Conservatism

Kesler: “What McCain did Right and Conservatives Wrong”

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My friend Bruce Kesler no longer is a “regular” blogger but he has recently found the time for an occasional guest-post at Maggie’s Farm. It’s good to see Bruce back in the game even on a sometime basis and I’m pleased to point your attention to his following post:

Appearances and Mood

What McCain did right and conservatives wrong

By Bruce Kesler

Over the past four years, conservatives have debated whether the Republican Party is serving them and the country. This discussion was stirred by several proposals by the Bush administration — particularly not vetoing some budget-busters, the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, and the immigration reforms that didn’t prioritize border controls – and the failure to fire back at the gross distortions and language by opponents.

Bush earned respect for his stalwart stance in
Iraq, but even there lost points for his failure to act earlier to change a troubled strategy and command. Seeming backpeddling and soft-shoeing on the threats from Iran and
North Korea, though following closer to the liberals’ playbook, didn’t earn him support from liberals or conservatives.

The debate among conservatives and libertarians after this election is likely to grow much more heated, whether McCain wins or loses.

Although conservatives have stood most strongly behind McCain, conservatives do not expect much thanks or loyalty from McCain if he wins, and do expect McCain to continue his practice of alliance with many liberal proposals, as he has in the past. That alone will add heat the pot. On the other hand, conservatives will welcome his Trumanesque temper and bluntness replying to the likely continuation of intemperate Democrats in the Congress.

If McCain loses, conservatives will likely place most of the blame on him and his campaign for failing to take more advantage of Obama’s coterie of radical mentors, to alert more voters of their dangers.

At the same time, in defense of McCain’s campaign approach, those most likely to hold these associations as important are aware of them. Meanwhile, in a campaign during which the overwhelming portion of the major media have utterly failed to research or expose Obama’s lack of record and record of shady allies, McCain would likely not have gotten much further in educating the wider public.

So, McCain has concentrated on trying to woo marginal voters. Those non-partisans react more to appearances and mood.

McCain earned none of the points he should have for trying to tackle the credit-economic meltdown, even by comparison to Obama’s passivity. Neither did McCain draw attention to the Congress’ tainted hands in creating it, but there are many Republican members who sat by and prospered from the false sense of well-being that preceded the deluge. McCain did not throw the Congressional Republicans under the bus, as Obama repeatedly did every time a mentor was exposed. And, McCain did exhibit a bully optimism in reacting to the meltdown and focused on quick actions.

It is that indefatigable optimism and sense of fair play that has been highlighted and redounded to his credit. This is in line with his military and political record of bravely meeting challenges. Despite every odd, McCain has fought the election to a near thing.

Conservatives must recognize that, for any of McCain or his campaign’s failings, it is among conservatives that reform must come. Much of our NY-DC commentariat are corrupted by overlong proximity to comfortable power and cocktail circuits, exhibiting callowness, lethargy or outright capitulation. Their lack of principle and intestinal fortitude must be replaced. Much of our bloggers have been consumed by editorializing and not organizing. The think-tanks we built and many major donors have been cringing or avoiding confrontation. Rank and file conservatives mostly looked to this inadequate leadership instead of to ourselves to step forward and fight.

It will take a major overhaul to revive the conservative movement. As in 1964, it will not come from the establishment, but must depend on openness to new participants and leaders. Of course, that does not mean fringe elements or ideas. The crucial role that National Review played post-1964 in guarding against that will require a new central forum of conservative sanity and principle.

No one can predict where they will come from. But they must be encouraged, welcomed and supported when they appear. Indeed, each of us must see in ourselves the willingness and determination to be those participants and leaders

Wise words.

American conservatism needs a substantial overhaul – perhaps even a 12 Step program – to recover it’s essence as an optimistic philosophy that profoundly empowers individuals and trusts them to make their own choices. Then, in my opinion, conservatives need to harness that spirit to a thorough comprehension of how globalization changed the world to operate in terms of metasystems and networks, so as to balance economic dynamism with resiliency (and learn how to get that point across in normal English). Then go on message and do not deviate.

The other side, if Senator Obama wins Tuesday, will be so consumed with jerry-rigging top-down, hierarchical, statist, solutions out of a fantasist version of the New Deal that they will inevitably overreach and create an opening for a new brand conservatism four years from now.

Or perhaps just two years. Time to get busy.

Those Who Live in Glass Houses…

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The latest kurfuffle in this years election is how a Representative from Georgia, a Democrat, accused Republican John McCain of creating the same “hateful atmosphere” that was fostered by Gov. George Wallace with his racist and segregationist policies.

Someone needs to pull the honorable lawmaker aside and explain that George Wallace was a fellow Democrat. While they are at it, they might also mention that most of the truly ardent racists during the Civil Rights era were Democrats, while the Republicans were the people who did the most to advance the cause of equality.

Your Move, Mr. Donkey

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For the first time ever in this election cycle the GOP actually has momentum.

We were watching this election slowly trickle down our pantlegs, until last night.

But now McCain and Palin have gone off-script.

The planned ritual execution of the Old White Guys before the coronation of His Holiness Barack I is now officially not-going-as-scheduled.

McCain threw a barracuda into the swimming pool. Maybe it will work. Maybe it won’t.

But it has made life interesting, for now.

(And it has made Obama’s defensive eat-up-the-clock approach look ill-advised. It has also made his, or his wife’s, rejection of Hillary look like the weak decision it was. Real leaders have the stones to surround themselves with the strongest people in their own party. JKF took LBJ, Reagan took Bush I, Clinton took Gore. That is how the pols with balls do it.)

The MSM and the Donks are stunned.

But they won’t stay stunned.

Their initial volley of vicious slime attacks and jeering, arrogant condescension have failed. The Donks and their MSM allies, the ones who are assigned to do the dirty work, will now come back like cornered rats, like animals. It is going to get way, way worse.

Expect a massive and vicious counter-attack, possibly based on some purported “new revelations” of corruption, against Palin to begin today or tomorrow. No doubt Mr. Axelrod and his team, Obama’s brain, are working hard right now on the counter-attack.

They have to destroy her now.

Gov. Palin and her family are going to have an ugly two months.

UPDATE 1: “I’m really looking forward to the VP debates. And – for the first time – the election itself, although there’s a lot of water between here and there, and something tells me that the long knives are being sharpened.” Neptunus Lex (The Other Lex!) gets it.

UPDATE 2: I laughed out loud at the spirit of this, and its apparent accuracy:

There’s also more to the pit bull thing: Why do they bite so hard? Because that is what they love to do most in life. And it’s not funny, unless the person get chewed up richly deserves it. She even found a funny, extemporaneous (apparently) way to say explicitly that she was, in fact, a pit bull, though one with lipstick. Translation: I wear lipstick and I am your worst nightmare.
 
This lady was not fighting for her life. She was having the time of her life. She’s a stone fighter, not the kind of victim the bullies want. I begin to get the barracuda moniker. A natural born killer. I think I’m in love.

The Right Coast

UPDATE 3: Here’s the photo of Gov. Palin with the moose she bagged. I’d heard about it, but I had not seen it before. Looks like good eatin’.

“Working” versus “Fighting”

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The Assistant Village Idiot observes that Democratic politicians tend to say “I’ll fight for you,” whereas Republican politicians tend to say “I’ll work for you.” His explanation:

Republicans run for office telling you they’re going to work for you, because that’s how they perceive progress happening: someone works for it. Democrats run telling you they’re going to fight for you, because they believe that’s how improvement comes: someone has to wrest good stuff away from others.

I think it’s generally true that Republicans have tended to say “work” and Democrats have tended to say “fight”, although I did notice that McCain used the F-word several times during his announcement of Gov Pailin’s candidacy.

Neptunus Lex had some related thoughts:

The innate character flaw of the political right, with its thrumming appeals to the logic of blood and soil, is its lamentable tendency to go in search of enemies abroad. The left, on the other hand, with its own appeals to the politics of envy and class warfare, is content to find mortal enemies closer to hand.

To me, it seems pretty clear that today’s Democrats view society basically as a neo-Hobbesian war of group against group…hence, their preference for the “fight” formulation–with the fighting, of course, to be done against fellow Americans–is a natural one.

Jim Bennett’s comments on Gov. Palin

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Jim has been quiet lately, and his insights have been missed.

His analysis is too good to be left buried in the comments:

The McCain-Palin campaign needs to address the experience question head-on, and they need to do so by working from Palin’s strengths, not by sweeping objections under the rug. This should be done by announcing several areas in which she would take the lead within the administration, areas where her existing strengths give her plausibility. Three areas suggest themselves immediately.
 
1. North American energy and trade policy. The most important substantive accomplishment of her administration has been the natural-gas pipeline deal with Canada, that she was a key figure in brokering and pushing. The Financial Times gave her credit for this accomplishment weeks ago, when nobody thought she had a chance for the VP slot. Have her make a speech as soon as possible before a major energy or trade meeting in Canada, where she will give a preview of the McCain-Palin policy for energy cooperation with Canada. Cite her pipeline experience frequently. Get in digs at Obama for playing the anti-NAFTA card in the primaries, and against Biden for having voted against the pipeline when it was first an issue decades ago. Play up her experience as an Arctic governor and show sympathy for Canada’s Arctic issues, including the undersea resource claims we and Canada will soon be disputing with Putin. Maybe follow that with a trip to Iqaluit, being sure to bring her husband. Up there, talk about America and Canada’s common Arctic and Inuit/Eskimo heritage.
 
Obama has done nothing as important or complex, or as international, as the pipeline deal. Not to mention Biden.
 
2. Middle-class/blue-collar issues. The Republicans need to hone their “Sam’s Club” agenda. She’s the person to do it. Adopt the Romney proposal for a realistic (at least 10K per kid) child credit, and be sure it’s deductible against parroll tax. And pledge to revisit and reform Joe Biden’s (D-MNBA) bankruptcy bill, making sure to repeat ten zillion times that it was Biden’s baby. She can take credit for convincing McCain to revisit his previous position and decide it needs reforming.
 
3. Native community issues. Not only are her husband (and kids) part-Eskimo, Palin had to deal costantly with the powerful “native corporations” as governor. The Bureau of Indian Affairs and its programs are an ongoing national disgrace. Let Palin head up a task force to entirely revamp [programs for native communities. This might sway enough votes in New Mexico to swing the state their way, and would count in several other Western states that are leaners.
 
So here are three “mules” for Sister Sarah to ride – – to office.

Jim also added this:

Here’s a story on Bloomberg from Aug. 1 about the pipeline deal, before the media got the talking points from the Obama campaign to pretend that Palin has accomplished nothing significant: