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Category: Conservatives (Page 40 of 40)

Chris Matthews sucks up to Tom Delay

April 4, 2006 /

Now I know why Tom Delay wanted to go on Hardball tonight. Chris Matthews treated Delay as if he were one of our greatest statesmen who was retiring after a long and distinguished career. Of course Delay, like any guest, deserves civility, but Matthews should be embarrassed by his “softball” interview. Delay is under indictment in Texas, and now federal prosecutors may be closing in on him as well. Matthews mentioned this, but he certainly didn’t ask any tough questions about it.

Matthews kept harping on the very talking points that Delay and the Republicans are trying to promote – that somehow the Democrats will act irresponsibly with the subpoena power (and possible impeachment) if they regain the House. It took Bob Schrum to point out to clueless Chris that the Democrats would be foolish to impeach Bush and elevate Cheney to the Presidency. Absent a significant smoking gun uncovered by real investigations, impeachment is not on the table for most Democrats.

Matthews let Delay get away with claims that the GOP changed the culture in Washington, without pointing out that the new culture was one of corruption that went far beyond what the Democrats had done. No mention of the abuse of earmarks, the explosion of spending or the complete abandonment by Republicans of many of the principles they ran on in 1994 when the took over the House.

Larry King could have done a tougher interview. Chris Matthews has his moments – he has been all over the Plame and Abramoff stories and he’s been very tough on Bush and Cheney (at least lately) on the pre-war deceptions. But interviews like this make him look like a fool.

Conservatives, House 2006, Republicans

James Taranto – Blinded by the Right

March 21, 2006 /

While many conservatives are waking up and recognizing that the Iraq war is a complete fiasco, others like James Taranto are sticking to their guns. His latest post is both hilarious and bizarre. He starts things off with this whopper:

We’ve long been convinced that history will eventually come to regard George W. Bush as a near-great president, or possibly even a great one, chiefly for his bold foreign-policy vision.

This might be the dumbest comment I’ve read about Bush in months (other than most of the drivel coming from Fred Barnes). Bush’s “bold vision” has been exposed as pie-in-the-sky Wilsonian utopianism. Thinking you can turn Iraq into a Jeffersonian democracy simply by toppling Saddam will go down as one of the biggest foreign policy blunders in American history. The two biggest beneficiaries of this strategy are Iraq and al Qaeda. Good grief.

Taranto, however, is just getting started. He follows that line up with this:

Call us Polyannaish, but although we are annoyed by the incessant drumbeat of defeatism over Iraq, we find it hard to get worried about it. Will it lead to another Vietnam–i.e., an ignominious withdrawal? It seems unlikely. It certainly won’t happen on President Bush’s watch. And who, faced with the responsibility of actually making the decision, would pull out of Iraq, leaving behind a potential base for terrorists who could one day attack America again?

The thing to keep in mind is that the people who complain about how terrible the war is, or who take the weaselly position that they’re for the war but it’s all gone wrong because the Bush administration is irredeemably “incompetent,” are doing so for reasons that have little to do with the actual war. Some have always opposed it on ideological grounds. Others are seeking partisan advantage. Still others–and many of our fellow pundits fall into this category–are simply succumbing to peer pressure. They feel as though they have to gang up on President Bush because that’s what all the cool kids inside the Beltway are doing right now. Perhaps one day they will be mature enough to make up their own minds about things.

Polls suggest that public opinion has of late turned decisively against the war. But it strikes us that these feelings do not run very deep, and indeed may be partly the result of the same sort of peer pressure.

The man is showing he’s completely blinded by partisanship. Are conservatives like George Will and William F. Buckley succumbing to peer pressure? Of course, Taranto doesn’t bother to address the countless examples of incompetence. He can’t. Instead he resorts to lame attempts at ridicule, not realizing that he’s the one that looks like a fool.

Conservatives, Iraq War, Republicans

Reality check

March 2, 2006 /

The drumbeat is growing louder against the war in Iraq. Why? Because most people, even conservative intellectuals, have some common sense.

To his credit, George Will was one of the first conservatives to express doubt about Bush’s Iraq folly, and he continues to point out the absurdity of the administration’s case. Money quote:

Last week, in the latest iteration of a familiar speech (the enemy is “brutal,” “we’re on the offensive,” “freedom is on the march”) that should be retired, the president said, “This is a moment of choosing for the Iraqi people.” Meaning what? Who is to choose, and by what mechanism? Most Iraqis already “chose” — meaning prefer — peace. But in 1917 there were only a few thousand Bolsheviks among 150 million Russians — and the Bolsheviks succeeded in hijacking the country for seven decades.

This quote summarizes the problem with Bush’s utopian fantasy that freedom and democracy can flourish in Iraq and the Middle East. Of course most people want to be free and have some form of self-governance. Yet humans are also susceptable to tribalism and religious fanaticism. Too often throughout human history those forces have trumped the desires of good people to be free.

Bush doesn’t see this. He has faith in his position, despite the evidence that his policies are leading to disaster.

Conservatives, Iraq War

Krauthammer vs. Kansas

November 18, 2005 /

Another princlipled conservative takes on the extremists on the religious right. Money quote:

How ridiculous to make evolution the enemy of God. What could be more elegant, more simple, more brilliant, more economical, more creative, indeed more divine than a planet with millions of life forms, distinct and yet interactive, all ultimately derived from accumulated variations in a single double-stranded molecule, pliable and fecund enough to give us mollusks and mice, Newton and Einstein? Even if it did give us the Kansas State Board of Education too.

Conservatives, Culture War, Lunatic Fringe, Media

GOP is a mess

November 17, 2005 /

George Will is leading a growing chorus of commentators arguing that the GOP is destroying the conservative movment. For years I’ve been hearing pundits (including Will) brag about the conservative revolution overtaking this country, but the success of the GOP has more to do with political tactics (see Karl Rove) and the inept Democrats (see Kerry, Gore, Daschle and Gephardt) than the power of conservative principles.

The most obvious example involves spending. The GOP controls the Oval Office and both houses of Congress, yet George Bush and his Republican buddies are spending like crazy and reversing the fiscal sanity of the Clinton years. Bush loves to throw around the word “irresponsible,” yet this term is one of the first that would come to mind when describing Bush (along with “incompetent”). The GOP is winning elections not by challenging liberalism, but by offering goodies like prescription drugs and massive tax cuts and dividing the country on the issue of security. Barry Goldwater has to be turning in his grave. If they offered small government conservatism to the public, their winning streak at the ballot box would surely come to an end. George Bush learned this the hard way when he interpreted the 2004 election as a mandate for gutting Social Security. His approval ratings have been in a free fall following that brilliant determination.

My favorite new phrase is “big-government conservatives.” Huh? Are you kidding me? Will addresses what’s really happening – the religious conservatives are taking over the GOP. Fortunately, principled small-government conservatives like Will are getting fed up. Silly issues like “intelligent design” might force a split in the party. The mess in Iraq isn’t helping. Now, can the Democrats seize this opportunity?

Conservatives, Republicans

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