"The election of a Progressive like Clinton or Obama would deprive conservatives of power. The election of a Progressive like McCain would deprive conservatives of both the government and the means to resist Progressivism. Which is the lesser evil?" Cato Institute
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With all the old Kennedys being trotted out, I really begin to think the Democrats are going to do the impossible: lose the next election. And after reading the above quote from the Cato Institute's libertarian crazies, I'm not so sure it would be such a bad thing.
Cato aren't the only ones. On the other side of the ultra right spectrum, here is what America's favorite fascist, Pat Buchanan has to say about McCain,
With all the old Kennedys being trotted out, I really begin to think the Democrats are going to do the impossible: lose the next election. And after reading the above quote from the Cato Institute's libertarian crazies, I'm not so sure it would be such a bad thing.
Cato aren't the only ones. On the other side of the ultra right spectrum, here is what America's favorite fascist, Pat Buchanan has to say about McCain,
"Where President Bush has been bravest, on taxes and judges, McCain has been his nemesis. Not only did McCain vote against the Bush tax cuts twice, he colluded to sell out the most conservative of the Bush nominees to the courts.With enemies like that, the man must be doing something right. Where is the progressive vote here? To a Clinton or a Kennedy restoration? The only Democratic candidate talking seriously about the issues is John Edwards and he is being treated by the media like he had genital herpes. Look, if we have to vote for a dynastic candidate, aren't there any living relations of LBJ interested in the job? At least he was a real progressive on labor, race, pensions, health and education. DS
In 1993, McCain voted to confirm ACLU liberal and pro-abortion Ruth Bader Ginsburg. But when Bush set out to restore constitutionalism, McCain colluded with Democrats who wanted to retain power to kill Bush's most conservative nominees.
McCain helped form the Gang of 14, including seven Democrats, who agreed to block a GOP Senate from using the "nuclear option" -- allowing a simple GOP majority to break a Democrat filibuster of judicial nominees -- unless the seven Democrats approved. McCain thus conspired with liberals to put at risk the most courageous conservatives nominees of President Bush.
With his record of voting for liberal justices Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer, and of colluding with Democrats in their campaign to kill the most conservative Bush nominees, what guarantee is there a President McCain will nominate and fight for the fifth jurist who would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade?
In the battle over campaign finance reform, McCain colluded again. The McCain-Feingold law denies to gun folks and right-to-lifers their basic First Amendment right to name friends and foes in ads run before elections."
McCain Gaining Among Republicans - Cato Institute
"Mr. McCain, who has delighted in sticking his thumb in the eye of mainstream Republicans throughout his political career, is now accumulating a base of support among party regulars who see him as the strongest general election candidate in the remaining Republican field," reports
"Mr. McCain, who has delighted in sticking his thumb in the eye of mainstream Republicans throughout his political career, is now accumulating a base of support among party regulars who see him as the strongest general election candidate in the remaining Republican field," reports
In "McCain vs. Madison," John Samples, director of Cato's Center for Representative Government, writes: "President McCain -- and yes, the words make me shudder even subjunctively -- would pursue endless 'reform' of campaign finance. He would do so in part for political reasons. Such restrictions on speech will quicken his transformation of the Republican Party away from its Reaganite past and toward a Rooseveltian future. But 'reform' is more than a political tactic for McCain. For him, the First Amendment is a philosophical mistake that limits our true calling to national greatness. It is a mistake that might be corrected by proper laws and compliant courts.
"The election of a Progressive like Clinton or Obama would deprive conservatives of power. The election of a Progressive like McCain would deprive conservatives of both the government and the means to resist Progressivism. Which is the lesser evil?"
5 comments:
McCain a progressive? Talk about cognitive dissonance.
Yes, strange isn't it. But actually McCain is the only major American politician that wants to reform the present system of campaign financing which is literally destroying democracy in America and making its citizens toys in the hands of special interest groups. So I guess progressive can be read in several different ways
I usually agree with your political observations. However,
today, I found myself thinking that you have been out of
the U.S. for too long, happily enjoying the benefits of a
civilized society like Spain (or any other EU country), where politics is really about choices of how best to improve life for its citizens. But that is not the choice here, and hasn't been for decades. The choice is far
starker: the key task for Americans is to try to prevent
the very worst, stupidest, and most criminal outcomes, as
the U.S. empire continues its decline. The real choice is
whether American decline more nearly resembles that of the
British (a decidedly unlovely business, as Kenyans and
South Asians will attest), or, as seems historically more
likely, comes to a otterdaemnerung-like end, a la the German Empire.
John McCain is an egregious war-monger; he is very likely
to start a war with Iran (it is hardly accidental that Joe
Lieberman is a staunch supporter). And, he will appoint Republicans throughout the beauracracy--and that party has long since been captured by the Christian Right.
I have little brief for any Democratic candidate, and
dislike Clinton, who, of course, is an utter opportunist. But the choice in American politics is not between relatively good and quite bad. It is between the seriously
criminal and the somewhat less so. Better an opportunist than a militant, reckless imperialist.
For that reeason, any sane person should support whomever the Democrats nominate, including Hillary Clinton. However
flaccid their ideas, corrupt their supporters, and opportunistic their positions, Democrats are less likely to escalate the wars in the Middle East than is John
McCain. (For example, there is no way Al Gore would have responded to 9/11 as did Bush by invading Iraq.)
None of this says the Democrats will be good, or even moderately decent. They won't be; they are simply somewhat less likely to be terminally criminal.
I share your admiration for William Pfaff. I strongly suspect that he would agree with my "minimize the very
worst" perspective, and I recommend it to you, as well.
Much writing these days is eerily reminiscent of 2000, when people kept saying to me, "Oh, there is really no difference between Bush and Gore." As someone who grew up
Yankee in Texas in the 1950s and early 1960s, I said, "Oh, yes there is; you haven't the faintest idea how dangerous the Christian Right is, my friend."
McCain is not a Christian nut-case like W. But, he is a bona fide war-monger, and will make a very bad situation in the Middle East even worse.
My thinking on the subject is tactical, not fully formed, but goes roughly as follows:
If McCain were elected, the Cato Institute and Buchananite America Firsters would be split off from the center of power. Here we would be looking at the end of Reaganism as we know it. Many of these people like George Will think that McCain would destroy the Republican Party. Couldn't happen to nicer bunch of guys.
Basically all these elements oppose him because he is the only candidate that advocates any serious reform of campaign spending. That the present system of campaign financing is what is destroying the USA, is an "article of faith" for all us Pfaffites. McCain is the only one to volunteer to bell the cat. I think all his tough talk about Iran is to keep the Israel Lobby quiet, because campaign financing is the heart of their power. Also, although McCain makes all the "right" noises on Iran, he has stated that he would send James Baker and Brent Scowcroft to the Middle East. Therefore it is only the, "bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iran" talk that keeps the neocons away from his throat. He is the only candidate with real experience of war and who has genuine connections to the military establishment. I don't think he will go to war with Iran, because the US armed forces couldn't pull it off and they know it, which is why they have executed what Pfaff calls a "coup d' etat" against Bush with the Iran intelligence report. In the coming economic crisis the US armed forces will do well if they don't have to sell off a few aircraft carriers to the Chinese.. Which brings me to my final point the economic crisis. I think the next presidency will break up on the rocks of the economy and I would prefer it not be hung around the neck of a Democrat, because I think the general tendency is changing and the left is coming back for the first time in decades and the Democrats aren't ready for this change yet. I notice with great interest the populism of Huckabee and the ecological rumblings among the younger holy rollers. I am waiting for the poor white evangelicals to discover in their bible reading that Jesus didn't own a gun and that some of his best friends were tax collectors.
I'm not sure it matters a whole lot who the American people choose to read the speeches. For all the empty blather about 'change' that is being thrown about, I don't see any of the so-called mainstream candidates challenging the salient feature of U.S. politics, which is the death grip that corporate power has on the country. Either the public approves of living in a plutocracy, fails to perceive the basic situation, or more likely, feels there is nothing that can be done about it.
Nor is it easy to say what can or should be done. The citizen walks into a polling station and selects X. What does that even mean? X has only said that he/she stands for 'hope' or 'change' or 'family', and in any event certainly has not disclosed what his in-group will do once they take power. Compare that to what happens when a lobbyist walks into a X's office. He gives X cash and spells out for X exactly what he requires. Who will get what he wants in this system, the citizen or the lobbyist?
As for the war, the meaningful voting is done at the recruiting station, not the polling booth.
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