Free Republic

Remember 04? Never let prudence get in the way of propaganda at The Nation. They did it again. Hilarious:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/thenation/20060410/cm_thenation/1576136;_ylt=A86.I1GwejpE5n0BQxH9wxIF;_ylu=X3oDMTBjMHVqMTQ4BHNlYwN5bnN1YmNhdA

Alright! Now go forth an write Brownback to vote against! ;)

God, how dense can you get. AF, tell us you're drunk. You need an excuse of some kind man.

Unlikely is one thing, we're agreed on that if we're cruising. We have the structural advantage. Impossible is something else. They can win and right now, we're running on a lot of things that seem designed to actualize it. I'm not arguing it adds up to our defeat, I'm arguing we need to do what's necessary to make sure it doesn't.

Well Tenno, we can't have everything from one man is all I can say. I'm not one of the cultists who thinks the man urinates holy water and he's infalible in all deeds. Indeed, part of that informs my objection to this nomination. Bush has done far more things right, than wrong.

Yep, we're agreed on that dimension too.

"No, I do not believe that the communist liberals have a chance to win control of congress."

Well, you have to wonder then if you're tendering sound politcal advice with an assumption like that. The Democrats can certainly win. They are well organized, well financed and totally determined. Their views are marginally unpopular it's true, so they need out help granted. We're currently helping.

"Miers has a fine record and certainly meets any qualification posed by the Constitution."

Great, half the people on here (base voters all) expect more than the minimum requirement out of a SCOTUS associate justice from a Republican president. Now believe me, they're not going to suddenly start diminishing their expectations and fall in love with the wisdom of the pick. That is short of discovering Miers wrote several distinguished volumes on natural rights and constitutional law under a pen name. If the WH had an argument that would content the discontented among us, we'd have heard it by now.

So in light of that, what are you going to do about it? The Bush administration's position is to win the argument at all cost. I don't think this is a remotely sensible course for the administration to take. I don't mean to hammer you, but really the political situation relative to the division of the base, is now critically more important than the nominee herself. But this is a foreign notion to most Miers advocates. They want to fight their brothers and win the day for Bush. I and others on the other hand, want to win the 2006 election over the Democrats.

"And they'll turn around and blame us that dared to only support him 98% of the time and not 100% of the time."

Ha! You're probably right about that. Kudos.

Is it you're contention that we could do absolutely nothing that would allow the Democrats to gain a permanent advantage and win control of congress? I'm sure you don't believe that. If you agree that there are conceivable scenarios where the Democrats could win the election, I'll say it starts with GOP base voter disenchantment and low turnout (particularly in an congressional eleciton cycle).

It's hard to consent to a person who has no applicable record. This is the nexus of the delimma.

Look, forget about whether the opponents of Miers are right and you are wrong or vice verse. Recognize the political reality that these opponents are core base voters just like you and they are numerous and growing in quantity. Even if you like Miers' record and think she's a dandy pick, please recognize that a large segement of our base vote does not and likely will not. I have yet to see a single person opposed to the pick, who has been persuaded by any of the arguments advanced by the WH. All I'm asking, is you consider the implications for this. Elections didn't come to an end in 2004 and Bush is not the last president we'll ever have.

I agree of course. Look, obviously the people tearing down every one of our thinkers, strategists and opinion leaders aren't providing a sensible basis for future success in elections. They're infatuated with a man, not the principles and ideals of our movement.

Remember, Nixon had 20% support in '74, week-o-resignation. I think we have to accept there's an element of our party that will support the leader no matter what he's done (or really, who he is probably). It's an admirable quality really, I'm not entirely disparaging it and we need a measure of it. And how do you turn out base voters with this stuff? We who see the obvious, need to get to work writing the Judiciary Committee members I think.

The Bush defenders in this instance, don't even know how to defend Bush. Things remain as they are a Democratic majority is possible in 06. They themselves believe the Dems will move to impeach (it's possible, I admit). Our Miers pick defenders here, are not helping anyone in that election by placing their loyalty to Bush over conservative concerns and the party. If you let them, they'll end up depressing base turnout so much they'll effectuate the impeachment of their hero.

"Nice strawman."

Ha, ha. Don't you love it when people explain your own motives to you?

How about no one has to assume anything and we get a nominee whose record speaks for itself? Perish the thought, I know.

"I happen to be in the "hold your nose and very reluctantly support her because the president has made a big bloody mistake and I don't want it to turn into a huge, smashing defeat" crowd. Half the time, I feel like I'm compromising my principles to go even that far. And I ran hundreds of volunteers for W in the last two elections and am a party official."

I originally shared this sentiment. But consider that defeating the nominee would very likely rally much of the base behind the Senate GOP. Which we need a helluva lot more than we need to rally around Bush, going into 2006. As has been stated ad nauseum: Bush isn't running again, for anything, ever. We need to be focused on congress until 08.

Many of the people supporting Bush on this pick without reservation, would be defending Bush were he to nationalize all private industry in the country. They're conservatives second, Bush men first. As AF brutally points out, all criticism of Bush is treason to him. There's no compromise with that and there's no future in embracing it. The people who are the future of the party, understand the electoral implications of dividing the base and attacking movement leaders who inform opinion.

Yep, even were our nominee defeated, we could have run the entire 2006 election on those grounds. I saw nominate the entire list of conservatives and force the Dems and RINOs to vote them down. We'd have turned the entire base out in passionate, firey intensity on a unifying principle. It worked like gangbusters in limited use in 04 (Thune anyone?). Now we get to run on current policy and Miers. As you can see, the base is pumped about it. Sigh.

Ha, ha. Man, oh man. My friend you don't even know who is on the president's side. By you're definition of all criticism = treason, the president has about sixteen supporters in the country. If you're the sort of advocate Bush is going to have to rely on to make the case for Miers...prospects look good for a defeat of the nomination.

I see you're still having some problems here AF. Let's try to simply things a little bit for you:

1. Criticizing the war and the troops is one subject.
2. Criticizing a SCOTUS nomination is a completely different subject.

You just want to conflate and confuse the two unrelated subjects so you can vilify people who disagree with the President, as traitors. You're acting like some nutty left-wing caricature of a conservative, denouncing all debate as treason. I wish you a better grip.

Again, Kerry was a critic of the war. Are you implying that his views on the Burger nomination (whatever they were) were giving aide to the enemy in some way? You're so far out of line it isn't even funny.