The Inevitability
Of inevitability. Roundup starts with Michael Graham, Beantown talkshow host and Herald op-ed columnist at NRO’s Corner, who calls the McCain nomination a done deal:
Assuming there is no shocking revelation or health issue, the GOP nomination is over. Conservatives need to start practicing the phrase “Nominee presumptive John McCa…..”
Sorry, I can’t say it. Not yet.But it’s true. When the campaign comes here to Massachusetts on February 5th, I’ll proudly cast my vote for any option on the GOP ballot other than You-Know-Who. But it will be a futile gesture. Mr. “1/3rd Of The GOP Primary Vote” is going to be the nominee.
He’s going to win the big, left-leaning states on Tuesday. Huckabee will stay in and deny Romney a one-on-one contest for GOP voters that Captain Amnesty would almost certainly lose. The result: More wins for He Who Must Not Be Named, and fewer wins for Romney—regardless of delegate count.
Florida has launched the one ship that Romney’s money and Rush Limbaugh cannot stop: The U.S.S. Inevitable. It’s gonna happen. Even if there were a realistic pathway to stop him, the media have seized control of the process now and are declaring him inevitable. He is, after all, the favorite son of the New York Times.
So it is over. Finished. In November, we’ll be sending out our most liberal, least trustworthy candidate vs. to take on Hillary Clinton—perhaps not more liberal than Barack Obama, but certainly far less trustworthy.
Not sure I agree with that, either on the point re Obama, or the “less trustworthy” part. Mitt Romney has hardly shown himself to be a model of consistency and has veered more wildly. In any case, as previously stated, this is a hold-your-nose election that has more to do with electability,* unpleasant alternatives and ultimately, whichever issue(s) you consider the most important. Because you aren’t going to get everything you want.
Unless your big issues are hope … and change!
* Which is as tough a question as any other: Ken-doll Mormon businessman with no appeal across party lines vs. old guy war hero loose cannon with some pull on moderates. Too late to hope anything is going to change.
Jawa: McRudy
Riehl: Not if you want the social cons.
Gateway: McCain, clear choice of conservatives?
Ace, channeling Hewitt: Frontrunner < Nominee.
Malkin: Who the heck was voting, anyway?
WSJ: Immigration is the fool’s gold of American politics. We’ll know who the best GOP standard bearer is in a week.
Surber, He may have baggage but he carries his own luggage:
Conservatives need to use this as a learning opportunity.
With his decisive win in Florida, following his decisive win in South Carolina, following his decisive win in New Hampshire, perhaps the candidate many of us did not want is about to become the Republican nominee.
Congratulations, John McCain.
The baggage we know well. From the Keating Five scandal to campaign finance deform to immigration amnesty, McCain has a lot of baggage. But he also carries his own luggage, does he not?
There is a lot to be said for humility and he’s been knocked down a few times. I see he has regained his legs each time.
Many conservatives no doubt will freak.
I decided last summer to leave the decision up to the Republican Party, and then back the candidate.
My wise counsel in this is the philosopher who pens under the pseudonym Basil.
Bush was not his first choice in 2000. Dole was not his choice in 1996. Reagan was not his first choice in 1980.
I can do him one better: I voted for Carter. Maybe I should wear a T-shirt: “What do I know? I voted for Carter.”
Basil advises people keep their options open: “So, now that Fred’s out, it looks like I’m going to end up voting for someone who wasn’t my first choice.”
…
Conservatives need to ask ourselves: Why have we not produced a viable candidate? Are we too picky? Has time passed this version of conservatism?
History may provide some guidance. In 1932, FDR was all the rage. But 28 years later, JFK did not run as an FDR Democrat. He said it was time for a new generation.
It has been 28 years since Reagan was nominated.
What he stood for as president included being pro-life, pro-gun, limit the government, cut taxes, cut spending, help the truly needed, and stand up to communism. At various times in his life, Ronald Reagan stood at the opposite ends of some of those positions. As governor of California, he signed into law the legalization of abortion.
But he learned. And by age 70, Ronald Reagan was finally a Reagan Republican.
Now about Mitt Romney, he made a good CEO but in politics the rules are different. What I like about political fund-raising is that it forces politicians to interact among successful people. Hopefully, some of their success rubs off. Self-financing does not do that.
Of more importance is that McCain has been vetted by the electorates of 3 states and he has proved his mettle.
He has baggage, true, but he has proved himself able to carry his own baggage.
You win some, you lose some. You keep playing the game.
For a guy who voted for Jimmy Carter in 1980, that Surber’s one smart hillbilly. Hey, I voted for John Anderson, what the heck do I know? Well, I know that the fat lady is just warming up.
Seems like just a few months ago the old guy was history.I hope that doesn’t mean the Huckster still has a prayer. OK, if the inevitable is inevitable, here’s a couple of glances ahead:
Investor’s Business Daily mulls McCain’s temperament, deems it non-presidential.
Moderate Voice with a Mexican view: McCain Si, Obama No.
Right Wing News: “What sort of nightmarish political system could produce a McCain vs. Clinton matchup?”
Meanwhile, Think Progress gleefully seizes the Buchanan/Scarborough take on McCain: “Less Jobs, More Wars.”
That actually sounds like a pretty good description of the indigestion you’ll end up with on the change-hoper diet of free lunch and a Kumbayah chorus.
Topics: pols
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 6:45 am on Wednesday, January 30, 2008
6 Responses to “The Inevitability”
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January 30th, 2008 at 8:18 am
I am not happy with this turn of events. McCain-Feingold is an abomination. McCain’s stands on taxation, immigration, global warming, and interrogation are uncongenial to me.
However, national security is the most responsibility of a president, and on this one subject McCain is acceptable to me. The country cannot afford to return to Clinton misrule, nor can it afford to educate a young socialist (Obama) on the job. Therefore in November I will vote for McCain if he is the Republican nominee.
But, I still don’t care for his politics, and I will vote for Romney in my primary election in a few weeks, if Romney has not given up before then. I do not pretend that Romney is perfect. Romney is a closet RINO and a technocrat. But he is far less noxious than McCain, and I believe that his world-view is more instinctively oriented towards free markets and private property than McCain.
Romney’s advantages over McCain are all in the surface attributes that will be in play in November. I think that head to head on TV, Romney would have a greater increment of attractiveness over Hillary, than would McCain. Furthermore if Obama is the Democrat nominee, McCain is much older, much shorter and much more choleric, and will be at a severe disadvantage. I think that Romney will be the much more attractive candidate in the general election.
January 30th, 2008 at 9:03 am
About closed primary voting
Questions are surfacing in the blogosphere about whether or not Florida’s primary was a truly “closed” primary since John McCain rec’d 17% of votes from people identifying themselves as Independents. Captain Ed explains here th…
January 30th, 2008 at 10:10 am
This is from today’s L.A. Times:
“John McCain now has a pathway to the Republican presidential nomination. The question is whether he can put his fractured party back together.
The Arizona senator, long the bane of the GOP establishment, showed in Florida that he could begin cobbling together a new Republican coalition — attracting enough support from all corners of the party base to give him a plurality in the biggest and most diverse state to vote so far in the 2008 campaign.
He took about a quarter of conservatives, secured nearly a third of evangelicals, dominated among his typical base of self-described moderates, and won easily among voters who care about authenticity, experience and electability.
In winning Florida, McCain threw off a major critique of his candidacy: He prevailed in an all-Republican primary that excluded the more moderate independents who had ensured McCain’s wins in New Hampshire and South Carolina.”
I hope conservatives will be able to pull together. I doubt Romney has much chance on Super Tuesday. McCain will probably wrap up.
Then we’ll need to unite, start healing the party, and get ready to defeat the Democrats in November.
January 30th, 2008 at 11:34 am
[...] –Jules Crittenden: Mitt Romney has hardly shown himself to be a model of consistency and has veered more wildly. In any case, as previously stated, this is a hold-your-nose election that has more to do with electability,* unpleasant alternatives and ultimately, whichever issue(s) you consider the most important. Because you aren’t going to get everything you want. [...]
January 30th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
I had been considering a write-in vote for Fred Thompson, but Surber makes a good case for voting for the candidate you get. And what do I know? I voted for Al Gore in 2000.
So, if it’s McCain, then it’s McCain and hope for the best. As Robert so eloquently put it:
The country cannot afford to return to Clinton misrule, nor can it afford to educate a young socialist (Obama) on the job.
February 6th, 2008 at 10:47 am
[...] how people kept saying just nothing’s inevitable, just wait till Super Tuesday? Yeah, well, the inevitable just got more inevitable, but it turns [...]