Someone might say that the FIRST problem with Romney’s campaign is that he doesn’t seem to care about his most fervent supporters. Because he’s not trumpeting their issues, he’s creating the impression that those key issues are unimportant or unreal.
As Carl says, genuinely pro-life Christians know that they have to be all for for Romney. Obama is an extremist–by far the worst Democratic candidate ever–when it comes to respect for religious belief and institutional religion. He’s the same when it comes to the ridiculous view that science and equality are both on the side of the most absolutist view of abortion rights. What the merits of the MacIntyre 2004 position concerning to hell with both parties, things have changed A LOT since then.
You would never know about the gravity of such issues by listening to Mitt.
And the genuine lovers of LIMITED GOVERNMENT know that Obama is an unprecedented threat to the Constitution. So Randy Barnett, who disagrees with Mitt on stuff like abortion, is shouting, in his highly principled libertarian way, that this is the most important election in a long time. In the name of limited government, ObamaCare has to go!
You’d never know that from listening to Mitt, especially the most recent Mitt who, in effect, is bragging that RomneyCare was almost as GOOD as ObamaCare!
The energy of the Republican victory in 2010 was mainly hatred of ObamaCare. That hatred is fading mainly because the campaign against that mega-expansion of big government isn’t being waged.
The new book by Charles Kesler identifying Obama as a highly principled PROGRESSIVE ought to be ammo for the Romney campaign. So far the book has been authoritatively dismissed as hyperbole by Marc Lilla in the NYT. If they’re weren’t something to what Kesler says, there wouldn’t be such a big effort to take him out. Even if the book has some hyperbole here and there, that’s what you need to wage a partisan campaign.
My view has always been that PROGRESSIVISM as an ideology is dead. Obama is a progressive in speech and somewhat in deed, but he is destined to a be a blip on our political radar.
If progressivism is dead, and so progressives are out of touch, then the ticket is to out Obama as pushing a dangerously out-out-touch ideological program. My view of Obama and even ObamaCare as blips becomes wrong if he gets reelected by not being properly identified as what he is. Who’s fault would that be, Mitt?
September 29th, 2012 | 4:17 pm
“As Carl says, genuinely pro-life Christians know that they have to be all for for Romney.”
Do we now? My calculation: the number of abortions for the next four years will hardly change whether Obama or Romney wins.
If Romney is true to his rhetoric, the number of dead Iranians could be much higher under Romney.
So as a pro-life Christian I will vote for the improvement I actually see as possible.
September 29th, 2012 | 5:16 pm
Apparently one pro-life Christian isn’t so concerned about a nuclear strike on Israel. Maybe because they aren’t Iranians so that’s okay? That’s disingenuous of course, but the refusal to balance the dangers of a nuclear Iran with the risks of war + the vagueness of the Obama administration over whether they would go to war with Iran upon their gaining nuclear weapons + the obvious bad faith regarding the possibility of more Obama Supreme Court picks upholding ROE for another generation (not “four years”) rather calls for the cheap shot.
Now if you were to tell me that Romney absolutely could not be trusted to appoint constitutionalist Justices along with a hardheaded (and maybe not just hardheaded) insistence that no matter who kills who in the Middle East it won’t be American soldiers dying, then maybe that would have some internal consistency. Though I wouldn’t call that view pro-life exactly.
September 29th, 2012 | 8:57 pm
I’m always astonished at how much “history is on the side” of so many contradictory points of view. A real glad-handing, back slapping, stand-you-a-drink guy, history is.
Be that as it may, I would note several things.
First:
“The energy of the Republican victory in 2010 was mainly hatred of ObamaCare. That hatred is fading mainly because the campaign against that mega-expansion of big government isn’t being waged.”
No, the campaign isn’t being waged, because the hatred is fading. Hatred is too unstable an emotion for political change. It overloads the human nervous system quickly and forces it to shut down.
Not that anybody’s opinion has changed, but winning the 2010 House election simply burned the hatred behind the tea party out. Emotionally, you have to have more, and longer term, feelings behind you than hatred. It’s like a serve in tennis, the second serve is never as powerful as the first, and the third is even weaker than that.
Second, Mitt Romney is a compromise candidate, just like John McCain, and even John Kerry. If you have strong views on any issue, a compromise candidate will compromise them, not usually out of a desire to, but simply because a compromise candidate is temperamentally unable to hold truly strong views about anything, even if he agrees with you.
The real question is, with whom did you compromise to bring forth this candidate. The truly important struggle is the ideological struggle with this person or this group.
The next question is where did Mitt’s primary money come from, and how much are those doners even interested in the issues you feel strongly about. The money did, after all, defeat candidates like Rick Santorum, who clearly was not going to compromise anything.
The final observation I would make from outside the circle is that, if pushed to it, the large majority Republican office holders I can think of would be nothing but compromise candidates if they had been nominated.
This, I think, is due to a structural weakness in the relation of the major money donors to Republican office holders. When so many of them are willing to sign a pledge to Grover Norquist to never raise taxes again, it is because they are morally weak and venal, no matter what their political opinions.
People with serious moral strength might pledge to a cause, but they would never pledge to a man, no matter how much they agreed with him, or how much they needed his money.
September 30th, 2012 | 9:39 am
Here’s something to cheer you up, Peter: on October 1st an Arkansas publisher releases “Escape Velocity: A Charles Portis Miscellany”. It’s Portis’ first book out in 20 years and contains “almost everything Portis has written outside the novels,” including a 3-act play. It’s probably got enough material for at least another TRUE GRIT STUDIES post.
http://www.amazon.com/Escape-Velocity-Charles-Portis-Miscellany/dp/1935106503
http://www.nwaonline.com/news/2012/sep/30/portable-charles-portis-20120930/
October 1st, 2012 | 9:04 am
CJ, I’m pretty sure our copy has already arrived, and only awaits my birthday for unveiling.
Joseph, I’m sure after looking over your (otherwise astute) comment, you’d agree that you and Peter should be using another word besides “hatred” here. “Passion,” perhaps?
October 1st, 2012 | 9:06 am
cj, got the book. thanks.
October 1st, 2012 | 10:05 am
Carl, an apt observation. As I took Peter’s use of the word “hate” as an ellipses for, among other things, an irresponsible opportunism on the part of the Obama administration to exploit the economic crisis as a means of advancing an alternative (and economically costly) agenda
having nothing to do with the economic crisis at hand. Unintentionally allowing Joseph to invoke the word “hate” as a liberal trope directed at a caricature of conservatives as incoherently angry by nature.
A good way to improve the quality of discourse among the different sides we have represented here would be to choose our language carefully, and to listen carefully. And to avoid the temptation of building straw men as convenient obstacles to truly understanding eachother.
October 2nd, 2012 | 5:41 am
“Apparently one pro-life Christian isn’t so concerned about a nuclear strike on Israel.”
No, apparently one pro-life Christian does not buy into the paranoid belief that a country that does not yet have a single nuclear weapon and has pledged it won’t acquire them is a nuclear threat to a country that has a couple of hundred nukes already.
October 2nd, 2012 | 1:29 pm
Gene, I’m really, really impressed with your trust of the Iranian Islamic regime.
October 2nd, 2012 | 5:09 pm
Apparently you include among the Obama administration among the “paranoid.” http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/president-obamas-2012-address-to-un-general-assembly-full-text/2012/09/25/70bc1fce-071d-11e2-afff-d6c7f20a83bf_print.html
Maybe when you find yourself on the same side as the Iranian regime and across from Secretary Clinton regarding Iran’s intentions, maybe you might want to rethink which side the “paranoid” are on (if any – could be a reasonable disagreement.) But you also seem to be under the impression that a President’s impact on abortion policy evaporates when their term expires.
So I guess you still have Jill Stein.
October 2nd, 2012 | 7:30 pm
Robert, I don’t have “faith” in that regime. But I also think that most Iranians, like most human beings, wish to live and would not, with the first nuke, attack a country with a 200-1 advantage in firepower.
Note how two neocon narratives about Iran run directly counter to each other:
1) Iran has been a covert sponsor of terrorist, being careful to work secretly behind the scenes so they won’t face retaliation; and
2) Iran is totally nuts, and will cheerfully nuke Israel because they don’t give a hoot about retaliation.
October 2nd, 2012 | 10:17 pm
Gene, and please keep in mind that I love your work at Voegelin View, but I might, respectfully suggest the point you’re not focusing on is the degree of derailment among our perverse Islamic friends.
I might suggest that your arguing as if our Islamic friend’s thinking represents reason grounded on a certain noesis. And, that simply isn’t the case.
October 3rd, 2012 | 7:21 pm
The “contradiction” Mr. Callahan identifies between two “neocon narratives” does not exist. In the first place, no one is asserting that Iran will definitely “nuke” Israel as soon as it gets nuclear capability; the more likely danger is that nuclear capability will enable Iran to attack Israel in more conventional ways while chilling Israel’s will to defend itself for fear of triggering a nuclear conflict. (Nuclear capability would also enable Iran to threaten the West, e.g., by closing the Gulf Hormuz.) Secondly, Iran hides its support of terrorism (are you questioning that they do support terrorism?) to minimize the cost it pays for doing so (in terms of sanctions, etc.); past performance of the US and other Western countries show that Iran it has little reason to fear any sort of “retaliation” from them as long as it keeps the level of harm below the 9/11 level. In the unlikely event Iran actually fears any retaliation (other than from Israel) for its sponsorship of terrorism, having nuclear capability would further reduce such fears.
A lot of the discussion of the Iran issue seems to be premised on the notion that the choices are (1) launching a military attack or (2) continuing on the wishy-washy path taken up till now by the current US administration (and before it by the previous administration). Contrary to this view, knowledgeable observers I have read (e.g. Barry Rubin at PJ Media) opine that the US could be doing much more against Iran, WITHOUT launching a military attack. For example, we now agree to exempt such nice countries as Russia and China from cooperating with the sanctions that are in place. Obviously, to really get tough with Iran would hurt the business interests of other countries, and would complicate our relations with those other countries. Obama’s refusal to take such steps suggests that he is not really serious about stopping Iran from obtaining nuclear capability.
Finally, Mr. Callahn expresses faith that “most Iranians” wish to live, overlooking the fact that the relevant actor is not an amorphous group comprising “most Iranians,” but the oligarchic and unaccountable government of Iran (the elected president, good or bad, has little power).
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