He’s listened, he’s learned — nothing
I’ve been hammering the Obamachrist pretty hard of late, and this story provides the opportunity for some equal-time bashing of another no-borders, pro-illegal-immigration liberal:
The John McCain campaign celebrated Cinco de Mayo today by launching a Spanish-language version of its website–and announcing that McCain will speak at the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza (that’s “The Race”). The campaign justifies his appearance by framing it as a gesture of inclusiveness and outreach that is “part of his commitment to talking with all Americans.” Yes, they see it as an act of tolerance to legitimize the militantly open-borders, anti-immigration enforcement, ethnic nationalists who call themselves “The Race.”
Keep McCain’s decision to speak to “The Race” convention in mind the next time he sanctimoniously rushes to the liberal media condemn conservatives as racists for having the audacity to bring up Jeremiah Wright or demand strict immigration enforcement.
Vote for whichever liberal you like this fall. Just don’t offer me any bites from the shit sandwich, thanks, and don’t try to lecture me on how McCain will be “better for America” than any of these other pygmies. He won’t be. In fact, he can probably do the most good for conservatism and Constitutional government by getting himself roundly and thoroughly trounced.
It’s time for conservatarians to start thinking long-term rather than trying to react to every leak in the dike that crops up. We don’t have enough fingers to plug ‘em all; it’s time to start building a new dike downstream, and let the old one fall under its own dead and disintegrating weight.
Update! On the other other hand, Juan McAmnesty is perfectly, completely correct about this:
Senators Obama and Clinton have very different ideas from my own. They are both lawyers themselves, and don’t seem to mind at all when fundamental questions of social policy are preemptively decided by judges instead of by the people and their elected representatives. Nor have they raised objections to the unfair treatment of judicial nominees.
…Apparently, nobody quite fits the bill except for an elite group of activist judges, lawyers, and law professors who think they know wisdom when they see it – and they see it only in each other.
I have my own standards of judicial ability, experience, philosophy, and temperament. And Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito meet those standards in every respect. They would serve as the model for my own nominees if that responsibility falls to me. And yet when President Bill Clinton nominated Stephen Breyer and Ruth Bader Ginsberg to serve on the high court, I voted for their confirmation, as did all but a few of my fellow Republicans. Why? For the simple reason that the nominees were qualified, and it would have been petty, and partisan, and disingenuous to insist otherwise. Those nominees represented the considered judgment of the president of the United States. And under our Constitution, it is the president’s call to make.
It most certainly is — except under “post-partisan,” “tolerant” Democrat hegemony, wherein only meddlesome statists are qualified, and only Democrat Presidents may reasonably expect to see their nominees confirmed.
- Entries
To say nothing of the fact that staying home or making a "protest vote" just throws the other party into power. The democrats have been doing that for years (see Ralph Nader, et al) and look where it's gotten them.
You may have to face up to the harsh reality that as self-evident as libertarian/conservative beliefs are to you, they are not shared by a majority or even a significant minority of the electorate.
So where is this white-knight party that will rescue us from the perfidious Republicans going to come from? Do you really think there's enough disgust with the existing political parties for a viable third party to form? I don't think we're even close to that point yet.
In fact, I'm not sure we ever will be again - the historic events that caused the formation of the existing parties was the struggle over slavery, an existential struggle that completely redefined the United States as a nation. I just don't see that kind of "engine" driving the formation of a new party. Do you? And if so, what is the "engine?" Deficit spending? The war in Iraq? I'm just not seeing it.
Well, except of course Alito's too conservative, and wears his conservatism on his sleeve.e
"Mike: The flaw in that line of thinking is in assuming that there is an alternative to picking the lesser of two evils. There isn't."
The flaw in your logic is that it entirely lacks logic. Of course there is an alternative. Reform the party of your choice by whatever means you deem necessary and effective. In my case, I am convinced that means subjecting it to the kind of drubbing that will convince it that it must return to its conservative roots if it ever wishes to hold power again.
You wear blinders, Martin. I feel sorry for you. But I'm not going to let your defects of vision destroy the two party system by permitting it to morph into a one party system with two names.
Bill: Has that ever worked? Ever?
I'm still waiting on Congressional Republicans to "return to their conservative roots" after the "drubbing" they got in 2006.
Like any good conservative I've indulged in the schadenfreude of watching the Democrats immolate themselves, but it's not really funny. The Republicans have zero incentive to "move to the right" as long as they can be convinced that the Democrats will continue to nominate unelectable presidential candidates (Clinton was a fluke, the result of a rare confluence of events that is unlikely to repeat itself anytime soon.)
But even if we assume that Obama can somehow get elected (which I doubt, though of course a lot can happen in 6 months) I don't see how that helps Republicans move to the right. If anything, they move to the left because the political center of gravity will have shifted that direction.
So either way, "conservatives" lose: If McCain wins, after being snubbed by the hardcore conservatives, then the message is: "Hey, Conservatives, I don't need you." The conservatives will have consigned themselves to the political wilderness and will be reduced to ranting and raving on the fringes, much like the hard left has been for the last 20 years or so.
And if McCain loses, then the Republicans have to balance the votes they might gain by moving right against the votes that they will certainly lose if the move right. And hardcore conservatives, having shown themselves fickle and unreliable supporters, aren't going to be a real appealing demographic anyway. So where does that get you?
A permanent place on the fringes of American politics, right there with the Ron Paul supporters, the John Birch Society and the Black Helicopter crowd.