Friday, Mark opened his show discussing a disappointing article by Charles Krauthammer, who was critical of Ronald Reagan and others.
I normally love Charles Krauthammer, but his column sounds like the cross between a RuPaul supporter and Weiner Nation! The only thing he didn’t do is call someone a ‘neocon’! Yikes! Mark was right to come down on him the way he did!
You can read Mark’s National Review Online article on the subject here.
Hannity looks nicer in person
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Reagan was both unaware of the consequences of some of his decisions or didn’t really say or do what today’s pundits often mistakenly think and say. Krauthhammer is normally an exception. That is not the case for today’s crop of Republican candidates. Every one of them stands upon the shoulders of Ronald Reagan. They extol his presidency and they are questioned about how their performance is expected to be like his. What Ronald Reagan did that failed is not what he would ever support in himself or today’s candidates. Reagan, like most of us, realized that he was human. Edison and Ford realized the same thing. Some of us make mistakes. That is why erasers are put on pencils. It is amazing how we can point to the non-deliberate consequences of a Ronald Reagan who was looking for an alternative result and yet not criticize FDR who was deliberately seeking and achieved the socialism we now endure. Nor do we look at Jimmy Carter who wanted world peace, diversity and cooperation and yet he gave us the largest State of Terrorism in the world while we suffered under his “Misery Index†and runaway stagflation topped off by a hostage crisis. Yet today Jimmy Carter defends his record.
We are born instinctively conservative and compassionate. They are not separate and distinct. The liberals do their best to separate the two and it takes a while to understand this and get back on track. Reagan was no exception. He was, as many of us know, once a democrat. The democrat party left him, as it left so many others, to become the party of Stalin and Lenin. Before ML was even born Al Smith a NY City Democrat Mayor stated the same thanks to the New Deal of FDR. It was nothing more than an old deal devised by Engels and Marx and repackaged and soft-sold as compassionate liberalism.
The Krauthhammer, opinion is telling in another way. They say that “hindsight is 20/20 and foresight is as blind as a bat”. You know for sure when people like Krauthhammer, whom I respect, can get hindsight so wrong just how impossible it is for the rest of the pundits to ever get foresight right.
Right on, task! As Yogi Berra said: “Predictions are difficult- especially about the future!”
I’ll probably catch a little flack here……but I’m going to cut Krauthammer a little bit of slack on this.
I also enjoy Krauthammer as a pundit, and love it whenever he’s on “Special Report” with Brit Hume. He normally brings a focused perspective, and isn’t afraid to disagree with his colleagues in his very distinguished way.
Anyway, I understand Mark’s argument with him about a couple of the points he made about Reagan (particularly the abortion “flip-flop”). However, I think the point that Krauthammer was trying to make—–and on this, I agree with him 100%—–is that in the hindsight of what has become the Reagan “legend”, many in the conservative movement have come to expect some kind of miracle across-the-board migration of absolute conservative political “perfection” (which, by the way, never previously existed) from today’s Republican candidates. So much so that by spending so much time tearing them apart because they’re “not Ronald Reagan” on one issue or another, people lose all perspective on all the other Republican presidential candidate pools in recent history, and on how this pool would have stacked up by comparison—-quite favorably, IMO (in fact, Michael Medved wrote a fairly recent column about just this phenomena. I don’t always agree with Medved….but I thought that article was spot-on).
The bottom line is, some of the pundits—-and that includes some of our friends on the radio (Laura Ingraham, who I otherwise love, comes to mind)—-have got to take their foot off the gas peddle a little bit, cut what is collectively a very solid field of candidates a little slack, and not hold the monolithic figure of “Reagan” over their heads on every issue. Doing so, in my view, only serves to disenchant some……which in turn benefits the OTHER side. Frankly, I hate it—-absolutely HATE it—-when Democrats get to stand on the sideline & happily listen to Republicans scream & holler about how much their candidates “suck”. Frankly, I’m SICK of it. It doesn’t have to be that way.
Anyway, a little long-winded, but I believe that was the crux of Krauthammer’s point.
ScottT, as Laura Bush stated, “She is voting for the Republican candidateâ€Â. And so will we. I think we know what Krauthammer meant and he meant what you have implied but he did so in a disparaging way. At least he did so from our perspective. His rendition was absent accuracy. He certainly did this with the idea that we cut the candidates a little slack. We have no choice in that regard and in some cases we will cut them a lot of slack because the alternate is unimaginable. You and I, and others, along with Krauthammer, could have had a discussion such as this one, among ourselves, and have come to the same conclusion very fast. In fact we don’t need it because we are on the same page The real problem is the annoying left that jumps on stuff such as this and then tries to tell us how much they know about Reagan and how much we don’t know and that we are mistaken ideologues. That said I have already had to deal with this by one sophist hard leftist attorney who worked with some of the best leftist attorneys in NY. They are all a sick bunch that suffer from a derangement syndrome that goes far and beyond George Bush and includes Ronald Reagan. When I read the article I immediately knew he would jump on it, which he did. I cut him no slack. Liberal leftists such as this are legion and don’t need Krauthammer, another Republican, who will give them more aid and comfort than their own side, while leaving out the details. We did not need the article but the other side loves free ammunition. Especially when we provide it.
Other than what I just stated I got your drift and agree that was not the intent of the article. Actually, with slight modification, it would have made a good personal letter if he had just sent it to James Dobson. He undoubtably would have benefited from that rendition.
Right on, guys- Krauthammer might be excused for the points that he truly WAS intending to be the thrust of his message, but Krauthammer also was giving our opponents an easily- misconstrued piece of rhetoric that they then used against us. And a large part of the power of the misconstrued message lies in the fact that it comes from a famous Republican pundit. Krauthammer is not nearly so bad as Newt Gingrich has proven to be, but still I think that he should know better than to become the source of a potent “talking point” for the Libs.
Yeah, I get that, guys. Although it should be noted (and you guys already understand this, as task stated) that by NEVER taking a “prespective” break, the other side gets free ammunition not at the expense of a former Republican icon, but of the new candidates themselves. They get placed over an all-or-nothing barrel by some on our side……and as a result, the libs sit there & give their “talking points” every day about how “demoralized” Republicans are.
And they do this with that God-forsaken “Star Wars” bar scene collection of candidates on THEIR side. Absolutely infuriating.
By the way, task…..GREAT point about the article being better suited for Dobson. SPOT-ON, dude!