I hate the GOP civil war.
Any reader of any significant tenure on this site knows that I am and have been a Reagan conservative for thirty five years and will staunchly and proudly remain so for the remainder of my days. Which doesn't mean that I believe we should try to find "another Reagan," as that is looking back instead of around and forward, and that's no strategy for electoral success. What it does mean is that Republicans should remember the non-ideological aspects of the Gipper's sunny wisdom, first and foremost being what he called the Eleventh Commandment: Thou shalt not attack your fellow Republicans.
Now, yes, I know that the 2016 GOP nominating contest is well underway, and thus, there is an ostensibly compelling reason for, shall we say, overly ambitious Pachyderms to start goring each other with their tusks. But I still hate it, because (1) our guys rip each other limb from limb with all the rancorous passion with which they never take on the Democrats - I guess you could say they don't like "punching up" - and (2) when the Democrats have an open seat race, I just don't recall them beheading each other with machetes in similarly crazed fashion. Yes, they're rivals with and to each other, but somehow, even in the midst of a battle royal for their party's nomination, they keep their primary fire targeted on us instead of each other. 'Pubbies are incapable of following suit.
It makes our "hopefuls" look petty and small, and the Dems look like they know what they're doing far more so and better than we do. It also goes a long way towards explaining why Democrats have won four of the past six presidential elections, and five of the past six popular vote tallies.
Here are two examples of this disastrous dynamic, from both sides of the intra-Republican "no-man's land".
From the Tea Party side, Texas junior Senator Ted Cruz, doing what he does best: Point out the obvious while reinforcing the equally obvious fact that he is totally unsuited to carrying out his own recommendations:
Republicans will lose the 2016 presidential election if they nominate an "establishment" GOP candidate, Senator Ted Cruz told Newsmax TV on Wednesday.
In a candid and wide-ranging interview at Newsmax headquarters in Florida, Cruz predicted that a candidate in the mold of a Mitt Romney, John McCain, or Bob Dole will nearly guarantee that Democrat [Elizabeth Warren] wins the White House.
"It will, in effect, be a third term for Barack Obama," the Texas Republican said in an exclusive interview with "MidPoint" host Ed Berliner.
Clearly, Senator Cruz is correct. Just as clearly, it's an easy observation to make, since Romney, McCain, and Dole all lost. What Cruz doesn't touch on is all the various reasons for each of those defeats apart from all three being "establishmentarians". Dole lost because he had the wrong resume (decades in the Senate, no executive experience), he was too damned old, and because he was completely over-matched by Bill Clinton. It's doubtful that any Republican, "establishment" or conservative, could have toppled Mr. Bill in 1996. McCain had the wrong resume (decades in the Senate, no executive experience), although that was negated by going up against a fellow senator. But he also was too damned old, and was running in another cycle in which no Republican could have won. Being white was also a crippling handicap as well. Lastly, Mitt Romney did have the right resume (former governor), and didn't run a bad campaign, but wasn't willing to fully engage Obama across the issue board, and to, frankly, fight dirty like The One did early and often. Consequently, Mitt was fatally defined by the White House before he ever clinched the GOP nomination. And O's voter fraud operation, run right out of the Commissariat of Injustice, Revenge & Coverup by Eric "The Red" Holder, didn't help, and wasn't Romney's fault.
So being of the "establishment" wasn't the critical factor in Dole's and McCain's defeats, although it certainly didn't help them, but was more significant in Romney's falling short in the "last chance" election of 2012. And had the Ted Cruz of today been able to run in any of these elections? He'd have lost in all three because (1) he has the wrong resume (senator, no executive experience) and because his pugilistic combativeness saves the Democrats the trouble of painting him negatively. In addition to which is his questionable political judgment (he thinks Hillary is going to be the general election opponent) and his uncharacteristic unwillingness to name names as to who in the 2016 GOP field are the counterparts to Dole, McCain, and Romney. As fratricidal as Ted Cruz is, you'd think he could spit out the name "Jeb Bush" at least once.
Senator Cruz, in summation, is right, but in the wrong way. And the latter can be just as big an electoral albatross for Republicans as being wrong.
In the other corner, we have the aforementioned Senator John McCain, who has an even bigger bug up his butt for Rand Paul than he does for the Cruzer:
Arizona Senator John McCain fired back Wednesday at fellow Republican Senator Rand Paul, who earlier this week accused him and Senator Lindsey Graham of being "lapdogs" for President Barack Obama.
"One of my colleagues today said, 'Yes, McCain and Graham are lapdogs,' they're a couple of Doberman Pinschers," McCain said Tuesday on Fox News Channel's Your World with Neil Cavuto.
Paul made his comments Monday to Fox News Channel's Bill Hemmer. He was responding to Graham's criticism of Paul's foreign policy views.
"This comes from a group of people who have been wrong about every foreign policy issue over the last two decades," Paul said. "They supported Hillary Clinton's war in Libya, they supported President Obama's bombing of Assad.
I'll give Rand those two, given that knocking off Muammar Khaddafy (who had already been pacified by seeing what President Bush did to Saddam Hussein) turned Libya over to al Qaeda (and now, ISIS), and there was no even potential U.S. ally in the Syrian civil war. But then O backed away from letting the Tomahawks fly in any case, so that mistake was never, in fact, made.
But, though Senator Paul and most Americans evidently still don't want to hear this, we were not wrong to invade Afghanistan and Iraq, and should have overrun and liberated Syria and Iran as well when we had the chance and both were ripe for the taking, as failing to do so left the mullahs a sanctuary from which to wage proxy war against us in Iraq, and now to build a nuclear arsenal with Barack Obama's blessing with which to trigger a nuclear conflagration in the Middle East and cripple the United States. And it must be pointed out that Senator McCain was right about the "Surge" strategy that President Bush eventually implemented in 2007-2008 that crushed the "insurgency" in Iraq before Barack Obama was elected to perfidiously throw it, and everything we gained at considerable cost in blood and treasure, away.
Suffice it to say, Rand Paul is his isolationist father's son.
"They also support President Obama's foreign aid to countries that hate us. So, if there's anyone who is the most opposed to President Obama's foreign policy, it's me. These people are essentially the lapdogs for President Obama, and I think they're sensitive about that."
That is not actually true, Senator Paul. You differ with The One's foreign policy only in the sense that you are not avowedly and malevolently anti-American, and in league with our country's enemies. Your foreign policy judgment, however, is nevertheless woefully misguided because you do not recognize and accept, as President Bush limitedly did, that in a time of WMD proliferation and asymmetric non-state enemies, threats must be preempted before they can rise to the level of existential national security threats - 9/11 being the most prominent example to date. And that includes attacking and defeating state sponsors of asymmetric attacks such as the Taliban, Saddam Hussein, and, of course, the Islamic Empire of Iran and its Syrian stooge.
You, Senator Paul, would be every bit as likely to withdraw from the Middle East altogether as Barack Obama is already doing. So forgive me if I don't see a whole lot of difference between your foreign policy ideas and his.
Asked by Cavuto on Tuesday to respond, McCain echoed the sentiments of his friend Graham.
"Senator Paul is the worst possible candidate of the twenty....
<shudder> Isn't there any way to put a maximum cap on that number? That isn't a primary debate, it's a cocktail party-cum-food fight.
....or so that are running on the most important issue, which is national security," McCain said. "The record is very clear that he simply does not have an understanding about the needs and the threats of the United States national security."
Oh, I don't know about that, Sailor. Senator Paul is a better candidate than you ever were, largely because I think you took a dive (or "did the job" in pro wrestling parlance) in 2008. Your problem is that while you recognize the need for muscular U.S. global leadership, you have inordinate difficulty recognizing just exactly what are national security threats worthy of our military attention, as well as seeing "allies" (the mythical "Free Syrian Army" being the most egregious example) that aren't actually there and do not in fact exist. The only way jumping into Syria a couple of years back made any sense was, as I wrote at the time, to glass the entire country, wipe out the Assad regime AND the Sunni jihadist "rebels". Which, if we'd done that, would definitely have preempted the rise of the Islamic State.
But then, the same thing and so much more could have been accomplished if we'd liberated Syria a decade earlier as we so easily could have. Something you didn't support then, and Senator Paul wouldn't have, either.
"Establishment" vs. Tea Party. Tea Party vs. "Establishment". I'd say, "a pox on both your houses," except that (1) they share a single house and (2) we kinda really need that house if anything is to be attained next year.
And that means that we need a unity candidate. Someone with a foot in both intra-party camps. Someone who hasn't bred enemies like cats, who has a track record of fighting and beating the Left, a track record of conservative policy accomplishment, the right resume (executive experience). And being from outside the Beltway wouldn't hurt.
The above criteria do not describe Ted Cruz, or Rand Paul, or Marco Rubio, or Jeb Bush, or John Kasich, or Chris Christie - even Rick Perry, whose lone drawback is that he already swung and struck out last time. In fact, there's only one candidate who does connect all those dots:
If the "establishment" really wants to win in 2016, and the Tea Party wants to avoid fresh heartache and disappointment after such a triumph, both camps will unite behind Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, a man who can satisfy both sides, provide the smallest PR radar cross-section for the Democrat-Media Complex, and be the veritable gust of cleansing fresh air that this country so desperately needs.
Or the GOP can finish its collective suicide and watch Fauxcahontas continue the destruction, and then Julian Castro after her. Because that is what will happen with Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush, or any other 2016 GOP standard-bearer.
We shouldn't have to think for three seconds about this choice.
Should we?
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