Man, does David Brooks ever tell the painful truth about Mitt Romney and the GOP. Excerpts: And what Romney failed to anticipate is this: In turning himself into an old-fashioned, orthodox Republican, he has made himself unelectable in the fall....
This really does take the proverbial cake. Huckabee, who has lost the Iowa lead of late owing to Romney's negative ads, called a press conference today to inform reporters that he had decided not to run a new negative ad...
We didn't make it to church this morning. The kids are still sick, and Julie and I don't feel so hot ourselves, with our post-Nativity colds. But our liturgical hiatus did afford me a chance to do what I almost...
Kerry Howley has read deeply into Huckabee, and is disturbed by what she sees: If you can get past all the dieting tips and self-congratulatory stories of scrappy-underdog-makes-good, past the narcissism and the naiveté, Huckabee emerges as a relatively consistent...
Here's an interesting analysis by WaPo's Dan Balz of Huckabee's closing-round Iowa speech, which Balz, a veteran political reporter, says is unlike anything he's ever heard in politics. Excerpts from the Balz analysis. Boldface mine: Most candidates in the final...
Just completed a national conference call between the news media and Mike Huckabee. My notes: 1. In opening statement, Huck's downplaying expectations, playing up Mitt Romney's money, and attacks from "Washington special interests" like the Club For Growth. "These people...
The Bhutto killing and its aftermath has not brought out the best in Mike Huckabee, it must be said. As Pod puts it: The horrifying assassination of Benazir Bhutto in Pakistan this morning comes only one week before the Iowa...
These Huckabee supporters are hilarious -- and they can sing:...
My wife got this in an e-mail tonight; can't imagine how the McCain campaign got her e-mail, but here it is: My Christmas Story As a POW, my captors would tie my arms behind my back and then loop the...
(Photo taken by me last weekend, somewhere on the highway outside of Dallas)....
Reuters is framing Huck's visit to John Hagee's megachurch today as potentially offending Catholics, given Hagee's fundamentalist, anti-Catholic theology. This is stupid -- I mean, if Huck, or any candidate, appeared before an orthodox Catholic Church, he would be speaking...
Today my newspaper, the Dallas Morning News, endorsed Mike Huckabee and Barack Obama in their respective party contests. I agreed with both editorial decisions, and voted for both in our board ballot. It was not a unanimous decision in either...
My friend Bill Donohue of the Catholic League is upset that Huckabee is going to speak to John Hagee's Cornerstone megachurch this Sunday in San Antonio. Hagee puts out some ugly anti-Catholic nonsense, I'm sorry to say. This kind of...
On the Corner, Jonathan Adler points out that both homeschoolers and the New Hampshire NEA love Huckabee, the latter because of his opposition to school vouchers. Asks Adler: If both groups are enthusiastic about Huck, my question is which group...
Great Huckabee quote, via The Stump, regarding his controversial "Merry Christmas" ad: "If I had used the name of Jesus Christ in vain, and blurted it out as profanity, no one would be talking about it," he says. "Nobody. It...
Thank you, E.J., for writing a really smart column today identifying why Huckabee is connecting with certain voters. Excerpt: In a report issued in May 2005, the Pew Research Center pointed to the rise of a new group within the...
George F. Will accuses Huckabee of engaging in the LDS equivalent of the anti-Semitic blood libel. To which Ross responds: oh, puh-leeze: An abstruse theological point that makes Mormonism seem weird and possibly creepy is the equivalent of saying that...
I say it here. And Erick from Red State, who doesn't like Huckabee and thinks he would be bad for the GOP, says it here, in his defense of Huckabee against conservative elites. Excerpt: The New York-Washington Corridor of Conservative...
Shorter Sully: "Huckabee supporters are ignorant white trash."...
Jonah Goldberg is surely right here: [P]opulism is a useful and healthy passion when aimed at the liberal elite. But conservatives can get drunk on it when they proclaim that elites are bad simply because they are elites. Conservatives respect...
Juan Cole's got a bad case of left-wing Huckenfreude: I simply can not tell you how much I am enjoying this. The GOP has been pandering to these stupid bastards for years, and every time I pointed it out I...
David Corn's been reading a book Mike Huckabee co-authored in the 1990s, and writes: In Kids Who Kill, Huckabee argued that school shootings were the product of a society in decline, a decline marked (and caused) by abortion, pornography, media...
Ross has some advice for the GOP candidates. It all makes sense to me, especially (!) his urgent call for Huckabee to lay off the social conservatism, and to emphasize economic populist themes. I think McCain and Thompson are goners...
Did Ron Paul really suggest that Huckabee's Christmas ad could be implicitly fascist? Yes, he did: And how, exactly, does Huckabee's Christmas greetings ad differ from Ron Paul's below? Paul uses the super-evil Christianist code phrase "Merry Christmas," and even,...
I address the glorious phenomenon of Huckenfreude in a Dallas Morning News column today. Excerpt: And Mr. Huckabee is hitting the demographic sweet spot in a changing conservative coalition. A comprehensive 2005 survey by the non-partisan Pew Center found most...
Mike Huckabee says that it's important to remember that Christmas is about celebrating Christ's birth, and wishes viewers a "Merry Christmas." Why is this offensive? Why does Andrew portray this as crossing some sort of political line? I think it's...
Is Mike Huckabee a kinder, gentler Pat Buchanan? New York magazine's John Heilemann thinks so: Huckabee’s brand of populism isn’t nearly as strident (read lunatic) as Buchanan’s. But to describe it as watery doesn’t do it justice. Huckabee’s posture on...
Huckenfreude -- Ross's excellent word for the pleasure certain Huckabee sympathizers take watching other Republicans attempt to pass a brick through their backsides over the quasi-populist ex-Arkansas governor's rise -- proceeds apace. Today, Mitt Romney showed himself to be Neidermeyer...
A reader sends this Daily Kos item from a year and a half ago: When people look at the GOP field for 2008, they worry about McCain or Allen or even Romney. You want to know who the strongest GOP...
This just in from the Huckabee campaign: Ed Rollins, who ran Reagan's 1984 re-election romp, has just signed on as campaign manager....
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