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.
I second that.
She can wear a wig, lose 30 lbs, morph into a patriotic, nationalist American, change her gender in Denmark, grow a beard and spit fifty dollar gold pieces. She's unelectable as president.
I think Steyn is wrong. Hillary is not electable
I hope you're right, but Herr Steyn is usually pretty spot on! What we need to do is start on a plan, not to mention finding a candidate, to BEAT HER.
If the Republicans play it right, they can win. But it's not obvious at the moment who their candidate for will be in 2008. The most prominent names are pro-abortion, and therefore unelectable.
It wouldn't be the first time the Republicans managed to take a winning position and lose with it.
My dream vision at the moment is that Condi stands up, declares that she has seen the light and is now pro-life, and runs for the presidency. Failing that, they will have to take some conservative southerner who is unknown to most of the country and make him known, with the liberal media obstructing every inch of the way.
Sounds like just the ticket for the Dim party. Anything to keep the voters from actually THINKING, which would have them voting anything but Dim.
Shalolm.
That depends on who the Republicans run against her. By the time she announces, the MSM will have paved the way so that she will be deemed to have won by acclimation. The only formality will be to run an election.
Also ignore her talks about the border.. She is just saying it to fool some people.. She does not give a damn about the borders.
She is a magnet for fund raising. The GOP has the biggest trump card they ever held in young voters and tax hikes. We shall see how bad they want to lose.
It wasn't fraud...they stole it fair and square.
You can take it to the bank. Hitlary is a loser in any run for president.
There are Republicans that have yet to be flailed by the MSM and the Dims, that will be shining stars by the time 2007, and the hard campaign push begins.
Should the Dims nominate her, she'll be getting zotted so much she'll be shooting lightning bolts out of her butt.
Ask any woman, you respect, if she would vote for Hillary. ;)
I really have a hard time gauging the average American, especially on issues like "would you vote for the quintessential Witchy Woman" but it seems to me that her grating, annoying, shrill (go ahead, call me sexist) voice when she gets "animated" will not last long in a grueling Presidential campaign.
Thanks for posting this, CD, and for the ping, Pokey.
I think Hillary could definitely be elected. It would be the uninformed and women who vote her in.
Take my sister, for example. Please ;)
She never reads the news--especially political news--and is proud of it. And she votes straight ticket Democrat in every election.
There are plenty of women who voted for GW because of security concerns who would love to vote for Hillary. Especially after the fawning Oprah appearances, etc...
*gag*
If Hillary runs for re-election in 2006 and is beaten by Guiliani, she is essentially finished as a political player. She'll have all the political stroke that Al Gore and John Edwards have now.
"grating, annoying, shrill (go ahead, call me sexist) voice when she gets "animated" will not last long in a grueling Presidential campaign."
You're not sexist at all. I agree with you about her annoying voice and demeanor.
That may be the one saving grace. Can she present a fake persona for all that time, under all that pressure?
I hope not.
Just don't run a "Bob Dull" campaign and I think it will be all right. Well, unless it's McCain or Guliani...they'd be even worse! If either of those two are the Pubbie nominee, I'm selling some mutual funds shares and buying lots more guns and ammo.
I have had several women who are Democrats tell me that they would never vote for Hillary, and they say it emphatically.
Maybe, but what if the economy is good during her 4 years. She could win again!
Ughhhh.....
It's funny because I've never heard a female politician get shrill the way she does. It's not at committee meetings or sit-down interviews (then she does the fake laugh) but it's when she gives speeches. It's grating. Her handlers will try to keep her out of the limelight as much as possible, but there is nothing like an American presidential campaign. Nothing even close.
Do they also tell you you're cute and they'd really like to find a guy just like you?
Maybe they just want on your good side.
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