Posted on 02/08/2016 12:40:30 PM PST by SeekAndFind
Via the Daily Rushbo, that’s the second time in a week that Rush has given Rubio a vote of confidence at a moment when the rest of the field (Ted Cruz very much included) is desperate to blow him up. That feels strange after so many months of Limbaugh mainstreaming Trump on the right — as I said in last week’s post, it’s hard to be pro-Trump and pro-Rubio — but it makes sense strategically. If Rubio collapses, conservatives are left with Cruz and … that’s pretty much it, given that the other remaining survivors in the field are apt to be Trump, Kasich, and/or Bush. Unless you want to (shudder) take a second look at Jeb, you need Rubio in there in case Cruz hits a wall after the SEC primary. For all his faults, from amnesty to hyper-interventionism to his inability to stray off-script even when he’s being mocked for staying relentlessly on script, Rubio would still be more conservative as president than the rest of his center-right competition. Rush is simply playing the long game here by declining to wreck him for his debate stumble.
As for the substance of Rubio’s answer, I wouldn’t go as far in claiming that “Obama knows what he’s doing.” Domestically, that’s true: ObamaCare wasn’t an accident. It’s true in some foreign policy matters too, like the Iran deal. O succeeded there in his goal of neutralizing the threat, if you define “the threat” as “American hawks willing to risk war with Iran to stop their nuclear program.” He took war off the table for the foreseeable future, even at the price of legitimizing uranium enrichment by Iran in 15 years’ time. He knew what he was doing. I’ll never buy that he knew what he was doing in Libya and Syria, though. There’s no strategic benefit to setting red lines for Assad on WMD and vowing that Assad must go and then failing to follow through on either of those threats later. It’s pure amateurism, a bluff with nothing behind it, and emblematic of Obama’s short-sighted approach in Syria of doing just enough so that hawks can’t claim he’s doing absolutely nothing while doing little enough that doves can’t claim we’re on our way to Vietnam 3.0. Rubio, I’m sure, does have some concrete ideas about what the commander-in-chief should be doing in Syria. Whether a McCain-ish ramping up of America’s presence in the Syrian maelstrom would be better than Obama’s “strategy du jour” approach, I leave for you to decide.
Anyway. It’s fine to say, as Rush and Andy McCarthy do, that Rubio was right on the merits of his “Obama knows what he’s doing” talking point. The problem, as McCarthy notes, was Rubio’s insistence on mindlessly repeating the point even while being mocked for mindless repetition, as though he couldn’t delve into the substance of it. The point of Christie’s jab was that a freshman senator is too inexperienced to successfully advance his agenda as president, which is really stupid considering that Obama’s actually done it. He got the stimulus through; he got ObamaCare through; he made a dubious deal with Iran and proclaimed a dubious mass amnesty via executive action. Claiming at this point that young legislators can’t move the ball for their team as president is like claiming that it’s scientifically impossible that the sky is blue. Just look up! But rather than say that, Rubio stuck to his script, and as Ace noted yesterday, once you’ve seen the 25-second speech exposed it’s hard not to see it in everything Rubio says. That’s unfair insofar as all of the candidates are giving canned speeches — Christie’s famous townhall passage on drug addiction is one he’s repeated many times — but Rubio’s dependence on it under fire, when he was practically being dared to say something spontaneous, created a filter through which he’ll be viewed going forward. Not fatal, I think, but it’s a problem now.
One more thing. Rush praises Rubio (and Cruz) here for correctly identifying that Obama has succeeded in moving his agenda whereas so much of the rest of the party, most notably Trump, dismiss Obama’s problem as incompetence and inexperience. Rush’s theory for that is that the establishmentarians have to pretend that Obama screwed up because they’re complicit in his successes. They’ve worked with him, after all. Okay, but … so has Rubio, first and foremost on the Obama-friendly Gang of Eight bill and to a lesser extent in lending rhetorical support for the disastrous intervention in Libya. (McCarthy notes both of those in his piece.) If Rubio knew all along that Obama had bad intentions with his policies, why did he cooperate with him on anything, let alone major initiatives? And why are we knocking Trump for believing that Obama’s an incompetent when the whole premise of his candidacy rests on that assumption? This goes back to what Rush said a few weeks ago about how Trump, in his own way, is making the case for smaller government by relentlessly attacking government as incompetent. Not so. Trump’s problem with government is that it’s run by morons, not that it’s too big and therefore destined to behave inefficiently. Obama’s just the head moron. Replace him with Trump and yuge improvements will be seen. If we’re going to boost Trump, let’s at least be clear-eyed about his message is.
I couldn’t stand listening to him today. Went to local talk.
Crispy Creme has his memorized speeches as well.
All I hear is New Jersey this, and New Jersey that. As a Governor I did this and I did that.
Just recycled bullsh!t.
He was doing so well.
No....
I don't listen anymore, I listen to Kuhner on-line or via phone app ( WRKO out of Boston, and if he goes National he might kick Rush's @zz ).
However, my theory is this...
Rush is reading the Tea Leaves and realizes we are in a revulsionary mood and if we see him as establishment and sticking up for the establishment, we will do just the opposite, aka Trump and or Cruz.
The master may have played us all again....
I am to the point I’d like to see a debate with NO crowd.
No, I completely agree. The news clips I've seen of the episode do not begin to do justice to the carnage.
I've never thought much of the whole "prosecuter" resume Christie has emphasized, but during that debate in real time... it was on display in FULL glory.
Some reports refer to this as a "stumble." It was not. It was a complete dismantling of Rubio. His inexperience and inability to respond to anything other than with canned talking points were brutally evident.
Rush has defended each of these guys at different times for different things. I would imagine his view of Rubio is fairly similar to mine. And also of Cruz. He is not willing to play the game of trashing guys who are assets to the conservative movement over one or two issues or a few weaknesses. Rush is pulling out the positive for each. He was extremely favorable to Trump for many months, only retreating when Trump pulled the left-wing moves on Cruz.
Rubio is a conservative on many or most issues. He happens to be terrible on immigration (and duplicitous) and, IMO, he’s too much big-brother on surveillance. Overall, he’s got a pro-liberty, pro-freedom core. I am really frustrated with his immigration bs, but I am not going throw him out completely for good, even if not my favored candidate for this race. Rush harkens back to Rubio’s stellar conservative battle in 2010 in running a core conservative campaign to beat the party poo-bahs and sitting governor. He expoused conservatism as well as anyone during that race and after.
I’d like to see him pursue Governor or something if he does not get the nomination because I do find him to be an asset overall.
I oppose Rubio for multiple reasons not least of which is the Gang of 8, but I think that Rush is right on this narrow point. Christie et al. keep saying that Obama’s main problem is his incompetence and ineffectiveness. Rush is basically saying, ‘No, no, Obama has been devastatingly effective in implementing his left-wing agenda.’ Sadly for the country, it’s true.
Just throw up a plexiglass divider, give each candidate 5 minutes each and read the damn questions.
I think Rush’s wife, Katherine, has a lot to do with the way Rush is thinking now...
He used to talk about all the candidates, never tipping his hat to any one of them, and now he is picking....
His backers, you know he is owned by companies for ads and things, they could be putting pressure on him also...
I know I won’t listen to him anymore...
All the candidates do, to varying degrees. CC targeted MR and hit the bulls-eye.
If that is his plan then it is working to perfection.
Rush has ONE bottom line: He will vote for ANY Republican vs Hillary or Bernie.
LOL the Duke.
He can give Cruz the secret Harvard Law handshake
FWIW, My thoughts on our "vaulted candidates" back in Dec of 2014 wasn't too far off: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3232647/posts?page=14#14
It also begs the question, why did Rubio try to help Obama push through his America destroying Gang of 8 bill? I wish Cruz would have asked.
Hooray...you have seen the light!
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