Mark America

Angry at Conservatives

I have never really observed Ronald Reagan’s “eleventh commandment” whereby he disclaimed the idea of speaking ill of his fellow Republicans, but it’s true to say that I avoid being unnecessarily harsh where I expect some bridges might be built. On this day, I come to you to explain why I am going to speak ill of certain Republicans in the most heartfelt, sincere manner.  Watching the senior Senator from Arizona deliver his critique of Senator Cruz after his magnificent twenty-one hour speech, I couldn’t help but think how far John McCain(R-AZ) has fallen.  Just five years ago, he had been the nominee of his party, a party that ultimately accepted and supported him despite the fact that he’s been a thorn in the side of conservatives for decades(and in no small measure because he chose a running mate who was dynamic and powerful.)  Now John McCain appears to be nothing more than an angry old man, who once championed the idea of “maverick senator” right up until he was swallowed by the DC establishment.  Now firmly entrenched in the good ol’ boys club of Washington, and accustomed to being the center of attention, McCain looked the fool on Wednesday as he belittled the efforts of Ted Cruz and other conservative Senators who decided to oppose Obama-care.

John McCain has built quite a record of opposing conservatism over the years since his presidential loss.  He’s been subsumed into the general ideological quagmire of moderates like his chief adviser, Steve Schmidt, who never met an actual conservative he liked.  Just a few months ago, he referred to Cruz(or those like him) as “Wackobirds.”  Before that, he made a long speech mocking the “hobbits” of the Tea Party.  McCain wishes to share in the control of Middle Earth these days, and he’s more than satisfied to lie down with the dogs of Obama’s encampment.  He wants to bomb Syria so badly, he was willing to hang out with terrorist thugs, and he now holds conservatives in such thorough contempt that he’s willing to consider gun control measures.  Now, he rushes to the defense of the DC status quo establishment in order to preserve Obamacare on the basis of the shoddy but oft-repeated argument that “Obama won.”  If this is the length and breadth of the Senator’s vigor for the fight, perhaps he should simply retire.  This country has no room any longer for the vigorously inept or the supinely resistant.

There are those Republicans, though not so many conservatives, who insist that one must make allowances for Senator McCain’s previous service as a pilot and a prisoner-of-war in Vietnam, but given his performance on the floor of the Senate Wednesday, I believe it’s fair to suggest that he’s used up the last of his tokens for past honorable conduct.  What Senator McCain did was a crass spectacle in opposition to both the mood and the temperament of the nation, possible only because he will serve at least three-and-one-half years longer without an election.  I can virtually promise you that his intemperance with respect to the grass-roots would never have made it past a primary in 2010 had he displayed such contempt for Tea Party-inclined conservatives, and the Senator knows it.  In short, he faked-out the world and Arizonans in 2010 by pretending he was a conservative, when indeed, there are few conservative reflexes in Senator McCain’s body.

McCain said he took umbrage at Senator Cruz’s comparison of some to the appeasement of Hitler by Neville Chamberlain, but I must ask why Senator McCain would take offense at this at all.  McCain has basically said that he is surrendering on Obama-care on the basis of an election almost eleven months ago, and that he will do nothing to oppose it.  That sounds a good deal like Neville Chamberlain to me.  If McCain would merely embrace Barack Obama and claim to have gained “comity in our time,” the picture would be complete.  Not satisfied with that, McCain tried to drag his father and grandfather into the argument, an absurd juxtaposition that allowed him to pout and spout, but to make no sense whatever.  The truth is that in his statement, McCain looked afraid, and barely cogent.  His words were incoherent. He said “I resoundingly reject…”[Cruz’s remarks] but I think it is clear from the aftermath of Cruz’s speech that what is being rejected resoundingly is John McCain and his ethos of capitulation.  A writer less-concerned with honoring Ronald Reagan’s eleventh commandment might observe that he’s apparently accustomed to living in political captivity at the behest of communists.

I honestly cannot tell you that I’ve ever thought much of John McCain.  I supported him in 2008 only after he picked a running-mate I thought might well salvage the ticket – and almost did – until John McCain’s brilliant adviser convinced the Senator to suspend the campaign to return to Washington to “confront the financial crisis” in which he was factually almost entirely powerless to act. McCain may well enjoy deriding and defaming actual conservatives, but what I find more egregious is his contention that since Barack Obama won, conservatives in and out of Washington DC ought to surrender to his agenda.  Last I checked, Ted Cruz also won in 2012, and as I remember from the 2012 campaign, nobody talked about Obama-care except conservatives, in part because the GOP nominee had inflicted a similar program on Massachusetts, and also because Obama himself didn’t want to talk about it.  Besides, nearly a year having elapsed, the facts or at least the opinion the American people hold about them have changed, and as more facts come to light about the consequences, Senator McCain should be taking heed to the catastrophic effects of the law.

I don’t know why Senator John McCain is so intent on destroying conservatives and conservatism, but he is.  It could be that he feels most fulfilled when being treated by the establishment media as their favorite pet Republican.  Even the speech he made in the Senate on Wednesday was arranged by Democrats.  I wonder if he’s simply just another Arlen Specter-like liberal who has been posing as a Republican.  Whatever the motive, his speech of Wednesday dishonors whatever good he had done in his service to the country, while openly disavowing any claim he has made to conservatism.  With respect to John McCain as well as Barack Obama, 2016 cannot possibly come soon enough.  It’s time to retire this oaf.