McCain: The Worst Panderer?

I recently read a piece by the NY Times columnist Nicholas D. Kristof about the pandering abilities of John McCain. The soft-sell and false narrative of John McCain continues to be pursued by writers and pundits and pushed out to unsuspecting readers and listeners. According to Mr. Kristof, because John McCain has so much integrity and honesty he is incapable of pandering with any degree of dexterity in comparison to other politicians. It seems the Straight-Talk- Express has run over another pedestrian on the road to the White House. The truth is that Senator McCain has spoken against his Party on some issues, but let’s not get carried away these were not issues of visionary proportions. Let’s examine the issues that Mr. Kristof believes Senator McCain deserves special merit for disagreeing with his Party for.

The issues that Mr. Kristof mentions in his piece are the following: whether we should torture prisoners, lynch immigrants, and racism. The fact that Senator McCain would choose to disagree with his Party on these issues says as much about “his Party” as it does about Senator McCain. Are we now to applaud a member of the Klan who refused to take part in a lynching but continues his membership in the organization? To consider Senator McCain a maverick for choosing to take such enlightened stances on these issues in and of itself is remarkable, but in order to shore up his cred with the less enlightened of his Party and of the human race, he has now fudged on his torture and immigration stances. So I am left to wonder where is this man of honor and integrity?

His most famous pander came in 2000, when, after earlier denouncing the Confederate flag as a “symbol of racism,” he embraced it as “a symbol of heritage.” To his credit, Mr. McCain later acknowledged, “I feared that if I answered honestly I could not win the South Carolina primary, so I chose to compromise my principles.”

In short, Mr. McCain truly has principles that he bends or breaks out of desperation and with distaste. That’s preferable to politicians who are congenital invertebrates.

I disagree with Mr. McCain on Iraq, taxes, abortion and almost every other major issue. He has a nasty temper, which isn’t ideal for the hand holding a nuclear trigger. For a man running partly on biography, he treated his first wife, Carol, poorly. And one of the meanest put-downs in modern political history was a savage joke that Mr. McCain publicly related about Chelsea Clinton when she was 18 years old; it was inexcusable.[1]

So according to Mr. Kristof, because Senator McCain compromises his principles with such great agony he should be exalted over other compromisers. Have we gotten to the place where we expect so little of our elected officials? Today we don’t expect them to stand on their principles, we only expect them to surrender them with anguish. What ever happened to expecting and electing leaders who refuse to surrender their principles? I’m sorry, I am all for compromise and the art of the deal, I am not so idealistic to believe that in politics one agenda will be completely accepted at the exclusion of all others. But in my opinion there are some principles that are non-negotiable; torture is not an option, racial intolerance and bigotry the same. The strange thing about this piece is that Mr. Kristof himself seems to defeat the purpose of it being written and yet as with the myth of McCain he continues to a conclusion that does not merit the facts. How can one man be seen by so many in such disregard to the facts?

The fact is that John McCain is a panderer and as he attempts to increase his support among the social conservatives it will become more obvious. No matter how odious it may appear to the casual observer pandering is still pandering and in the case of Senator McCain it is even worse because of the issues involved and his own history. It will be extremely difficult to pander to a Party base that is filled with intolerance and yet present yourself as being something different. There are those in the Democratic Party who fear McCain, I don’t see it. Senator McCain represents all that this election is revolting against. He represents the Party of old white men and the continuation of Bush policies, if we choose that then I guess we are not the country we thought we were. I believe that the American public is looking for a change and no amount of political hyperbole is going to stop it. Senator McCain represents the past and no matter how hard they try to present him as the future, it can’t be done. There is not enough makeup left in the case to make this a silk purse.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/17/opinion/17kristof.html?ref=opinion

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The Politics of Rage and Hate

In what is sure to become his last ditch effort to gain the Republican nomination Mr. Giuliani is pressing forward with the politics of rage and hate that has endeared his Party to so many Americans. Speaking at a campaign event in New Hampshire Mr. Giuliani proposed expanding the war in Afghanistan with his own variation of the “surge” strategy. Also, Mr. Giuliani has released a new television ad with all the usual suspects (Osama, WTC, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) and he’s added a new one (Benazir Bhutto). In the ad Mr. Giuliani stresses the point that the world is in chaos and America needs a leader who is ready, ready for what it doesn’t say. Nor does the ad mention who has been the creator of most of this world’s chaos.

“I think it wouldn’t be unfair to describe us as the 9/11 generation, because how we handle this is going to say something about us in history,” Mr. Giuliani said in his speech.

The push comes as some of Mr. Giuliani’s Republican rivals are questioning how his background as mayor of New York City gives him national security or foreign policy experience — questions Mr. Giuliani may not have allayed Wednesday when he told reporters that the United States had some troops “under U.N. command” in Afghanistan (when in fact the United States has some troops there under NATO command).

Military officials said last month that the NATO-led security assistance mission in Afghanistan had about 40,000 troops, including 14,000 Americans. Separately, the United States military has 12,000 other troops conducting specialized counterterrorism missions. Charles Hill, Mr. Giuliani’s chief foreign policy adviser, said that it was the American-led troops that Mr. Giuliani wanted to double, but that the rise could be gradual.

Mr. Giuliani’s new campaign advertisement — which will be broadcast here and in Florida, as well as nationally on Fox News — contains images of Muslims with rifles; explosions; a bloody man; Benazir Bhutto, who was recently assassinated in Pakistan; and the president of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.[1]

Will this guy stop at nothing to become President? Now we are the 9/11 generation, as if to say everything we do will be couched in 9/11. The sad part about it is that for too many of our fellow citizens this has been true and this has led to an assault on our personal freedoms, our constitutional rights, and the world community. How many of these crack pots do they think they can get elected with the politics of fear? After 8 years of Bush, do they really think that American is looking to elect another one of these “the sky is falling” nuts? If the best campaign slogan you can come up with is “Be very afraid”, I think maybe this isn’t your election and someday soon won’t be your country.

My hope is that the first thing the next President will do is to lower the US threat level. After 8 years of being on red, maybe it is time to dial it back a little. While I am not advocating returning to the lax standards of security pre-9/11, I am saying that we have allowed fear of the unknown to go unchecked for too long. We must wakeup from the nightmare and stop fearing every little thing that goes bump in the night. We will never be able to do this, if we allow our fears to be stoked by Mr. Giuliani and his ilk. This line of “You are in danger and I am the only one who can protect you” is the same logic he tried to use to extend his term as Mayor. If the choices are an America with Rudy Giuliani as President or the terrorists, I am not so sure I wouldn’t be better off with the terrorists. How painful can getting your head cut off be? As one famous patriot so eloquently stated, “Give me liberty or give me death”. If nothing else the last 8 years should have shown us that the way these clowns want to protect us is with cameras, wire-taps, and by shredding the constitution; no thanks fellas I prefer the following sentiment. “It is far better for a man to go wrong in freedom than to go right in chains.”[2]

Freedom like so many of life’s cherished gifts will not be missed until it has been lost. The greatest freedom one has is the freedom to decide what one is willing to die for. Mr. Giuliani may promise safety, but at what cost? I personally do not believe we as a nation are any safer today due to the policies of George Bush than we were seven years ago. Yet, despite approval ratings in the high twenties, Mr. Giuliani wants to out-Bush, George Bush. What is this guy smoking? The Mayor of 9/11 needs to go back to his rip-off consulting firm and allow America to get past the nightmare of 9/11 and move forward into a new day.

If the Iowa caucus taught me anything, it is that America is ready for change and in a big way. If you aren’t a part of that change I am afraid you will be left behind. I don’t know if there is enough sentiment to take the White House and government back, but it can no longer be ignored. The journey to take back America has begun. It is now time for all of us to decide. Do we continue to cling to fear and hatred of the past or do we get behind the change and move towards a better future? The choice is ours. I pray we choose wisely.

[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/us/politics/03giuliani.html
[2] http://thinkarete.com/quotes/by_teacher/Thomas%20H.%20Huxley

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The Huckabee Yelp

As the Baptist preacher, turned governor, turned Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee continues to rise in the polls, it will be very interesting the imaginative ways the Republican establishment will use to derail his candidacy and still maintain its strangle hold on the evangelicals who are flocking to him. In just two short weeks we have been treated to new revelations concerning the “man who would be king”. There was the “pardoned rapists” story, the unelectable story, and now the release of private letters written by Mr. Huckabee while in Arkansas. The Republican dirty tricks department is in full-throttle mode and as his numbers continue to increase the tricks will get dirtier and the tone is going to get meaner.

As Mike Huckabee gains ground on his rivals for the Republican nomination, opponents have quietly begun highlighting the slew of ethics issues the social conservative faced during his political career in Arkansas.

A recent Washington Post-ABC News poll found Huckabee trailing only Mitt Romney — and by less than the margin of error — in Iowa, where the primary season kicks off with Jan. 3 caucuses.

But opposition research files on Huckabee’s ethics stand at the ready, and their contents have begun seeping into press releases.[1]

The only way for the Republican establishment to discredit Mr. Huckabee and retain the evangelicals they will need is to attack him on two fronts. The first will be to question his ethics and try to expose him as a hypocrite (as if in the Republican Party that would be a deal breaker); using this method it would appear that the candidate self-destructed, he really wasn’t a “true believer”. The second front will be to attack him as being “too liberal” on social issues, this would include immigration, taxes, and social spending. By using either of these two weapons against him the Republicans can smear the candidate, but still maintain the “moral” high ground.

What the Huckabee candidacy has exposed is the lie that has been the lynchpin of Republican politics since Nixon’s campaign, the lie is that social conservatives and fiscal conservatives share commonality of views and issues. The truth is that they don’t and the destruction of the Huckabee campaign will expose it for all to see. While the fiscal conservatives have always needed the social conservatives, it has always been a one way relationship. The fiscal conservative candidate would pay lip service to the social conservative agenda and they would be allowed to speak at the nominating convention, but then after the election the fiscal conservatives would go back to business as usual. That business of course is to turn on the public faucet for the wealthy to fill their pails at the public’s expense. This game has been played out in election after election.

What no one counted on was that a “true” social conservative would ever get the nomination; this is the fly in the ointment. It is ok for Republican candidates to pander to the social conservatives to get their votes so long as the social conservatives remain on the fringes. The problem with pandering to the lowest common denominator is that every cycle requires you to offer more, so if you are pandering to bigots, racists, and intolerant people the line keeps getting lower and lower. The rhetoric has to get nastier to satisfy the mob. Up until now, the fiscal conservatives have been able to feed the “monster” and still remain viable in a national election. Sure there have been the occasional social conservative candidates, Pat Robertson, Gary Bauer, and of course Pat Buchanan; but they have always polled low enough to not raise any alarm. Usually, the fiscal conservatives could present a candidate who could project himself as a “true believer”, but this year is different.

This year you have a pro-life Mayor who committed adultery, a Mormon Governor from a liberal state, and a secular Senator with no ties to the social conservatives; it couldn’t get worse for the fiscal conservatives. The rise of Mike Huckabee should have been predictable for the Republican strategists, but of course due to their arrogance of intelligence they believed that they could continue to roll out the “perpetrators” and continue to keep the social conservatives inline. You keep stoking these fires and someone is bound to get burnt. The Republicans, using the Karl Rove play book, have stoked the fires of the social conservatives with their phony “value” issues until now there is a flame that is threatening to consume the rest of the Party. The social conservatives are now ready to exert a larger influence over the Party than ever before, now they want one of their own, a true believer.

The previous social conservative movements have all been orchestrated by the fiscal conservatives to imitate a real movement, but it was always under the guidance of a fiscal conservative masquerading as a social conservative. Mike Huckabee represents the day of reckoning for the fiscal conservatives. He has recognized the “frailty” of the current crop of wannabes and has rushed in to fill the void. To the chagrin of the Party establishment his message is playing better than the “anointed” candidates and it scares the hell out of them. They know that on the national stage Mr. Huckabee will be vulnerable to all types of attacks and would probably lose in a landslide. The thing about the message of hate and intolerance is that it may play well to the Party base, but it doesn’t play so well to the nation as a whole.

So, as the deconstruction of Mike Huckabee plays out it will be interesting to note the role of the media in his downfall. The Republicans will use their trusty friends in the fourth estate to write the stories that they have leaked. All of this will be done of course in the interest of the public’s right to know, if only they were as forthcoming with all of their candidates.

[1] http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1107/7000.html

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