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Conservative Cannibals Pushed Aside?

February 8th, 2008
By SHAUN MULLEN, TMV Columnist

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It may be an example of mass wishful thinking, but John McCain and hard-core conservatives seem to have taken a big step toward rapprochement.

In a speech draped with olive branches and punctuated by only a smattering of boos, the prohibitive favorite to win the Republican nomination told the annual meeting of the Conservative Political Action Committee that:

“We have had a few disagreements, and none of us will pretend that we won’t continue to have a few. But even in disagreement, especially in disagreement, I will seek the counsel of my fellow conservatives. If I am convinced my judgment is in error, I will correct it. And if I stand by my position, even after benefit of your counsel, I hope you will not lose sight of the far more numerous occasions when we are in complete accord.”

Jennifer Rubin, speaking for a goodly number of conservatives at Commentary.com, wrote that the speech was just what the doctor ordered:

“That take comes from the most loyal Romney supporters to a wide array of conservative voices. The ‘We’ll take Hillary’ view is clearly out of fashion. One speech a reconciliation does not make, but realistically there is only one way forward now for former McCain critics: Take credit and make the most of it.”

I’m not sure about the taking credit part because in the end conservatives not in the thrall of cannibals like Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, James Dobson and other Malkintents knew that their failure to acknowledge McCain’s viability — and his failure to reciprocate — would mean likely defeat for the Republican Party in November.

The chances of McCain going down the tubes is still pretty good regardless of whether he tacks further to the right. Besides which, the conservatives’ core issues aren’t likely to play well enough this time around to make a difference. These issues include abortion, punitive action against illegal immigrants and standing with President Bush on the Iraq war.

All that so noted, there is some unfinished business for the CPAC crowd:

* How could a group that prides itself on ideological purity have bought so totally into Mitt Romney’s hollow declarations that he was one of them?

It was not just a matter of Romney not being McCain. The conservatives’ seduction as a result of the former Massachusetts governor’s charm offensive will go down as one of the biggest con jobs in political history.

* What to do with those conservative cannibals?

Limbaugh and Company will always have their followers, but their willfully destructive attacks against McCain reflect so poorly on the CPAC crowd and conservatives in general that it is beyond time for right-minded conservatives to begin dis-inviting more than Ann Coulter from their party.

I don’t expect these issues to be addressed and have no stake in that happening beyond my belief that we need two vibrant political parties. But sweeping them under the rug, which is what will happen, will just leave big lumps that conservatives will keep tripping over.

I’ll leave the second-to-last word to Ed Morrissey, my hands-down-favorite conservative blogger, who wrote:

“As I believe Georges Clemenceau once said, in order to get a seat at the feast, one has to help set the table. This is the choice facing conservatives. Either we help set the table and join in public policy and use our influence to help shape a Republican administration, or we abandon McCain and get four or eight years of statist policy that could take a generation to undo. Even worse, the conservatives might watch McCain get elected without their assistance — and watch themselves get marginalized as a movement for a very, very long time.

“Most of the people here at CPAC understand that choice very well. A few still do not. Fortunately — and this is Mitt Romney’s generous gift to the Republicans — the factional war has ended, and we can hope that the long run-up to the convention will give an opportunity for the visceral reactions to McCain’s nomination to fade. McCain can assist that by fulfilling his promise yesterday to bring more conservatives onto his campaign for counsel.”

The last word is a warning. If there is a common denominator in this extraordinary election year, it is that voters are thirsty for change. That makes Romney’s attack on the Democratic competition in his CPAC swan song all the more reprehensible:

“If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and make it more likely that Senator Clinton or Obama would win. And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign, be a part of aiding a surrender to terror.”

Romney, of course, was playing to the basest part of the conservative base. That would be the people who got conservatives in big trouble in the first place.

Photograph by Evan Vucci/The Associated Press



This entry was posted on Friday, February 8th, 2008 at 6:16 am and is filed under Ann Coulter, Republican Party, Newsweek Blogitics, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Conservatives, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, 2008 Elections. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Viewing 20 Comments

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    McCain has almost no chance of winning since he has so little credibility on any winning issues. An Obama-McCain race will result in a Democratic rout and 60 (or more) Democrats in the Senate.

    If McCain was pure on immigration then he could attack the Democrats on the voodoo socialism of increasing immigration while wanting to cut back on greenhouse gas emission. The only way to do it is to severely reduce the standard of living of the middle class.

    Obama/Democrats want a the largest expansion of entitlements in over 50 years but also want to eliminate several industries from the U.S. How do they plan to do this.

    Also, the Democrats want open borders and unlimited immigration but want average pay to grow faster than inflation. How do they reconcile this?
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    Barbarians? Cannibals? Savages? The slander continues [tm]...
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    It would help if things were described more accurately. "Conservative" issues are not limited to the narrow and inaccurate list starting this thread. For example, in the case of the war, not "standing with Bush" but avoiding the stupid, reptilian brain-stem-level-only instinctive urge to remove all our troops immediately, which is the cry of the naive to much worse anti-war crowd. It also means being aware and sane about the threat presented by Iran rather than engaging in stupid denial of that threat or misusing it to falsely accuse the USA rather than Iran of threats or of poor behavior.

    Abortion? Most people don't want it prohibited, though normal people will tell you there is no absolute right to abortion whenever someone wants one, particuarly at government and taxpayer expense, least of all at federal government and taxpayer expense.

    Conservative influences are needed when selecting future Supreme Court justices in order to continue to apply the brakes to the illegitimate judicial activism (creatively interpreting any legal document to "mean" what liberals want it to mean, especially if they cannot get the laws they want the legitimate ways, because they don't always win elections to influence the legislatures in this nation). The reaction to this illegitimate activism has been and remains an insistence on stopping this practice and replacing it with valid law and valid rule of law (due process rather than "due substance"), dishonestly referred to by liberals as "conservative judicial activism" [sic].

    The truly base behavior and motives remain on the Left rather than the Right, as has been true in particular since the 1960s.
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    DLS- So what about the "judicial activism" that overruled the Florida Supreme Court in 2000, resulting in a 5-4 decision (broken down strictly by ideology) that handed the presidency to George Bush? Or aren't you counting THAT decision, lol???
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    As for Romney's statement, most Americans agreed with it; the Left and the Democratic Party are notorious for a legacy of being soft on crime, compounded by post-1960s radical US-hating elements in this country. This is hardly the most important issue affecting voters today; it ceased being so in the 1996 elections and is even less of an issue this year.

    And the word is "terrorism," not "terror" [sic]. Not only Romney but so many talking heads and other politicians engage in dumbed-down English. (They've even mis-pronounced: "terr'ists," "terr'.") Fortunately, for a change, Obama's deft handling of Romney's statement (with an elegant turn-around on Romney that really stuck and struck well) at least featured correct English. We need more of it from Democrats.

    "That’s the kind of poorly thought through statement that led him to have to drop out. It’s a classic attempt to appeal to people’s fears that will not work in this campaign. And I think that’s part of the reason he was such an ineffective candidate. No Democrat has suggested that we surrender to terrorism. Democrats have suggested that we start withdrawing out of Iraq so we can focus our attention on terrorism. But, you know, it’s a classic example of trying to conflate the war against real enemies with the failed strategy of the Bush Administration in Iraq. ... It’s those sort of glib statements that I think got Romney consistently in trouble in this race.”
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    K, I think instead about the blatantly political Florida supreme court. Naughty folks.
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    DLS and Kritt - Don't forget about the hypocrisy of both the Bush brothers and Terri Schiavo. Enacting a law for a single person and ignoring local jurisdiction was pandering and Conservative activism at its worse.
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    krit,

    Are you proposing that the Democratic Congress repeal the 1964 voting rights act and let the states have complete control over voting? How very reactionary of you.
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    Rudi- I haven't forgotten conservatives' hypocrisy- or how Bush felt impelled to cut short his vacation to fly back to Washington in order to deal with the national "crisis".

    Of course he stayed in Crawford during Katrina- the real national crisis!
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