THE ONE INESCAPABLE CONCLUSION FROM THE SEPTEMBER GOP DEBATE

9/18/15

One can make plenty of observations regarding Wednesday night’s GOP debates:

• Donald Trump has some chinks in his electoral armor and his opponents are starting to find them.
• Jeb Bush has a pulse.   That his supporters are touting as a huge positive for his campaign the evidence the debate provided of that pulse’s existence shows how much trouble the fair haired boy of the GOP establishment is in.
•  Marco Rubio did a pretty good job but, for some reason, the punditocracy didn’t notice.  He might be the establishment’s alternative if Mr. Bush should continue to fail to live up to what look like cut from whole cloth expectations.
• Mr. Rubio, if he is to inherit Mr. Bush’s well moneyed support, will have to somehow transcend Chris Christie, who performed quite the Lazarus act on his presidential hopes Wednesday night.   Christie was terrific, especially when lambasting the front runners for their obsessions with themselves and positioning himself as an establishment Republican who can still speak for the middle class.
• Rand Paul’s sensible, sober approach to foreign policy clearly disqualifies him for the nomination of a Party that equates to treason the exercise of caution, prudence, and Constitutionality when putting the lives of young Americans on the line.
• You can stick the proverbial fork in Scott Walker. 
• If the American people were yearning for the Fred MacMurray (the good, My Three Sons Fred MacMurray, not the double dealing, caddish, scheming, Double Indemnity and The Apartment Fred MacMurray) approach to life and politics, John Kasich would be a shoo-in.   But that approach became passé when yours truly was a small child.   Too bad.
• Ben Carson is probably too smart, and too much of a gentleman, to be president.  Also too bad.
• The debate was too long.   Even those of us who have yet to overcome our silly addiction to politics were getting bored as the debate moved into the third hour.

While those are all, at the risk of sounding a touch braggadocious, searingly insightful observations, we can only draw one inescapable conclusion from Wednesday night’s debate:  Carly Fiorina is going to be on the GOP ticket.  If she is not at the top of the ticket, still something of a long shot, she will be in the vice-presidential spot.

Mrs. Fiorina is clearly bright, articulate, forceful, and, despite Mr. Trump’s apparent opinion, attractive.  And she is a woman, which certainly has its attractions whether or not Hillary Clinton heads the Democratic ticket.  (See “Something(s)about Hillary,” 9/8/15.)  Mrs. Fiorina is also a cancer survivor, which not only shows courage and grit but is, ironically, a big plus in the increasingly emotional electoral climate we face.  The establishment is more than comfortable with this former corporate chieftain and the social conservatives also like her for her strong pro-life positions.  

Mrs. Fiorina only has two obvious drawbacks.   The first is that her record in corporate America is, to put it charitably, worse than mediocre.   However, the American people seem to be coming to the (correct) conclusion that even someone who did far less than stellar work in a real job is a better choice than someone who has spent his or her life in and around electoral politics, i.e., who has made his or her living having his or her hindquarters smooched and who consequently is terrified at the thought of having to work in the private sector, or even in a public sector job with responsibilities that transcend preening for the cameras, for a living.

The second drawback is that Mrs. Fiorina, unlike Messrs. Kasich, Rubio, Walker, or Bush, has no chance of bringing a swing state, or any state, into the GOP Electoral College fold.   California isn’t going to go GOP regardless of who is on the Republican ticket.   But enhancement of the electoral map by selection of one’s running mate is an overrated strategy, as evidenced by Bill Clinton’s selection of Al Gore, Barack Obama’s selection of Joe Biden, and Ronald Reagan’s selection of George Bush as their running mates.   Each of these veeps either didn’t bring his state into the fold or was from a state that was already solidly in the fold.   Running mates have an appeal that transcends their home states.   This is especially true in the case of Mrs. Fiorina.

QUINN ON SYRIA, PRAYER AT PUBLIC MEETINGS, AND EMANUEL’S DISPENSING HIS WISDOM ON WABASH

5/9/14

Time is tight, as it has been for the last several months, but a man’s gotta write what a man’s gotta write…

WHY DO SO MANY IN WASHINGTON WANT TO HELP AL QAEDA IN SYRIA?

http://www.rantlifestyle.com/2014/05/09/why-do-so-many-people-in-washington-want-to-help-al-qaeda-in-syria/

Contrary to what the likes of John McCain would have you believe, militarism and meddling does not equate to patriotism.

CAPTAIN OBVIOUS STRIKES AGAIN:  SUPREME COURT SAYS IT’S OKAY TO PRAY

http://www.rantlifestyle.com/2014/05/06/captain-obvious-strikes-supreme-court-says-okay-pray/

Maybe this is the beginning of the end of all the silliness inflicted on us by the freedom from religion crowd…but probably not.

RAHM EMANUEL TO DOWNTOWN BUSINESSPEOPLE:  JUST SHUT UP AND PAY

http://www.rantlifestyle.com/2014/05/03/rahm-emanuel-downtown-business-people-shut-pay/

And have you noticed how the local media, or at least elements of the Chicago Tribune, seem to have turned on their consanguineous champion?  Still…bet heavily on the wise and mighty Rahm’s reelection.  In the screwed up politics of enlightened, modern day America, it’s all about money, and Mr. Emanuel has boatloads of it.

Have a great weekend, everybody, and God bless and thank all of you out there who are mothers.

See my two books, The Chairman, A Novel of Big City Politics and The Chairman’s Challenge, A Continuing Novel of Big City Politics, for further illumination on how things work in Chicago and Illinois politics. 

CHRIS CHRISTIE AND CHUCK HAGEL NEED NOT APPLY

2/28/13

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, long time champion of lean, efficient, and limited governance and stalwart opponent of pubic employee unions’ efforts to highjack state and local government, was, er, disinvited to something that calls itself, still with a straight face, the “Conservative Political Action Conference (“CPAC”).”  

Former Senator Chuck Hagel, a decorated Vietnam veteran and genuine war hero who favors a defense policy that defends and a foreign policy that cultivates foreign friends and encourages reason over hysteria, was confirmed as Secretary of Defense…but with only four votes from senators from the Republican Party, which still laughingly calls itself the conservative party.   See my 2/1/13 post JOHN McCAIN, CHUCK HAGEL, AND DEFERRING TO HISTORY, only the latest in a series of posts here and at the now defunct Rant Political that argued enthusiastically for Mr. Hagel’s confirmation.

What is going on in the “conservative movement” and the Republican Party?   Why are such good men with solid values, deep seated beliefs in the primacy of the people over their government, and optimism about and confidence in the American people (misplaced in yours truly’s opinion, but that is another issue) no longer welcome among the self-styled keepers of the conservative flame?

One “conservative” beef with Mr. Christie is that he, never a poltroonish type given to the hemming, hawing, and equivocating that characterizes most of the invited guests at CPAC, very clearly let it be known that he was fed up with Congress’s delay, or worse, in passing a relief package for his state of New Jersey and other areas affected by Super Storm Sandy.   Another complaint about Governor Christies is that he appeared too chummy with President Obama when the President toured New Jersey in the wake of Sandy.

Admittedly, the “Sandy relief” bill that emerged from Congress was a crummy bill.  It was loaded with provisions and spending that had little, if anything, to do with Sandy.   But that only reinforces Mr. Christies’s point.   The reason the bill took so long to, and almost didn’t, become law is because the Congressional popinjays insisted on seizing on the hardship of those affected by Sandy to get taxpayer money for their districts.   If they just passed a clean bill, relief would have gotten to the affected areas sooner and at a lower price.   But they didn’t pass such a clean bill.   And Mr. Christie realized that his constituents needed help right away.   He didn’t put Party ahead of his state and his job serving that state.  

And, yes, Mr. Christie was courteous toward Mr. Obama when the President visited Sandy ravaged New Jersey.   Since when is civility and gentlemanliness not a conservative value?    Does calling one’s self a “conservative” require that one be so consumed with hated for the president of another party that one treats that president with coolness, or contempt, when he is there to help in a time of need?   Is it a mark of honor and “true blueness,” if you will, to dump on the president of the United States, especially when he holds the key to getting relief to people who badly need it?   Mr. Christie has a job that makes him responsible for the welfare of the people of his state; unlike that of, say, Paul Ryan, a hero of the “conservative” movement, Mr. Christie’s job does not consist of preening for the cameras and assuming that the American people are badly in need of the type of wisdom that can only be gleaned from a lifetime of bloviating from Washington.   See my 1/26/13 post, PAUL RYAN:   MORE PAP AND PABULUM FROM THE MASTER OF HYPOCRISY.

Mr. Hagel’s unpardonable sin was finally seeing the light and opposing George Bush’s excellent adventure in Iraq that has already cost us billions of treasure and the incalculable value of thousands of American lives and will cost of us for generations not only in dollars but in enmity throughout the Arab and Muslim worlds and the legions of aspiring terrorists that will result.   Mr. Hagel also has the temerity to suggest that perhaps we think before going off on ill-considered crusades designed primarily to enrich those who bankroll the lifelong ego trips those who attend CPAC call careers.   (My words, not Mr. Hagel’s.  He is too circumspect to say the things that I can say.)   The War Party is now firmly in control of the foreign policy apparatus at the likes of CPAC and those who, like Mr. Hagel, favor a foreign policy grounded in the principles of limited government and careful consideration of national interests are no longer welcome.  CPAC’s view of the world can be summarized by the admonition to shoot first, aim later, and keep the campaign (?) cash flowing from the “defense” contractors.   Who needs a skunk like Mr. Hagel at such a wonderful garden party?

I’ve spent most of my life as a conservative.   That started to change as Ronald Reagan, after a pretty good start, decided that we could give ourselves goodies without paying for them and started us on the fiscal train wreck from which we are currently suffering.   The change picked up as the despicable George W. Bush decided that big government was just fine at home and was especially advisable overseas and that score settling, or who knows what, rather than national interests, should be the guiding light in foreign and military policy.   Now the banishment of Mr. Christie and Mr. Hagel, two of the few people in public life whom I respect and admire, has completed my metamorphosis.   Into what, I don’t know.   But if the people who find Messrs. Christie and Hagel so dyspeptic are “conservatives,” I know what I am not.