Posted on 09/17/2010 4:18:33 AM PDT by ejdrapes
By Charles Krauthammer Tuesday in Delaware was a bad day not only for Republicans but also for conservatives. Tea Partyer Christine O'Donnell scored a stunning victory over establishment Republican Mike Castle. Stunning but pyrrhic. The very people who have most alerted the country to the perils of President Obama's social democratic agenda may have just made it impossible for Republicans to retake the Senate and definitively stop that agenda Bill Buckley -- no Mike Castle he -- had a rule: Support the most conservative candidate who is electable. A timeless rule of sober politics, and particularly timely now. This is no ordinary time. And this is no ordinary Democratic administration. It is highly ideological and ambitious. It is determined to use whatever historical window it is granted to change the country structurally, irreversibly. It has already done so with Obamacare and has equally lofty ambitions for energy, education, immigration, taxation, industrial policy and the composition of the Supreme Court. That's what makes the eleventh-hour endorsements of O'Donnell by Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) and Sarah Palin so reckless and irresponsible. Of course Mike Castle is a liberal Republican. What do you expect from Delaware? A DeMint? Castle voted against Obamacare and the stimulus. Yes, he voted for cap-and-trade. That's batting .667. You'd rather have a Democrat who bats .000 and who might give the Democrats the 50th vote to control the Senate? Castle wasn't only electable. He was unbeatable. Why do you think Beau Biden, long groomed to inherit his father's seat, flinched from running? Because Castle, who had already won statewide races a dozen times, scared him off. Democrats had already given up on the race.The Buckley rule
Friday, September 17, 2010
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
He doesn’t like Palin either. These establishment conservatives have no idea what is going on.
Pray for America
Applying the Buckley rule to politics in 2010 is like fighting the Taliban using tactics from the Napoleonic wars.
Karl Rove, Newt Gingrich, and Barack Obama are other examples of the Senior Prom Syndrome.”Are you kidding me?
Angry men getting shunted aside by spunky, pretty, conservative women. My heart bleeds!
Winning this general election for O’Donnell without the establishment and the pundits is where all the marbles are at. For all of us who have bided our time, kept our powder dry, and waited for the opportunity to put real conservatives in place of phony scoundrels, I say, “Once more into the breach-—CHARGE!!!”
Visa, Mastercard, and everything else accepted.
“Stunning but pyrrhic.”
That’s your OPINION, Mr. Krauthammer. Literally millions of voters disagree with you. You’re just a political commentator, a card carrying member of the chattering class in DC. Who cares what you think? I can think of hundreds of FReepers whose opinions I value more than yours, and they probably have better track records, too!
Mr. Krauthammer, if you REALLY cared about the future of this country, you wouldn’t be sniping after the fact at Sarah Palin and Jim DeMint. What’s done is done, and you’re just coming across as petty, because we ignored your advice. Get over it!
BTW, your argument is full of holes. Even if I agreed with your opinion that O’Donnell can’t win (and I don’t, not by a long shot), you completely ignore the fact that history indicates you are WRONG. Don’t tell me you’ve already forgotten Jeffords, Specter, and the thoroughly dysfunctional Republican majority of the Bush years? That’s what happens, HAS happened, when we elect political scum like Mike Castle.
What a joke.
The GOP had sufficient clout in the U.S. Senate to filibuster any and all measures in "Obama's social democratic agenda."
Krauthammer conveniently overlooks the fact that liberal Republicans who could not be counted on to oppose Obama's agenda have pissed away whatever trust conservative voters may have had for the GOP's ability -- or even its willingness -- to oppose Obama's agenda.
You have state-level Republicans (governors, legislators, attorneys general) now fighting the battles against ObamaCare that Senate Republicans surrendered earlier this year, which is compelling evidence that supporting half-@ssed Republicans in Washington is a waste of time, money and effort.
“Then I get freeper private emails telling me to be nice to him - after all, he’s in a wheelchair. What’s that about?”
Your mom always taught you to be nice to cripples? Trouble with that here is, you are not attacking his handicap. And to his credit, he doesn’t rely on it for sympathy.
He’s out there with his mind and his mouth. Sometimes people disagree and use theirs. He is a formidable man. But sometimes he is wrong.
51 liberals, some of whom are RINOS, control the agenda fixed
I refer to my earlier post, liberal senators, regardless of party affiliation mean we get cap'n'tax, more $timulus, more debt, more super liberal supreme court appointments, weaker defense, and we continue to lurch toward socialism.
Specifically, Mike Castle might very well have been the key vote to approving funding for Obamacare, or failing to overturn the VETO of Obama on repeal. You assume Christine can't be the 51st vote. She can be, and she'll be a Hell of a lot better than Castle. That rabid pet Coons is a marxist - he should be easy to defeat.
I believe Krauthammer has long been a fan of Mike Castle because of Castle's strong support for fetal stem cell research. I say this as delicately as possible and with the full recognition that I might very have the same attitude if I were in his shoes . . . but I think Krauthammer bases a lot of his politics on the notion that these ethically questionable (at best) medical research efforts may represent his best chance of ever getting out of that wheelchair.
Conservatives ignore it at our peril.
Our purpose must never be to win anything but the General. That's all that counts.
Too many Conservatives are now walking around power-drunk thinking winning the primary was winning the war. If the D wins the General, Christine O'Donnell will forever be the poster girl for TEA’s failure to support electable candidates.
What good is controlling the AGENDA if 5 or 6 of those 51 are Reliable votes for THE OTHER SIDE???
He is also quite slack in his research. Buckley also believed in voting for the democrat if the Republican was a flaming RINO. Buckley espoused this principal against Lowell Weicker.
nikos1121: “I agree with this last paragraph.”
Unfortunately, the simplest explanation for Krauthammer’s article is that he doesn’t really want Republicans to win. He throws that last paragraph in, but I personally think it’s a lie. His derision for Palin, DeMint, and the will of the MAJORITY of conservative voters in Delaware is palpable. He doesn’t sound like someone who wants the Republicans to win.
TGR: “He has it backwards: a Castle ‘victory’ would be the pyrrhic victory, because liberal republicans guarantee we loose the war over policy.”
Yes. You are correct. He couldn’t be MORE wrong, as proven by the history of Jeffords, Specter, and the impotent Republican majority of the Bush era.
He is off base. Castle was no conservative. CK sounds more and more the those “conservatives” who were able to justify a vote for Barry.
Charles Krauthammer can leave the room.
Some districts are written off as unwinnable, when with a few extra $$ a candidate with the Ronald Reagan message could win, especially given the job loss, the higher taxes and obamacare. Reagan proved that when he won.
I know they’ve written off the US 9th TN where we have an arrogant POS 2 term obama butt kisser Steve Cohen. Who says he votes like a black woman, (he’s a white, Jew) BUT won’t debate his black, GOP, Memphis Tea Party backed candidate she won 61% of the GOP primary vote over 2 male candidates.
Charlotte Bergmann http://www.charlottebergmann.com/
Radio ad spot
http://www.charlottebergmann.com/RadioSpot.htm
Cohen is so arrogant he isn’t even campaigning against Charlotte.
http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2010/sep/12/cohen-not-worried-about-gop-foe/
Steve Cohen not worried about 9th Congressional
The Commercial Appeal ^ | 9/12/10 | Zack McMillin
Yet, even as Steve Cohen’s 9th Congressional District opponent prepares a campaign that may include a billboard proclaiming “Charlotte Bergmann can whip Steve Cohen,” Memphis’ most popular elected Democratic legislator is indicating he will not mount a large campaign aimed at motivating Democratic voters.
Snip
Cohen wasn’t even sure how much effort he would put into a get-out-the-vote operation for his Democratic base.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/14/us/14memphis.html
“I vote like a black woman,” he said in an interview. “I don’t know the black experience, but I know about being a minority and being discriminated against because of religion.”
This is the man who liken 0 the community organizer to JESUS CHRIST!
MindBender26: “If the D wins the General, Christine O’Donnell will forever be the poster girl for TEA’s failure to support electable candidates.”
I’m sure you’ll be jumping up and down with joy in November if she loses. After all, like Krauthammer, you’re more concerned about being proven right than actually winning, right?
Do you realize you are openly advocating for conservatives to sacrifice nearly everything we hold dear simply because YOU think some ass is more electable? Who do you think you are to tell us who is and who isn’t electable? What are you doing on a CONSERVATIVE forum?
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