Redstate

By Nathan Nelson Posted in Republicans — Comments (15) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

I've never been President Bush's greatest fan. To be honest, I am still in recovery from Bush Derangement Syndrome; prior to realizing my own center-right views back in February, I harbored as much hatred for President Bush as the next Democrat, if not more. For this reason and others, I have stayed away from blogging overly much about the President. Although I no longer hate him as I once did, I'm certainly not enthusiastic about him and I have little interest in his presidency. As someone who is in recovery from Bush Derangement Syndrome, however, I know it when I see it. And I see it on the right today.

Read on...

It comes in a different form for those on the right than it does for those on the left, but it is still a form of the same problem. Whereas those on the left believe that Bush is responsible for all the problems of America and, indeed, the world, those on the right increasingly believe that Bush is responsible for all the problems of the Republican Party and the conservative movement. In other words, they believe that Bush has betrayed the right. I call this Bush Betrayal Complex. The Anchoress currently has some strong medicine for those who suffer from Bush Betrayal Complex. My advice is to read it twice and then call me in the morning.

The idea that President Bush has betrayed the right stems primarily, although not exclusively, from the pending immigration compromise. Put simply, those on the right do not want the compromise to pass, and they're mad as hell that President Bush has lent his support to it and thus strengthened its chances of actually becoming law. Fair enough. I'm opposed to the immigration compromise as well, and I'd rather not see it become law. I'm not particularly happy that President Bush disagrees with me. But I'm not surprised by our disagreement over this, nor do I feel that I have somehow been betrayed. How can one cry betrayal when one has been told all along what the President believes? Were those who are now crying betrayal not listening in 2000 and then again in 2004 when Bush said that he favored comprehensive immigration reform? If they were listening, did they think he was joking? How anyone can say that positions Bush held when he was elected and then reelected constitute betrayal is beyond me. Perhaps they have a different definition of betrayal than I have.

I think the real problem, the real root of this Bush Betrayal Complex, is that Bush has dared to disagree at all. If anything, President Bush has been too willing to bend to the will of those on the right, and I say this as someone whose leanings are center-right (and more to the right of that center). The right has gotten so used to Bush doing whatever they demand that, when he finally disagrees and won't capitulate, they go apoplectic and cry betrayal. It's sort of like when parents let their children grow up always getting their way, and then finally one day say no. Such children will inevitably throw an unholy tantrum because they have become so accustomed to getting their way. I think that's what's going on here. The right has gotten so much from President Bush - if you want to disagree with me, re-read The Anchoress' post above - that now they expect him to give them everything they want.

It's not a bit surprising that President Bush has decided to throw down the gauntlet in this policy area. Having served as the governor of a border state, he likely feels that he knows a bit more about illegal immigration and what to do about it than a bunch of conservatives in the Midwest and Southeast. We think we feel insulted by the fact that he's not listening to us, but have we ever stopped to think how he must feel? He governed a border state and yet his experience as Texas' governor is routinely dismissed. Like those on the left, we treat him as though he is inept, stupid. We're more subtle about it, but we're treating him the same way. And then we complain about our feelings being hurt? He's the President of the United States, a former governor of a major border state, and on this issue he's treated by those within his own party as if he is nothing more than the court jester.

Of course, these are not the only issues cited by those who are calling for a conservative "divorce" from the Republican Party. There was the Harriet Miers nomination. And for the love of God, government is spending too much! My response to this? So what, and yeah, what's new?

The Harriet Miers nomination. What can one say about it? Yes, it was probably a mistake on the President's part. We don't really know how big a mistake it would or would not have been, of course, because the Miers nomination was withdrawn. But it's perceived by many on the right as having been a big mistake. What was the President thinking? Well, I don't know exactly what he was thinking. Had I been him and had I chosen Harriet Miers, though, I might have been thinking something like this: I know Harriet Miers. I trust Harriet Miers enough to be my own lawyer. I know Harriet Miers' legal philosophy. At this crucial time, when the balance of the Court could either remain the same or change in favor of judicial conservatism, I believe that I can trust Harriet Miers to be the kind of Supreme Court justice we're looking for.

If that's what the President was thinking, was he wrong? He could have been. God knows the man doesn't claim presidential infallibility. But he could also have been right. Have we ever stopped to consider that? Have we ever stopped to consider that Harriet Miers may not have turned out to be the judicial ogre everyone assumed she would be? In any event, she didn't turn out to be a judicial anything. And why? Precisely because she and President Bush heard the outcry of those on the right, admitted their mistake, withdrew her nomination, and instead nominated Samuel Alito. How, then, is this betrayal? The President made a mistake, accepted that it was a mistake, and corrected the mistake with an outcome favorable to those on the right. Where's the beef, folks? In what sense is this a betrayal? Was he not permitted to make the mistake in the first place? Is it infallibility that you expect of him? Were you looking for a messiah in Crawford, Texas, or a President?

And then there was spending. The President is a traitor to conservatism because he has signed bill after pork-laden bill. Spending is out of control! Well, yes. Thank you for noticing. There's just one teensy problem with heaping this burden onto the President's shoulders: he didn't draft the bills, and he didn't amend the pork into them. Guess who did that? Congress. Read it again: Congress. The same people who are getting on TV to condemn the President for supposedly governing from the left are the same people who drafted, amended, and voted on these pork-laden bills, then sent them to the President and said: "Here. We need your John Hancock."

Could the President have vetoed them? Sure, why not? Then the federal government could have gone into meltdown, because let's not forget that Congress would wait until the very last possible minute to send these pork-laden bills to the President. Maybe Bush should have exercised more control over spending. Then again, the Constitution puts responsibility for spending squarely in the hands of Congress. The 109th Congress failed to produce the line item veto that would have really given the President the power to control spending, and then proceeded to send him bill after pork-laden bill to be either signed in full or vetoed in full, consequences for the country be damned. It sounds nice, doesn't it, when John McCain says that he will veto pork-laden bills and make the big spenders famous? But let's see what he'll do when he receives a war spending bill with funding needed quickly, filled up with pork for peanuts. Will he veto that? Maybe he will, but I don't think so.

I don't deny that President Bush bears some responsibility for out of control spending, but the real responsibility for it rests squarely on the shoulders of the congressional leadership and anyone who voted for pork-laden bills. It is, after all, Congress that has the power of the purse. The fact that they're turning the purse upside down and emptying it into their friends' pockets is not really the President's fault when everything is said and done. It might be easy for congressmen and senators to blame their election losses on a President who wouldn't veto overspending, but maybe they should look themselves in the mirror and ask themselves how hard they worked to ensure that their Congress got a grip on spending. Obviously, someone in Congress wasn't working hard enough.

Sure, there are other issues. When a man wants to feel betrayed, he will come up with reasons to justify that sense of betrayal. The President hasn't done enough here, he's done too much there, therefore he is governing from the left, he is a traitor to conservative values, he is the enemy of the right - and we want a divorce.

Meanwhile, an election is coming and the nation is watching. The mainstream media has been saying since well before the 2006 elections that Republicans must distance themselves from Bush, otherwise they'll lose. This should be telling us that we need to do the exact opposite, given that this is a media hostile to us that wants us to lose, a media routinely dumbfounded by political realities that most common people grasp. If conservative bloggers and other conservative leaders distance themselves from Bush or from the Republican Party as a whole, what do they think is going to happen? I'll tell you what will happen: center-right and right-leaning voters will either stay home, vote third party, or vote Democrat. Any of those three scenarios leads to the same outcome, and that is Democratic victory in 2008 - a Democratic House, a Democratic Senate, a Democratic White House, and a Democratic bureaucracy. If this is what we want, then by all means, let's have our divorce. Let's part over our irreconcilable differences and our accusations that President Bush has committed adultery with the left. But if we still want to win, if we still believe that even the worst Republican is better than a Democrat, then let's clean up our act, iron out our differences, and get back to the ideals that win us the people and the policy proposals that win us elections.

This is really the choice we face. Once upon a time, it was the left and only the left that sought utopia in this world, a messiah among politicians. The right is now in danger of turning toward a conservative version of this same messianic utopianism. We are no longer content with a President. If he is not perfect, then he has betrayed us. And the next President must be perfect. He must not dissent on immigration or campaign finance reform, he must not dissent on abortion or gay civil unions, he must not dissent on trade with China, he must not dissent on creationism vs. evolution, he must not ever change his mind, and he must not be too Hollywood. He must be like us in all things but sin. He must be our utopian messiah. Personally, I have a messiah already and a faith that reminds me that utopia in this world is impossible, and thus folly for man to seek. Perfection among men is that which we must strive for in the knowledge that we will only achieve it at the end of the race and by God's grace alone, and thus perfection is not something we can or should expect from our political leaders.

We must accept that the man we have now is a President and not a messiah, and we must look for another man to be a President and not a messiah. We must have faith in our God that, as Julian of Norwich said, "all will be well, all will be well, and all manner of things will be well" - but in God's time, not our own. We must strive for perfection, we must hold our leaders to high standards, but we must not expect more of them than what human beings can actually give. We must not expect uniformity, and God forbid conformity. We must accept that no matter who we choose to be our next presidential candidate, he will disagree with us over something, and probably over several somethings. We must be content with the fact that we all accept the same basic, broad values: faith, family, and freedom; limited domestic government and a strong national defense. And we must iron out our differences as we go along, through prayer to the God who unites us and civil debate between brothers, without talk of "betrayal" and "divorce" - but merely disagreement, debate, discussion, dialogue, and ultimately, decisions made for the good of this great nation.