Posted on 04/13/2005 1:10:44 PM PDT by Constitution Day
The Icewoman Cometh By Mark Steyn During the impeachment trial of blessed memory, I had a brief conversation with Sen. Barbara Boxer. “My duty is to the Constitution,” she said gravely. “My duty is to preserve our two-party democratic system. It’s up to the Democrats to save the Republican party from itself.” Warming to her theme, the petite brunette liberal extremist noted the latest Republican poll numbers — down somewhere between Robert Mugabe and the Ebola virus — and explained, “That’s not good for our democracy. This is a tragedy for the Republicans. The GOP has become the Get Our President party. That’s not the Republican party the people want. We have to reach out to them.” “Oh, come off it,” I said. Well, okay, I didn’t. Instead I nodded thoughtfully in a nonpartisan sort of way and marveled at the senator’s ability to reel off her bit with a straight face. Eventually, sensing a massive uncontainable guffaw rising in her gullet, Ms. Boxer wrapped it up and stepped into the Senate elevator. As the doors slid closed, muffled howls of laughter began to shake the Capitol, glass rattled in the windows, plaster fell from the ceiling . . . Politics affords few greater pleasures than offering one’s opponents some friendly but hopefully lethal piece of advice. We’re in one of those phases now — hence, the vogue for columns on the “Conservative Crackup,” a fearsome beast that, like the Loch Ness Monster, more and more folks claim to have spotted looming in the distance. In reality, the unrelieved gloom is on the Dem side of the ledger: The Republicans are all but certain to increase their majority in 2006. Whereas, if you want the state of the Democratic party in a single image, cut out the photograph from the New York Times the other day: a pumped Robert C. Byrd giving a clenched-fist salute at a MoveOn.org rally. That’s the Rainbow Coalition 2005 model: a dwindling band of ancient vindictive legislators yoked to a cash-flush unrepresentative fringe. It would actually be to the Democrats’ advantage if the Byrd-Kos union were to crack up, but instead their union seems merely cracked, like a miscast double-act thrown together by a desperate burlesque agent. There is, however, one exception to the Dems’ dance of death: President-presumptive Rodham Clinton. The chances of a Rodham restoration in the White House are better than even. For one thing, the salient feature of the Clintons’ Democratic party is that it was grand for the Clintons, disastrous for the party: The Dems lost everything — House, Senate, state legislatures, governorships — but somehow Bill and Hill were always the lone exceptions that proved the rule. Clinton couldn’t even bequeath the White House to his vice president in a time of “peace and prosperity,” yet the First Lady won an unprecedented victory in a state she’d never lived in. There is no reason to believe the Clintons’ historical immunity to their party’s remorseless decay will not continue. Second, the fact of a female candidate will send the media into orgies of diversity celebration. Right now, it’s the GOP with the star blacks (Rice), Hispanics (Martinez) and immigrants (Schwarzenegger), while the Dems are a sad collection of angry white males (Kennedy and Byrd). Were Condi to run against, say, Joe Biden in 2008, the press would play it strictly on the issues. But if it’s Bill Frist against Hill, get set for a non-stop cavalcade of stories with little inset photos of Mrs. Thatcher, Mrs. Gandhi, Mrs. Bandaranaike (Sri Lanka), Golda Meir, Benazir Bhutto, Helen Clark (New Zealand), etc., etc., and headlines like “Is America Ready?” that manage to imply ever so subtly that not voting for Hillary is the 2008 equivalent of declaring that Negroes are three-fifths of a human being. Yes, yes, I know — cattle futures, HillaryCare . . . That’ll be 16 years old on Election Day and nobody — or not enough — will care. Third, the senator is a quick learner. Her initial campaign stops in the 2000 race were embarrassing: stiff, evasive, that robotic I Speak Your Weight voice. By the end, she was almost charming — not lightly worn Fred-Astaire-romancing-Audrey-Hepburn charm; you could see she had to work at it. But nevertheless she did, and she succeeded. Smart folks adapt: For Republicans to assume they’ll be running against the Hillary of 1992 is a big mistake. When you look at her feints to the right in the post-9/11 era, what matters is not whether she believes them but that she’s the only Democrat with sufficient star quality to be able to ignore the deranged needs of UnableToMoveOn.org. Evan Bayh can’t — hence his pathetic vote against Condi. No male Democrat could get away with Hillary’s tentative moves away from Dem orthodoxy on abortion: Kerry was reduced to claiming that, while he personally believed life begins at conception, he would never let his deep personal beliefs interfere with his legislative program; Dean was practically offering to perform partial-birth abortions on volunteers from the crowd. But, if a woman runs as kinda-sorta-pro-life-ish, I’ll bet the NOW types decline to protest. Can Hillary be stopped? Obviously she can. But one lesson of the last 15 years is that the Democratic party is basically a dead husk — it’s as effective as whoever’s wearing it. In the Nineties, the Clintons swiped it. For the 2004 St. Vitus’s dance, Michael Moore and Barbra Streisand and MoveOn.org seized it and couldn’t make it work. But, if Hill takes it back . . . Don’t get me wrong. Biennial incremental gains by the GOP are set to continue for a while yet. But don’t be surprised if November 2008 is the usual day of disaster for Democrats in the Senate, House, and states, with the exception of Hillary’s election as president — and Chelsea’s stunning victory in the North Dakota governor’s race.
To Hill and back.
You know, it seems to me that we agree as to voter ignorance, but we don't agree on the scale. You think they are ignorant nationally (i.e., on the future of the country as a whole), and I agree, but I also think the ignorance extends locally. In principle, I agree with you re. voter greed. I am just not sure that people think about their Senator's ability to bring home the bacon (or pork). I think a lot of Hillary's "soccer mom" voters would talk about her empathy, how she cares about children (gag), etc., and would perceive themselves as voting for her based on more national issues (or at least national issues on the Oprah model... you know, national child care, that kind of stuff). I'm not sure they factor in their U.S. Senator's role in the budget process. Philosophically, yes, I think many voters go for that "take from the rich and give to me" mentality (without realizing that in many cases, per the Dem model, they ARE the rich). I think the difference in our viewpoints is in the way in which we believe that general voter desire translates into races at a particular level. I think the bottom line is not to count out Hillary based on her "unelectability" or "un-likeability." The GOP needs to take her races very, very seriously, but I think they surely will do so.
I feel somewhat responsible for that. I was just a stupid college kid and I didn't know any better. I had learned my lesson by 1980.
This from the LA Times:
"Two Republicans - John McCain of Arizona and Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island - have said they would vote with the Democrats against the rule change."
Tell me again how McCain would be better than Hillary?
McCain is a pain in the butt, but compare his voting record in the Senate against Hillary's and try to convince me that she's more in step with the conservatives.
Thanks...sorry to mess up your bookeeping.
( :-D
No one in their right mind would read my bookkeeping!
Of course there are many here and elsewhere that are, shall I say, mentally challenged?
However, I will give consideration to your plea and place you in the "Don't-be-lulled-into-complacency-just-because-us-freepers-detest-her-so-much." list just in case we are audited by the P/C police. ;)
BTW ... No need to be sorry. My list was confiscated by a person, or persons unknown and my backup was stolen.
Now where did I put that aluminum foil? ;)
That is very true. The Dems have been able to count on that vote, and never have had to do a thing to earn it. Even if that vote just became up for grabs, the Dems are in deep doo-doo.
Voting record. Right. I think this qualifies as just a tiny bit bigger than pain in the butt status. I suspect if Hillary recovered her Goldwater Girl roots and became a born-again Republican tomorrow, you'd be finding some way to rationalize her behavior as well. You GOP lemmings are a real hoot.
She would grieve for Bill as much as Scarlett O'Hara grieved for her first two husbands.
In the balance I think she would take advantage of a living Bill by using his star power (which I fail to understand) or a dead Bill by making his memory sacred.
Steyn has done his homework--North Dakota is one of the states which will have a gubernatorial race in 2008--but it is also a generally Republican state (except for its Congressional delegation) and pays its governor one of the lowest salaries of any state. Chelsea will more likely choose a state like Washington or New Hampshire which pay better and aren't in "flyover country."
Had John Kerry an additional 60,000 votes, a leftist Senator with a dubious record of no distinction would have defeated a wartime Republican incumbant. Hillary is a LOT stronger candidate than Kerry.
Please elucidate your thesis.
Further, the loathing of Hillary is so intense that it could even cut into the usual third party protest vote on the right as well as increase voter turnout.
We can mess with the numbers to come up with whatever we want the spin to be. Had Bush gotten 20,000 more votes combined in Wisconsin and New Hampshire, Bush would have won 300 electoral votes to Kerry's 238.
And there are Republican women who would.
Further, the loathing of Hillary is so intense that it could even cut into the usual third party protest vote on the right as well as increase voter turnout.
The loathing of RINOs is pretty intense too, especially after this garbage over judges, the border, spending, and the continuing regulatory straitjacket.
We can mess with the numbers to come up with whatever we want the spin to be.
You make a good point there, but the point remains: Kerry was a weak candidate with an extreme leftist record. Hillary is a savvy political operative who's been talking about border security.
Nobody thought she would crush Rick Lazio the way she did.
My wife and her female friends are a mixture of centrist Dems and Republicans. They might disagree on particular policies but they all agree on one thing. They all despise Hillary. I know this is anecdotal but there will be some sloughing off of votes normally expected to be Dem. I also believe that certain Hispanics and Blacks will have a tough time pulling the lever for her. Between her strident speech quality and her championing of abortion she may very well be unelectable.
I found the same thing with my wife and female friends. Each and every one, with the exception of my die hard mother, stated they would never vote for Hillary.
My mother, A Massachusetts liberal, when asked whom she would vote for between Condoleeza and Hillary, stated she "would vote for the most qualified".
Now I love my dear old mother, but ... ;)
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