Redstate

By absentee Posted in 2008 — Comments (10) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

Ready Or Not, Here I Come, You Can't Hide
Gonna Find You and Take it Slowly
Ready Or Not, Here I Come, You Can't Hide
Gonna Find You and Make you want me.
- the Fugees, "Ready or Not"

Ok, that smacks slightly of triumphalism but I was going for hip. I am so hip I have difficulty seeing over my pelvis.¹

Inevitable refers, of course, to this blog entry, not to Senator McCain's potential selection as our party's nominee. I suspect this will be one of many inevitable blog entries this evening. At the end of this one I plan to link to a few that I think are well worth reading. Most of those will be deep, detailed, insightful analysis. If that is what you are expecting here, let me disabuse you of that notion. This blog will not enlighten you. It won't give you any revelations. You won't cheer it. Let's be frank, I'll be lucky if you even read the whole thing. The good blog entries are located here.

I am no deep analyst. I am, however, a believer. I believe in God, Country and the Marine Corps. I believe in capitalism. I believe in democracy, America, the NFL, the NRA, and Redstate. We've talked before about believing, in particular my believing, here at Redstate (and apparently today on Rush Limbaugh as well).

I'm writing about believing again tonight because the general depressed and gloomy mood that greeted this evening's primary results is troubling to me. I am many things in life, but in each of those things I am also one very important other thing: a tireless optimist. I love positive thinking and positive ideas. I like looking for a win, not defending against a loss. I am a nameless, faceless, anonymous blogger with no credentials, no expertise, and no particular skills, but I type away nevertheless. I guess being an optimist is rather directly related to being a believer. I'm a believer.²

I believe above a storm the smallest prayer
Can still be heard
I believe that someone in the great somewhere
Hears every word
- Elvis Presley, "I Believe"

Tonight there are those asking what has happened. Analysis is, of course, inevitable. We will be treated to "I told you so" by some, "I never thought it could happen" by others, and "I need a young priest, and an old priest!!"³ by still others.

Some sound on the verge of despair. In a few cases this is the reverse of the cult of personality phenomenon. It is a despair born of an outright rejection of the man, John McCain. This type must be summarily dismissed. As it is unreasoning, there is no point trying to reason. These are a minority, thankfully (to the credit of the party and this website). Far more common is the despair of expectations. It is a desperation and exhaustion, the result of a dread that insists on predicting millions of moments and thousands of days.⁴

"Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits."
- William Shakespeare, All's Well That Ends Well

Sure, it is possible that those coldest expectations will be met. As the believing optimist, I don't think so. Let us assume, for the purpose of this blog entry, that Senator McCain is our inevitable nominee, a not wholly unfounded assumption. The despairing among us must now make a decision whether to vote for him or not. I believe you should vote for Senator McCain, and I mean to tell you why. That I should make this effort to persuade you was, of course, inevitable.

I know what you are expecting right now. Bold typeface that says War and lists why John McCain is good on the war. You already know this, though. There have been small grumblings that he is less than perfect on the war due to his stands regarding "torture". Let me say now, I agree with Senator McCain on the issue. Our troops do not torture, this I know. The enemy will say that we do. They said this before John McCain, they will say this after John McCain. If he is our Commander in Chief, they will say this of John McCain. It's inevitable. Our troops do not torture, but we must be firm and vocal about standing against torture. It is a moral stand, a righteous one. Other than to say that, however, I am not going to go into War. Senator McCain will be great on the war.

Here is where you expect me to have bold typeface that says Spending and explains why Senator McCain and his allies are going to be the Spartans, in both ferocity and minimalism. You already know all these arguments. Instead I just want to address the broad issue of the economy. Economically, the Senator will be a good President. Ramesh Ponnuru points out tonight at the Corner (love that blog) that McCain's "major health-care proposals are pretty strongly free-market. They're basically borrowed from Rep. John Shadegg, and in some respects they are more deregulatory than those of Giuliani or Romney."

"It can only be by blinding the understanding of man, and making him believe that government is some wonderful mysterious thing, that excessive revenues are obtained. Monarchy is well calculated to ensure this end. It is the popery of government; a thing kept up to amuse the ignorant, and quiet them into taxes."
-Thomas Paine

The despair of expectations is looking at the opposition to the Bush tax cuts and predicting a future with none. Senator McCain has already said he wants the Bush tax cuts to be permanent. Here is where I try to persuade the non-believers: It is taken for granted at Redstate that Senator McCain is vainly egotistical. The Senator is well-invested in the notion that his initial opposition to the Bush tax cuts was predicated on the idea that it was insufficiently preferential to the middle-class, and that it was unaccompanied by spending cuts. Given the opportunity to approve a tax cut for the middle class, or that is accompanied by a spending cut, or both, who can doubt he will gladly sign it and say "My friends, I told you so"? Adam C has some excellent information regarding Senator McCain on taxes here. It may not persuade you to vote for him, but I believe that your hope will be good for you, so if you remain unpersuaded, hold this as your hope: Under President McCain, spending, fiscal irresponsibility, and the general tax burden will decrease, and revenues will increase.

The despair of expectations is often an issue-driven despair. Immigration, of course, springs to mind. There are two issues facing the next President: Border Security and Illegal Immigrant residents. On the border, let me first address the ubiquitous quote, "I think the fence is least effective. But I'll build the goddamned fence if they want it." In a January, 2007 article not-so-presciently titled "Why John McCain is finished", and which begins with the unfortunate opener "Why does John McCain hate the GOP?", Kevin McCullough of Townhall.com ominously suggested that this line was indicative of the Senator's "near hostility towards protecting the border." I hate to break my own rules here, but really? I know I've said this before, but as near as I can tell, the fence, as technology, dates to around zero dark thirty BC. Senator McCain clearly meant that A fence wasn't exactly the best DEfense. He talks all the time about using 21st century technology at the border. This is not a radical idea, but it is an excellent one. I happen to live in the 21st century, I love it when people buy from us. Senator McCain wants to protect America, and you can take that to the bank. He doesn't want dirty bombs and crack visiting Texas. Our border will be secured.

So then there's the illegal immigrants. I shouldn't go at length here about why I largely agree with Senator McCain and President Bush and Mayor Giuliani on illegals and guest workers. I am not writing this to persuade you to agree with them or with me. This is about persuading you to vote. Why give up, why give in? So I will go on until the end.⁵

Remember when I said I don't do deep analysis? You're running into that right now. I don't know what form a compromise is going to take, but it's going to happen. That's right, a compromise bill is inevitable. So I don't really see how President McCain makes that worse. Note that President Bush plus a Democrat controlled congress hasn't yet sold the Grand Canyon to Mexico. You may not believe this, but hold this as your hope: Our borders will be secured FIRST, and the tide of illegal immigration will stop. It falls to the rest of us to work out assimilation of those who are here and who won't be leaving in the short term no matter what, and may be here longer than we'd prefer. I think a little bit of that Neil Stevens prescribed activism might be in order here.

There are the other main issues. Judges is a big one. There is a popular ad hominem argument that Senator McCain will go back on his word about judges because good judges won't like McCain-Feingold. I just answered that in my description: It's an ad hominem circumstantial argument. Here is my belief and your hope: Senator McCain will keep his word on judges. He wants to, it's a political necessity, and we have the benefit of Harriet Miers behind us to show what we can do with those who are not acceptable.

But I am getting long with this entry. As William Shakespeare once said "He draweth out the thread of his verbosity finer than the staple of his argument." Or perhaps in light of my writing "style" the anonymous admonition "Sedulously eschew obfuscatory hyper verbosity and prolixity" is the appropriate remark? How about Richard Kemph, who said "Quotes are nothing but inspiration for the uninspired."

I know some of you are uninspired, but I am not. What is it that I believe? I believe a man who believes in America is going to be our President, and that he is going to fight the terrible war that must be fought. I believe he will fight the glorious war on spending that must be fought. Senator McCain can't claim membership any longer in that nebulous group we call "Conservatives", but he is mostly conservative. In the end, in four years, I believe some things will be the same, but some things will be much better.

For conservatives, that will be a bright day indeed. We'll be ready, we'll have a champion, someone Rush doesn't have to hate. I don't know who. But he'll have cleaner, less expensive, less corrupt Washington for us to send him to.

Many who despair will not be swayed or persuaded here. I know this is so. That's what the hopes are about above. Hold those, if nothing else.

The conservative agenda needs only one critical ingredient. Patience. Scratch that: Further patience.

Now, here are some good blogs to help you recover from this one
(plus some of my own ... thaaaat's right):

Positively Positive | Affirmative, Not Positive | Not Positive |
Excellent Farewell | Thoughtful | McCain: Taxes |
McCain: Abortion | McCain: Vet Care | Fallible George Will
update: Don Surber: acceptance
update: Not Voting Doesn't Do What You Think It Does

absentee