The (Non)Conservatives Against McCain
- 02.01.2008 - 1:54 PMThe rabid strain of anti-McCain sentiment among media conservatives is, in fact, a betrayal of one of the most important principles of conservatism itself: the willingness to work with the concrete facts of a situation. The great strength of a politically conservative mindset is that it’s predicated on seeing the world as it is. When Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin, Hugh Hewitt, and Rush Limbaugh threaten to deny McCain their vote because he’s not an ideal conservative, they come off more like quixotic Ron Paul undergrads or deluded moveon.orgers than like the realists they pride themselves on being. If it’s McCain’s lack of a consistent political philosophy that truly bothers this lot, then they can’t possibly mean it when they say they prefer Hillary. We know that the only politics she practices, and the only philosophy she abides, is that of the ferociously personal. So, what the McCain-haters are really doing is protesting the sub-Reagan Republican.
Recently, Victor Davis Hanson wrote a much needed reminder about the real Ronald Reagan. Hanson cited Reagan’s tax hikes, governmental bloat, and amnesty for illegals. The point is not that Reagan betrayed conservatives, but that his conservatism was not the pristine ideology-in-action that many now remember.
It’s liberals who are supposed to view political and cultural matters as they are not—in idealized hues. (And some describe neoconservatives as seeing the world as it could be.) But conservatives are supposed to size up a predicament for what it is, and make a non-sentimental decision. Conservatives do a cost-benefit analysis; liberals are the ones who take the ball and go home after an argument on the playground. Yet there they go: Rush, Michelle, Hugh, and Ann kicking up the dirt as they pout their way off the field.
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February 1st, 2008 at 2:03 PM
“…they come off more like quixotic Ron Paul undergrads or deluded moveon.orgers than like the realists they pride themselves on being.”
Amen. These people need to grow up and start acting like adults. They should start a dialogue with John McCain. He needs to be taken to task for his “good person” anti-intellectualism. But at the end of the day—McCain will likely be our leader in November.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:07 PM
If “it’s McCain’s lack of a consistent political philosophy “, that must be why they are supporting flip-flop Romney.
The current consenus in some conservative “Corner”s that Romney is the conservative alternative to McCain is one of the biggest shams that I can remember. I am not aware of any “liberal” position that McCain has taken that Romney did not take at one point or another. It seems that McCain’s fault is that he actually believed in his positions and was outspoken about it, while Romney merely took them out of political expediency and now has conveniently gone through a series of conversions.
In fact, it seems that Romney couldn’t even wait to be done with the primaries to start flipping back from conservative positions ($20 bil subsidies in MI, attacking McCain for voting against the Drug plan in FL, recently stating he is a big supporter of Gay Rights after the CA debate).
I have lost alot of respect for the judgement of numerous conservative pundits during this primary process. The bias of the liberal media often looks lame in comparison.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:11 PM
It pains me a bit to agree with Mr. Greenwald about anything, but for once he’s right.
I don’t get why the Hugh Hewitts of the world are so keen on Gov. Romney, who seems to be made of political styrofoam.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:15 PM
After seeing the Obama-Clinton debate last night that made me scared to think one of them will be the next president, let’s hope that these ‘mainstream conservative media’ pundits come to their senses before they end up cutting off their own noses to spite our collective face.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:18 PM
Mr. Greenwald, well said.
It’s one thing to find McCain disappointing in some regards, but to claim that Hillary Clinton is equal to or even superior as a Presidential choice is not a serious statement for a conservative to make.
February 1st, 2008 at 2:58 PM
I posted much of this on another site this morning, but I sincerely hope that Rush & Co come to their senses awfully soon. There are enough differences between McCain and Hillary in areas that matter to make this a no-brainer: Iraq/terrorism/national security alone should seal the deal for all Republicans, and on tax and spend issues—while admittedly McCain has a poor record—it is still much better than Hillary’s. There is at least some hope McCain will fight to make the tax cuts permanent and hold the line on spending; there is no hope Hillary will do anything but the opposite.
Mark Levin has been making the case that McCain will get wiped out by Hillary judging by the 2006 elections. It’s simply disingenous to compare a 2nd term midterm election, where rightly or wrongly much of the electorate was voting about Bush, to a presidential election where the incumbent isn’t even on the ballot! And let’s recall just how close many of the races were in 2006. Had even a small percentage of additional Republicans turned out, it would have been a much different story—but turnout is usually quite low in any midterm election.
It’s always possible that enough people are so turned off by McCain that they would prefer to stay home and see Hillary win, but I find this very, very hard to believe. Come election day, most conservatives will see the folly of an idealized pure hardcore conservative candidate — one that never existed, by the way — and make sure that the Clinton co-presidency never happens.
February 1st, 2008 at 3:41 PM
Other than the war in Iraq, can anyone point out another issue where McCain is in disagreement with the Clinton wing of the Democratic party in more than a nominal, pro forma sense? Given his behavior for the past decade, I don’t think his votes in Congress are a reliable indicator of anything. Further, I get the sense that McCain is being sincere when he sides with the Democrats. Romney may be insincere no matter what position he takes, but, as president, he would have to maintain his conservative base of support, since he would have no alternative.
I continue to puzzle over the assumption by people who claim to oppose the left that McCain would be a great leader in the war on terror. Again, I acknowledge he’s good on the tactics we should pursue in Iraq. But I don’t see how McCain can be classified as a man determined to maintain the United States’ freedom to take independent action to prosecute the war on terror effectively in Iraq, or anywhere else, when he supports the International Criminal Court, treating Guantanamo detainees as civilian offenders, and vague prohibitions on “torture” that will end our ability to interrogate detainees effectively. Who knows what other opinions he gets on these matters from the editorial page of the NY Times.
I have great respect for McCain’s heroism in Vietnam, but I fail to see how that qualifies him to be president. I am more concerned about what his class rank at Annapolis says about his intellect.
I am also amazed at the blythe assumption that McCain’s positions on domestic issues - particularly the judges he would apponit - do not impact on security issues. As the Supreme Court’s recent decisions concerning Guantanamo detainees reflect, the judiciary is extremely relevant to our ability to protect ourselves from terror. Sorry, my concerns are not allayed by his rote recitation of a meaningless promise to appoint “strict constructionist” judges, or judges “like” Roberts or Alito (oops, scratch Alito, we now learn).
When all is said and done, I care more about democracy in the United States than democracy (or whatever approximation thereof may be attainable) in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, or anywhere else. McCain may care greatly about “honor” and “patriotism” (as no doubt Vladimir Putin does), but he disdains democracy, as reflected in his execrable McCain-Feingold Act (which, I suspect, is only the first step on a long road) and his contemptuous treatment of any one who questioned the wisdom of his proposed “reform” of immigration law. By the way, if you don’t think that will impact America’s ability to implement an independent and firm defense of its own interests and its friends abroad, keep your eye on the Democrats. They will be in power for the foreseeable future if McCain has his way on immigration.
All of the foregoing would not stop me from voting for McCain against Obama (I think). But, given that I doubt a Hillary administration would be as far-left as her campaign rhetoric, I think its reasonable to conclude that a Hillary administration that could discredit the left in the eyes of swing voters would damage the country, and the long-term prospect of an effective opposition to the left in this country, far less than a McCain administration. I’d be open to reasoned arguments to the contrary, but mostly I’ve just heard cliches about how McCain “has to be better than” the return of the Clintons.
By the way, I am not a Rush Limbaugh listener, I don’t think the purpose of the Republican party is to get Roe v Wade overturned, I am not a communicant in the Church of Perpetual Tax Cuts, and I don’t expect or want the federal government to shrink back to the size it had in the 1950s, 1920s, or 1840s (or wherever it is that the anti-government nuts want their time machine to take them). I am just a citizen who believes in representative self-government, freedom of speech, the rule of law, and national independence, and the perpetuation of a national narrative that is more than a banal celebration of “diversity.” I though those were values shared by the people who write for Commentary. Those values plainly are not shared by John McCain.
February 1st, 2008 at 3:52 PM
As Republicans you will vote for the RINO candidate of the RINO party because anything else would be worse and you know this is all you deserve. You are nothing without the Republican party.
Yeah, right. Have someone explain to you what it means to be a battered wife.
February 1st, 2008 at 4:56 PM
Ooo. Mr Greenwald thinks those who disgree with him about McCain are a “rabid strain” of “media conservative” who have committed a “betrayal” of “one of the most important principles” of conservatism. And he generously is going to inform us what that is.
But what if some of the “concrete facts” of the situation are about McCain? I assume that is a non-issue for Mr. Greenwald.
Those of us in the rabid strain understand people like Mr. Greenwald very well. I assure him we are not going to pout our way off the field. He should go on with his political party. He doesn’t need us.
February 1st, 2008 at 5:30 PM
I support McCain, but it’s surreal to hear this sort of thing coming from Commentary, who was in many ways a spearhead of “movement conservatism.” Hanson’s reminders re: the real Ronald Reagan are indeed on-point, and I do find it utterly baffling that a weasel like Romney would pick up support as an alternative. If Thompson had run a real, serious campaign and stayed in the race, he’d find that this would have been his moment. But he never was serious about this, which is too bad.
With that said, I do understand why folks who see McCain as someone who will go out of their way to implement programs they oppose, while making it difficult to impossible for the party to offer a coherent alternative, and leveraging party loyalty to implement those programs instead of presenting a clear alternative, would have a problem with supporting him. Especially if he’s someone who, to top it all off, seems likely to repeat GWB’s big mistake of treating the party base as dispensible, and never really listening to them or hear their concerns. Yeah, I can see why a movement conservative, as opposed to a party conservative, would oppose him if they believed that. And they do, and McCain has played a role of his own in making those beliefs plausible.
Even a party conservative would have to pause and think about the long term damage to the party’s leadership base and ideas base under that scenario.
John has come back from a long way back, and I’m powerful glad to see it. In many ways, he is becoming a front runner. I don’t think Romney can win this thing - but John can lose it. Being himself, and showing folks what he’s made of, has been the making of him. The integrity communicates, shines. Iraq? “I said things you didn’t like, but I was right.” Illegal immigration? “We did what you pay us to do, we made the best deal we could.” But front-runners have a different test to face, a test of reaching out and building things within and among the people they wish to lead - and it’s different on a Party level than it is on a Senate level.
How John deals with this test, while remaining true to himself, is the real test of whether he has truly grown, and whether he is ready to be President. He ain’t going to become President all by himself, and he certainly can’t depend on a media that reliably polls for the other side by lopsided numbers. The only way in is through a large cadre of people who will fight with him, and for him. As a Canadian politican named Brian Mulroney always said: “ya dance with them that brung ya.” It’s the last piece of McCain’s puzzle - but first, he has to see and acknowledge the missing piece.