Bush Did Everything Right
Tue Dec 25, 2007 at 08:08:05 AM PDT
I cannot watch the Republican debates. My blood pressure runs too high, and I'm afraid I might die of an aneurysm. They are brain-bendingly stupid, all the way down to Alan Keyes. However, I do derive some pleasure from knowing that these men, old and grizzled and religiously crazy and mormon, will have to face one of our candidates. Any of our top candidates will trounce all any of their candidates next year.
Look at the policies these morons are espousing. Are any of them different then Bush? All of the top tier of candidates in the Republican field run either with Bush on almost all of the issues, or to the right of Bush. It's completely ridiculous, considering that Bush is both the worst and least popular president of all time. He's at thirty percent or below in every single poll.
Yet, it's not so ridiculous if we consider who makes up that thirty percent. They are the rabid, hardcore Republican partisans - the Kool-Aid drinkers. To them, Bush did everything right. They are also the base of the GOP, and if they make up thirty percent of the nation at large they must make up a pretty good chunk of the primary voters. That is why I see no difference between the Republican field and George Bush.
Let's go down the list of issue's near and dear to a Republican's heart.
A Republican likes strong national defense, or at least the appearance of one. Looking strong on national defense means bombing the shit out of people (but not if your a Democrat, like in the Balkans - then you're just wagging the dog). Sure they don't like nation building, but they're hot to trot for nation destroying. Bush has given them two foreign wars, both against the evil brown hordes. Hell, Bush is so strong on national security he just made shit up so we could bomb a country that just looked at us funny. Can't get more badass than that. The base still thinks the war is awesome, which is why John McCain thinks the war is awesome.
Being strong on national security is also about keeping this nation safe at all costs, which is why the Republicans think John McCain's a nancy. John McCain is against torture, mostly because he was tortured. That is not a valid reason in conservative land. Huckabee's fucked here too, because a good conservative has no qualms about aspirating people to keep America safe. Why do you think their favorite TV show is "24". Because Jack Bauer isn't afraid to torture Bush did it, they love it, it stays as far as they're concerned, and they've got Guiliani and Romney to toe the line on that point.
We do our torturing in Gitmo, so it stays, too. Bush and a the base conservative knows that the best way to deal with a terrorist is to lock his ass up and throw away the key. Putting them through the legal system is way too dangerous, because they might get off on technicality (or lack of evidence), and escape only to fly a 747 into the Mall of America. Better to keep those guys locked up. Again, Romney is your man here, because he wants to double Gitmo. Fuckin' A. Huckabee thinks Gitmo's too nice. He did say he thought Gitmo should be closed, but that's because he's going to hire Halliburton to build a subterranean uberprison in Alaska and move all those terrorist fucks there. Isn't Cuba a tropical island? Detention shouldn't be like a vacation.
Then you have your economic issues, and here a conservative leans heavily on Saint Ronnie. Reagonomics never died, it just went into remission when Clinton was elected. Conservatives worship at the alter of Reagan, and Bush gave them massive tax cut for the wealthy so the benefits could trickle down to the common man. Nothing better than tax cuts. Just ask Guiliani, who actually said that by cutting taxes you increase revenue. I'm not sure how that works. Must be the new math.
"But wait," you say. "Doesn't a conservative hate government spending? Bush has given us record deficits." To this I say, who gives a fuck about deficits? Certainly not a conservative. Reagan didn't, Bush doesn't, and by all indications the current nominees don't either. When asked if there were any government programs he would run a deficit for, Thompson replied "national defense." That's exactly what Bush did. Deficits don't matter if they're for national security.
The evangelical's love Bush as well. Even though he only paid lip service to there priorities, he still appointed to rabidly conservative judges to the Supreme Court. He still has a year to put one more on, and even if he doesn't, a new conservative would. Besides, gays still can't get married, so mission accomplished. Huckabee is courting these people hard, and it's the reason he's in the lead in Iowa.
But Huckabee is an economic populist and a foreign policy neophyte, so the base isn't happy about voting for him. Romney's a mormon flip-flopper, so he can't play with the theocons. Guiliani wore a dress on multiple occasions, so he's not exactly setting the conservative world on fire. Ron Paul has gotten support among anti-war activists, but the base still likes the war, plus Paul is crazy, so he's out. Fred Thompson is boring, John McCain doesn't want to keep us safe.
In short each man thinks Bush screwed up somewhere, but the base doesn't think that. Like the Reagan God, the conservative base thinks Bush has done everything right. The reason they are so lackluster in their support of their new candidates for president is because none of them are pure, the way Bush was.
So, if the conservative base thinks Bush did nothing wrong, and would elect him again if they could, I can only draw one conclusion.
Bush didn't fail us. Conservatives failed us. Conservatism failed us.
Now, Bush is certainly an idiot and accelerated the damage his policies were doing by being rock fucking stupid, but Bush has still been conservatism's dream boy. The new crop will try to say Bush is not conservative enough, that he didn't really believe in the dogma, but look at all the issues he catered to. We got small government, we got strong defense, we got antagonistic international policy.
Remember what Reagan said about the scariest thing you could hear? "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." Conservatives believe that. To a man in the Republican field, they believe that. Bush believed it, and New Orleans drowned because of it. That wasn't a Bush failure. That was a conservative failure.
We don't need to tie Bush to these conservative candidates, we need to tie conservatism to them. American's aren't stupid, and they do know when they have been bamboozled. It will be easy for the new conservative minds to say that their failed ideology was all Bush's fault. We cannot let them.
I propose we stop calling them Republicans altogether. They are the Conservative party. They believe in Conservatism, and they must be tied to it.
Because while Bush didn't fail them, they failed us. Until they come around, they cannot be allowed to do it again.
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