The McCain Machine Won't Win The Day

(HT: Hugh Hewitt) http://hughhewitt.com/archives/2005/12/04-week/index.php#a000702

Byron York's a smart guy, but he's way off base in his New Republic piece today regarding Sen. John McCain.

When I speak with a Republican strategist who is allied with one of McCain's potential rivals, he says McCain threw away much of the support he had won campaigning for Bush when he joined the so-called "Gang of 14" senators who reached a compromise on Democratic filibusters of Bush appeals court nominees. "The whole issue of judicial nominations is very, very important to Republican activists and Republican primary voters," the strategist says. "I think there was a sense of betrayal among Republican activists when they saw those seven Republicans join those seven Democrats to head off the nuclear option." The strategist is right about the importance of the judges issue, but wrong about the Gang of 14 compromise. Yes, McCain and others agreed to preserve the Democrats' right to filibuster. But, in return, they forced Democrats to back down on their most hated nominees: William Pryor, Janice Rogers Brown, and Priscilla Owen. And the GOP members reserved the right to break any future Democratic filibuster. That probably won't hurt McCain.

On the contrary, McCain's reeling, and it's due to his own political opportunism. First off, there wasn't a lot of support from the base for McCain during the campaign because he couldn't keep his mouth shut when it came to criticizing the war efforts in Iraq. That was a major sticking point for me, personally. He looked pretty two-faced in standing with the president at campaign stops, yet bad-mouthed him to the press when he wasn't around.

Second, the Gang of 14 fiasco really hurt not only his reputation, but his political standing within his own party. When it comes to stabbing a party in the back, McCain's a master, and when he organized that deal, as far as I was concerned, his fate was sealed. I talk with registered Republicans a lot, and each and every one of them have nothing but disdain for this man. This deal was well outside the bounds of the Constitution, and in the deal he and his cronies tossed seven other nominees under the bus; they never made it to the floor for their up-or-down vote. These people had passed out of the Judiciary Committee and were simply awaiting their vote. To get the three nominees through--Pryor, Brown, and Owen--he was willing to jettison the other seven.

Third, this man voted against the president's tax cuts, and stood firmly against them even as they passed. With the economy needing a jump start, tax cuts are the first step. Had the Senate followed his lead, we'd be sitting in a deep recession right now. Further, tax cuts have been proven, time and again, to help move a stagnant economy forward. People retain more of their money, use that money for goods and services, which inevitably drives the economy forward.

Fourth, McCain is against drilling in ANWR, which is a vital issue regarding our national security. Right now, we buy oil from Saudi Arabia and Venenzuala. Both of these nations are against the US. In Saudi Arabia, we have a government that is unwilling to deal with the radical form of Islam in their own nation, and money is being funneled to our enemies. In Venenzuala, we have a communist dictator in Hugo Chavez who dislikes the US. He doesn't hate our money, just our nation. And I'd like to remind our readers that Chavez does have ties to Iran which is another enemy of this nation. Drilling in ANWR can solve this problem. It severs our dependence on foreign oil, makes us far more self-reliant on our own resources, and keeps US money out of our enemies' hands.

Fifth, his anti-torture legislation could be a serious detriment to how we are able to prosecute this war. With the idea of torture removed from the table, there is nothing to stop our enemies from keeping their mouths shut after we catch them. Granted, I'm not a fan of torture. I don't condone it, but I will say this: Desperate times call for desperate measures. A desperate time could be something as simple as uncovering clues to a plot to smuggle in a crude nuclear device into the US, and detonate it. If we get those clues, and we nab someone we believe is connected to the plot, I want ALL of our options open to obtain the intelligence necessary to stop such a plot. Remember, we have to be right 100% of the time in this war. Our enemies only need to be right once.

Sixth, in a rush to rid campaigns of the "evil" soft money that supposedly "corrupted" the political process, Sen. McCain quashed our free speech rights. Up to sixty days prior to an election, no ad against a candidate can be run by a citizen against a candidate. The First Amendment's Free Speech Clause specifically was designed to protect this sort of speech. In England, the Founding Fathers didn't have such a right, and could easily be thrown in jail for speaking out against the Crown; a transgression that might have been deemed seditious in nature by the Crown. The Framers ensured we'd have our right to speak out against the government and it's officials freely without threat of persecution or prosecution. Thanks to Campaign Finance Reform, we have less free political speech now, and it's due to Sen. McCain.

Last, but not least, Sen. McCain believes that our captured enemies should be tried in US courts rather than the military tribunals authorized by Congress. These people were caught on the battlefield, in opposition to US forces, and they're not citizens. They have no rights under our Constitution, and shouldn't have access to them. But if he wins on this issue, not only will they have access to our courts, but also all the protections a citizen is guaranteed when charged with a crime, and put on trial. Now, in a case such as Jose Padilla's or Johnnie Walker-Lindh's case, they are US citizens, and are entitled to those protections. That I have no argument about. Even US citizens in the past charged with treason still had their Constitutional protections. But this privilege should NEVER be extended to foreign terrorists.

In short, Mr. York is wrong. Not only will the Gang of 14 deal hurt McCain, but so will the points I made above. This man is much like the "Defeatocrats" that Sabrina referred to yesterday. And because of these things, this man can't be trusted to hold the highest office in the land no matter how much he feels he's entitled to it. Every senator looks in a mirror and sees a president. Few win, and I'll be on the side against Sen. McCain should he run in 2008. He doesn't deserve the office, especially after the amount of times he's stabbed the party and the base in the back in reecent years. He just can't be trusted.

Publius II