Jan 25 2008
Classless Conservative Whiners
Peggy Noonan has come out today to show why her and the other Mary Poppins conservatives have destroyed the GOP and try and blame Bush for their inability to not get their way and all issues. She’s is all upset Bush did not court to her and her ilk and instead represented the nation:
As for the Republicans, their slow civil war continues. The primary race itself is winnowing down and clarifying: It is John McCain versus Mitt Romney, period. At the same time the conservative journalistic world is convulsed by recrimination and attack. They’re throwing each other out of the party. Republicans have become very good at that. David Brooks damns Rush Limbaugh who knocks Bill Kristol who anethmatizes whoever is to be anethmatized this week. This Web site opposes that magazine.
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On the pundit civil wars, Rush Limbaugh declared on the radio this week, “I’m here to tell you, if either of these two guys [Mr. McCain or Mike Huckabee] get the nomination, it’s going to destroy the Republican Party. It’s going to change it forever, be the end of it!”
This is absurd. George W. Bush destroyed the Republican Party, by which I mean he sundered it, broke its constituent pieces apart and set them against each other. He did this on spending, the size of government, war, the ability to prosecute war, immigration and other issues.
Pure bloviating and hyperventilating BS. No one forced the hyper-partisans to go on a purity putsch. It was the far right who could not abide anymore ‘moderates’ or ‘RINOs’. On every tough issue Bush tried to work with the hyper-right, but they would it all or nothing and cheap insults all the way. El Presidente Jorge Bush had nothing to do with the acrimony – he stayed above it and was an example of civility in the face of crude incivility from a frustrated element of the party that was sick and tired of having to live in a country with diverse opinions.
It was the Peggy Noonans and her “cabal’ (as Rush likes to call others – using a lisp to mock people who disagree with him as if a speech impediment is indication of intelligence or wisdom) who have revolted people. Bush attempted to find a comprehensive solution to problems, everyone had to give some to get some. It was not unreasonable compromises, He crafts solutions that can progress conservative values without causing a liberal uproar that stalls progress. But people like Noonan are perfect in only their ability to demand full fealty to their views. Sorry Peggy, but it was your narrow views and intolerance that destroyed the party – not President Bush.
Dead on target, AJ.
Dead on target.
amen!!!!
Even though it’s a fluke, I loved that this got underlined. She deserves it.
Miss Peggy (another of those important Presidential speech writers, doncha know) was a favorite guest on Hardball. She must have been converted because she started putting out her crap by 2004. Anyone remember her BDS article after he made that speech about freedom?
She is very important in her own mind.
If all these issues were so important to Republicans, why didn’t they settle them years ago. Immigration has been out there for years. and Bush is the president, not their daddy.
I can remember when Reagan’s time was ending and the whole Iran Contra thing was breaking. I can not imagine the ranting and raving that would ensue if something like that happened when Bush was President. But Saint Reagan? Oh well, no one is perfect.
Well, I’ll be the dissenter here. I think she’s over the top, but generally is right. Core conservative prinicples used to be the bedrock of the GOP. It isn’t that conservative positions have changed, it’s the GOP that has drifted left, under Bush. Whether it was Bush steering or a wayward congress, there’s no mistake that the GOP has moved left during his tenure, mostly with profligate spending and reluctance to do anything meaningful to stop illegal immigration and secure our borders.
Wiley:
I think the GOP has moved right. Bush has not changed, he is the same guy who ran in 2000. I keep hearing about that Contract with America and all that stuff, but the Republicans I know the best are ones like my Senator Lugar, he has been around forever and he is a moderate.
In recent years the talk radio and the blogs did a lot to drive certain elements of the GOP right, away from that moderate center that had allowed them to win elections. The people in the House who impeached Clinton actually lost some seats. It was in 2002 that Republicans gained back control and they got more seats in 2004…and that was thanks to Bush.
But the truth is the issues that Noonan says Bush messed up like immigration are chronic problems. Obviously this issue was not something the GOP had dedicated itself to dealing with years ago and then got distracted or something.
And after 9/11 the emphasis was on security and the war and that required different priorities. It is as if not only Democrats have forgotten about 9/11 and its impact on the United States and the structure of our government and our economy, it is as if Republicans have forgotten about it too.
And btw Bush has put more money and resources into dealing with illegal immigration than any president in the country’s history, including Reagan. So rather than bitch nonstop maybe some of these people should stop and realize that this is a problem they were more than willing to ignore for decades and so expecting Bush to snap his fingers and make it all better is just silly. It is a pundit driven issue that has been demagogued to the point of sheer exhaustion.
If it was really such a crucial issuel to all the Republican party, why is that Thompson and Tancredo and Hunter could not get some traction? Or for that matter why wait until the last couple of years to make it an issue?
I disagree. The GOP got moderate voters because they appealed to the middle — with traditional, conservative prinicples. McCain hasn’t changed, so why is he doing so well in this primary season when he got trounced by Bush in 2000? McCain is left of Bush, and now he may win the GOP nomination. And he’s done this without any conservatives.
Yeah, immigration has been festering a long time, but it’s been getting worse. And after the 9-11 wake-up, you’d think they (both Bush & the GOP congress) would have got serious about the borders, and for economic as well as health & crime & security issues, would have clamped down on illegal immigration. It didn’t happen, and conservatives were not happy.
Peggy Noonan is awesome… She was the first one to notice the 2nd Term was off the rails.. and on the first day ..
She took a leave of absence from her job to help get Bush reelected.. She’s no reckless Bush-basher.
I disagreed with her at the time.. thought she lost her mind.. but seeing how the foreign policy of the 2nd term has gone. she was absolutely correct and vindicated.