For background on just how awful a person I am, start with my first installment of the Tea Party Bozo Show. Read all the slams on my breach of protocol against Senate Candidate Joe Miller. Once finished, read on.
My response:
Boy oh boy, the angry conservative/libertarian faction is in full bloom tonight. A near universal drubbing from the commentariat!
Out of respect for the many intelligent people disagreeing with me, (and no, that is not being sarcastic or facetious), let me re-examine my premises.
First, I supported Miller winning, and still do. I remain an uncompromising critic of the “establishment” types, Murkowski in particular. (I notice no one took me to task for calling establishment types “perverted uncles.”) Check.
Second, I properly criticized an absurd unforced error on the part of a novice politician. Check.
Third, I remain convinced that the weakness of many Tea Party candidates is their penchant for running off message to prove some Randian, quasi-constitutionalist, Galt’s Gulch bona fides instead of realizing they are running for office in a state/district populated with 10s of 1000s of voters with millions of nuanced positions zipping through their neurons. Check.
Fourth, the radio host portion of my personality took hold for a moment, and caused me to go nuclear with some rhetoric. Guilty as charged. (but it did generate 17 comments on a slow news day, so hey…)
More evidence in my favor?
1. Sarah Palin, perhaps one of the most naturally talented politicians in the nation, was taken to task by a lightweight like Couric because she couldn’t bother to do a few hours of political homework every night.
2. Rand Paul opens the first week of his post-primary win with blurb about repealing the civil rights act.
3. O’Donnell is perhaps the first person to trump Nixon’s “I am not a crook” with her new slogan “I am not a witch.”
4. Paladino
5. Sharon Angle can’t keep out of trouble. http://www.mynews4.com/story.php?id=29918&n=122
6. Ken Buck “Being Gay is like alcoholism.” http://news.yahoo.com/s/theweek/20101018/cm_theweek/208303
C’Mon Y’all!!! Your aggressive reaction to my post critiquing Miller smacks of a little of projection. You’re all CB readers! Tell me this isn’t embarrassing. Be honest.
Also, complaining about liberal bias and double standards doesn’t cut it. In this environment, it’s an even stronger supporting argument for my view.
Look. I’m quite familiar with the libertarian/conservative penchant for attempting to convince the 70-95% of America that disagrees with us on some issue that THEY’RE WRONG!!! As someone on record for supporting the de-unionization of the public sector, I do quite a bit of that myself. I just get a kick out of some of the posts here attempting to rationalize the comparison of East Germany with the US. It’s endearing on a blog. On the campaign trail, it’s just plain stupid.
Exhibit 1 – “If East Germany could do it, we could do it.” What!? No supporting evidence from Kim Jong Il’s North Korea?!
I rest my case.
As a blogger or radio host, it’s a vocation. As a politician, it’s an absurd self indulgence. I applaud Miller beating Murkowski, and my strong reaction is a function of my really wanting him to win. But when you make the big leagues, realize where you are!! Grow up, and fast.
Bash me all you want. Leaving aside the heated rhetoric and name calling, I was dead on. If we are serious about winning, we had better approach the opportunities we are given with a modicum of professionalism.
Without examining too closely the rationality of wanting a candidate who is a blithering idiot and a pseudo articulate ass clown to win a U.S. Senate seat, or dwelling to long on the fact that your original post was itself a rather inarticulate statement of all the fine arguments you have presented here, I, for one, accept your abject rowback.
If we are serious about winning, we had better approach the opportunities we are given with a modicum of professionalism.
And that means doing everything we can to draw attention to the flaws of candidates on our side.
Here’s a link to sign up for the GOP phone bank. They give you a script to read, but maybe it would be a good idea to replace it with Bruno’s 6-point list.
On the other hand Mr. Barone has this.
I’m glad to hear that you support Joe Miller for Senate. It was very unclear from your first post (and I just reread it to make sure that I didn’t miss something). For future reference:
1. If your side makes a gaffe, take the opportunity to compare and contrast with poor positions taken by his Democrat opponent. You did not do this. Instead your criticism didn’t even mention Miller’s Democrat opponent.
2. If your side makes an unforgivable gaffe, take the opportunity to minimize the splash damage to other candidates on your side. In contrast, your criticism maximized it.
I don’t know you, nor what’s in your heart. What came out of your keyboard though is very clear and fits into a well defined Internet commentary category, the concern troll. If that’s unintentional, you might want to change up what you write. If not, gotcha.
TM,
While I occasionally suffer from bouts of believing what I write is important, I’m usually well grounded enough to know that my blog posts are mere expressions of opinion offered for those who might read my blog.
If I thought my post would cost Miller any votes in Alaska, I would probably have tempered it. That said, I remain convinced that, small impact or not, my post serves the important purpose of saying,
“Hey, tea party/patriot candidates! Get some professional help, and then listen to them!”
As for attacking Democrats, I do that virtually everywhere, as do most conservative bloggers, and I could make a very strong case that fielding professional or disciplined candidates is going to damage the left far more than circling the wagons around weak candidates.
As for ‘minimizing slash damage,’ it isn’t my job to protect candidates from themselves. While I’d hate for any of my posts to be used to cost Miller or others an election, the case can be made that their mistakes should serve as a lesson to the next round of candidates to have something more to their campaigns than anger and dogma.
I’m thinking of 2012 more than 2010 in any event. Hence my closing argument…
http://picsicio.us/image/9012337a/
Weighing the slick, public relations-oriented, don’t put a foot wrong, party above country, canned, media savy candidate VS raw, real, people give me the real person as a candidate. If a candidate can get enough of the blood of a campaign ($) and has good positions, mis-statements, slightly controversial, statements will amount to little.
“Rock the boat, give us real people”: that seems to be more the winning concept, at the moment. You, Bruno, seem to be asking for more of the same-same. Put on your party dress, tow the party line, don’t upset the children and old folks, stick with the script.
Re. your generating comments with low “rhetoric”: I dislike the idea, even if you’re trying to be cute (don’t be cute when accepting responsibility or half-ass apologizing). I’d expect it at some low leftist blog and was disappointed to find it here.
I, for one, realize that people are human and make mistakes. Please accept that the polished professional pols we have been saddled with for the last several decades are NOT looking out for the rest of us. We trusted them to ‘take care of government in our name’ and they didn’t. The took whatever wasn’t nailed down, and hauled it home.
I want MORE candidates like Miller, who are not afraid to make mistakes. My only hope for their election is if the lamestream media is ignored enough by the regular people so each and every mis-statement or awkward fact is not blown up to atomic-bomb proportions.
Grow up, in other words. We are not perfect professional robots, and for that I am glad.
tom
“professional or disciplined candidates”?
Please NO, dear god. Unless by that you mean you want lawyer doctor, accountant and architect amateur politicians OR salesmen and service sector citizen pols who opt to be spanked weekly.
Tyouth charges that I seem to be asking for more of the same-same. Put on your party dress, tow the party line, don’t upset the children and old folks, stick with the script.
I find this interesting, because in the very post I take so much heat for, I called those very people “A class of in-bred crooks who serve the functional equivalent of perverted uncles molesting American principles”
You either misapprehend where I am coming from, or you willfully ignore my view because I complained about an unforced error on the part of a neophyte who a) should have known better, or b) should have better consultants.
I want my candidates running on bold, aggressive policy. I want them well-informed and articulate enough to defend those policies while staying on-message.
If this is too “conventional” for you, we will have to agree to disagree. You can’t play if you don’t get in the show, and too many gaffes will kill you. (And sorry, y’all, but gaffes are defined by the media and voters, not by Ayn Rand Objectivist clubs).
My favorite role models are Mitch Daniels and Chris Christie. Real people with real accomplishments, running on stellar policies and winning real elections.
They are sometimes forced to compromise, and they sometimes make mistakes themselves. But they are in the game, and they are winning.
If saving western civilization is your hobby, blog away. If it’s your calling, and you run for office, get with the program. Against our opponents, it’s going to be a bloodsport. It’s not amateur hour.
If you feel like mentioning Hitler, Kim Jong Il, East Germany, or even bash Mexicans, stop yourself, call a professional (Daniels’ or Christie’s staffers might help), and stick to deficits, bailouts, and Obamacare.
Helian,
Well played.
Bruno,
I understand your points about avoiding “foot-shooting” but one of the problems politicians face now is the limit of what political correctness permits to be said narrows with each election cycle.
“Overspending and high taxes” for example? What is the cause? A candidate can’t say that the recent, elderly immigrant parents here on family re-unification and now on Social Security and Medicare are bankrupting the systems — that’s “anti-immigrant.” We can’t even be anti-Illegal immigration any more. Or that extending un-employment creates more debt and dependency among the intermittently employed — that’s “uncompassionate”. Teachers vote for their union leaders and join the unions to gain the irrational wages and benefits — how can they be the good guys (i.e. Chris Christie), but union leaders are the bad guys? Can we only rein in costs when we’re in bankruptcy?
We are being overrun by immigrants, illegal and legal, who aren’t required to pledge allegiance to our values. We are becoming bi-lingual; we’re even suicidal enough to welcome Muslims whose religion requires them to subvert our constitutional freedoms to promote Sharia.
We’re increasingly hedonistic, non-or anti-religious natives who prefer not to have and raise children (pets are the new children — after walking precincts, I know, having been greeted by two and even three dogs at door after door). The same natives who think that the government will care for them when they are in their declining years don’t stop to wonder who will be running that government.
What candidate can speak these truths and win? If we can’t name our problems honestly, what hope do we have to solve them?
We are becoming California — with a time out because Obama & Co. moved too boldly and frightened people with a real peek at their future. Too many people really do like socialism, if it comes on little cat feet and the costs are not theirs to pay.
I didn’t mean to be anonymous, but missed the sign in — sorry.