It's a heavy work day but I wanted to mention a few things here before I plunge back into a script…
Sam Tomaino writes to take issue with my characterization of John McCain as "pro-choice." He's right, though if you Google the senator's track record on this topic, you might see why I was confused. McCain votes pretty much like your basic "pro-life" candidate, though he occasionally says things like — this is a quote — "Certainly in the short term, or even the long term, I would not support the repeal of Roe vs. Wade." Opponents have accused him of being "pro-life" but of sometimes disguising this to try and tap into "pro-choice" voters. (By the way: I usually put "pro-life" and "pro-choice" in quotes because I think they're rotten terms for the attitudes they're used to denote.)
Sam and a few other correspondents also argue that Richard Nixon was not much-loved by the extreme right in his day…
I remember a man named John Ashbrook. Ashbrook was a conservative GOP congressman from Ohio (I think) who ran a campaign for the Presidency in 1972 in GOP primaries against Nixon. He got no delegates but he had support from important conservatives of the time like William Rusher, publisher of National Review. They even had little buttons with a no-left-turn symbol on them. Nixon had done a number of things to p.o. conservatives: detente with the Soviet Union, normalization of relations with China, expansion of the "welfare state" spending, etc. I don't remember whether wage and price controls were in effect in early 1972 but conservatives did not like them either. The Ashcroft campaign was the start of a conservative movement in the GOP that resulted in the Reagan campaigns in 1976 & 1980. So I don't think Nixon had much support from the "extreme right."
I agree that if you look at Nixon's record, there's plenty in there that angered hardcore conservatives…but my recollection is that Nixon had the support of much of the extreme right in spite of all that. They sure turned out to vote for him (or maybe just against George McGovern) in '72. Ashbrook — who was, you're right, from Ohio — didn't get very far. Nixon was very good at pushing emotional buttons, and with all his "tough guy" talk about America as a super-power and punishing war protesters and especially of "law and order," he got them where he wanted them. A lot of Conservatives might have preferred someone else but in the end, they supported Nixon. It was only after he left the stage that those Reagan Republicans had an opening.
A lot of this gets down to the fact that people often form an image of a politician based on his speeches and stated positions, and then cling to it despite that individual's actual actions. Nixon was not as Conservative as a lot of his backers wanted to believe, just as Bill Clinton — in deeds if not rhetoric — wasn't as Liberal as many of those who voted for him both times believed. And of course, George W. Bush was the guy who was going to reduce the size of the federal government and not get us into any silly attempts at "nation-building."
Chuck Sigars writes to remind me that the third G.O.P. emissary — who along with Goldwater and Scott went to tell Nixon it was all over — was House minority leader John Rhodes.
Several folks have written to ask what I think of Cindy Sheehan and why I haven't written anything about her protest efforts. I haven't been entirely sure what to think of Cindy Sheehan, beyond the obvious bullet points that I feel sorry for any mother who loses a child, and that I admire her guts for sticking her neck out as far as she has. It bothers me when anyone purports to speak for the dead, but it bothers me a lot less when a mother puts words in her son's mouth than it does when people who never met the kid announce that he would certainly have been ashamed of his mother.
I lost the last gram of whatever respect I once had for Bill O'Reilly that time he had on the young man whose father had died in the 9/11 tragedies. The son was protesting certain Bush policies on terrorism and O'Reilly — who never knew the deceased at all — was saying, "I don't think your father would be approving of this [position]." Just for the record, my mother doesn't know every single thing about how I feel but her understanding is sure worth a helluva lot more than the opinion of someone who never met me.
Cindy Sheehan is not a seasoned politician or pundit. That is both her strength and her weakness. Some of the things she has said — or at least, been quoted as saying, which is not always the same thing — strike me as awkward and off-target. In a way, the lack of polish and precision makes her message more effective because it comes from (or seems to come from) the heart. At the same time though, it makes her vulnerable to attack, and I guess the attacks by their very nature have driven me more towards her side. It's amazing to me that grown men and women weren't bothered by Bush saying we'd found the Weapons of Mass Destruction, or Cheney saying the insurgency is in its last throes, or Rice trying to explain away as insignificant, a briefing headlined, "Bin Laden determined to attack inside the U.S." or dozens of other disingenuous or blatantly false statements. All of those can be rationalized or ignored by people who are now going over every syllable Cindy Sheehan utters, trying to find phrases that prove she's a nutcase or a tool of the far left or just an awful person. Maybe she's just a grieving mother who believes what she says but hasn't yet learned how to speak in precise, carefully-worded sound bites.
Like an ever-widening majority of Americans, I think Iraq is a mess. I'm honestly not sure if it's a mess we should stay and fix or one we should just walk away from. Making either option work has to involve some recognition that serious mistakes have been made. If Cindy Sheehan, in her amateur, clumsy way can get us closer to that recognition, then more power to her.
