One minor correction: Chuckie Mathias of Maryland didn’t lose his seat, he voluntarily retired in 1986, allowing his 1974 Democrat opponent Barbara Mikulski, to succeed him. I think he was trying to find a way to switch to the Democrats while being able to retain a Senate Chairmanship, but couldn’t find a way, so just quit. Too bad we couldn’t have swapped him for Nebraska’s Ed Zorinsky, who swiftly regretted bolting the GOP after leaving the Omaha Mayoralty in a fit of pique after Watergate. I believe he was fixing to switch before his untimely death in 1987 paved the way for the execrable Bob Kerrey.
As for Jacob Javits, a convo I had with a New York Socialist Party leader confirmed to me that he was always considered “one of theirs.” He was (at least for his last term, if not longer), the most left-wing member of the U.S. Senate (and in the ‘70s, we had some real beauts infesting the GOP caucus, from Javits to Case to Brooke, Percy, Mathias, et al — which was no wonder when people like Orrin Hatch & Dick Lugar first arrived in ‘76, they looked like Conservative saviors, and they could rightly claim to be with all those Socialist snobs around). Javits was barely a degree or so away from the far-left Fiorello LaGuardia (if not Vito Marcantonio) types, once a mainstay of the NY GOP. Marcantonio could’ve probably maintained his association with the GOP, instead choosing to jump to the American Labor Party, which could barely disguise their links to Moscow. Marcantonio, of course, was the only person to have won in the history of Congress ever to have been officially nominated by the Communist Party (in 1936, while as the Republican nominee).
Thinking of Weicker the Wackjob, maybe it was his birth in Paris that set of alarm bells for me. Well, at least he gave up the pretense of being a Republican by his coming out for the radical Dem leftist moonbats (much like the freakshow Willie Weld in MA, whom I’ve maintained was a Democrat agent/Clintonista since the 1970s).
Vliet Lindsay unquestionably had the singlemost impact on my life prior to my birth. Had it not been for his execrable (which isn’t as strong a description as I’d prefer to use) stewardship of New York City, my family might not have been forced to scatter to the four winds. With the dreadful job situation in the city by the end of 1973, my father had to uproot my pregnant (that being me) mother, a lifelong resident, and relocate (from Manhattan) literally days after Abe Beame was sworn-in down to Nashville. Let’s say the psychological damage of that move we all never truly recovered from, even almost 37 years after the fact.
JVL was also a premier example of a party establishment choice. The Silk Stocking District had an excellent Congressman from the 1946 election onward (although a very snobby and French-sounding Frederic René Coudert, Jr., “Freddie” Coudert was a solid Conservative). Of course, with the party dominated by the Rockefellerites (big time Social libs and made even the most spendthrift Democrats look like Calvin Coolidge), they loathed Freddie with a passion. But Coudert was loyal and stepped aside for their young liberal savior in 1958, Vliet. To this day, I wish Freddie had curbstopped that little termite to dust (or at the very least forced JVL to the Democrats). JVL would likely never have survived a Democrat primary for the Mayoralty (indeed, after he officially became a Democrat, not even they wanted him, the most toxic and incompetent Mayor in the history of NYC, if not U.S. history).
When you get right down to it, are there ANY liberal Republicans we look upon with fondness and expert leadership ? It seems like the damage they wrought have often outdone their open Democrat counterparts. And some on this website wonder why I rail against them even more strongly than a lot of Democrats... after all, if we can’t keep our own house clean from this trash and traitors, how can we go after the other guys in a united front ?
Even the one time Lindsey lost the primary for Mayor(1969) he still won as the Liberal Party nominee. So we just can’t win anywhere in NY it seems.
On Javits, Bill Rusher (former publisher of National Review) once served as chief counsel to the Senate Internal Security Committee which took the opportunity to investigate then Congressman Jacob Javits during his first campaign for the Senate in 1956. Rusher wrote a book about his experiences. Apparently, in 1946, Javits was graduating to civilian life from the WWII Navy. He showed up at the Communist (not Socialist) Party HQ in New York to introduce himself to and seek support in a Congressional race from Dr. Bella Dodd who was then the Commissar of the New York Communist Party. He convinced her of his, ummm, philosophical mala fides but she advised him to be really sneaky and run as a Republican which he did and he won.
To Jake's credit, when he was in dire straits in 1980, seeking a fifth senate term only as Liberal Party nominee since he had been defeated by D'Amato in what amounted to a truly vicious campaign, however desirable the result, and also stricken by Lou Gehrig's disease (ALS), Jake had himself flown to the Miami area, rented out a big meeting hall, invited the many Jewish ex-New Yorkers to attend and urged them to vote for Reagan because if Carter were re-elected, there would be no Israel in four years. Jake made a difference in the vote by Jewish ex-New Yorkers in Florida.
How did I neglect Case, Percy and Brooke?
You had to live in Connecticut to fully appreciate the evil that was Lowell Weicker as a public officeholder. He did fundraisers for Planned Barrenhood and NARAL at the governor's mansion (which some governors had regarded as too dilapidated to occupy). He imposed a state income tax. As a senator, he left a fancy French restaurant in DC to go straight to the Senate to attack Ronaldus Maximus for bombing Qaddaffi in the Libyan desert. He imposed a state income tax. He made Donald Sundsquish look like a Republican but only by comparison, of course. He imposed a state income tax. He tried to change Connecticut Republican Party rules to allow unaffiliated voters to vote in Republican primaries, He imposed a state income tax. He nevr saw a leftist dictator abroad who did not sexually excite him. He imposed a state income tax. He stabbed Reagan in the back regularly. He imposed a state income tax. He was as passionately devoted to baby-killing as his fellow elitist John Warner was devoted to fox hunting. He imposed a state income tax. He could certainly be called an arrogant sob, among many other more colorful things. He imposed a state income tax. I am sure you get the picture but it was even worse being in the same state with him.
Nancyboy delenda est.
John Lindsay used the slogan: "He is fresh and they are tired." Fortunately, for some time now, he has been dead and we still live. Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.