Tonight’s GOP debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in Ventura County, Southern California, was better as a debate, thanks to moderator Jake Tapper, who decided to be journalist rather than part of the status quo. But it reveals the Republican Party’s fundamental bankruptcy (read my pre-debate analysis of each candidate here).
As has been clear for decades, the party has abandoned its defense of individual rights and capitalism, which has never been strong and consistent. But tonight’s debate showed the total inversion. The three-hour main event demonstrated that the candidates oppose man’s rights and pure capitalism while pretending to represent the best of both ideals. Frontrunner Donald Trump, for instance, made his essential value proposition that he can fix America because he’s a businessman. Then, he promptly defended the income tax, denouncing the flat tax as too complicated in favor of the graduated income tax, and called himself “militaristic” in an apparent confusion over whether militarism is a virtue in an American president. When Trump was right, as he was in contending that George W. Bush made Obama possible, he failed to explain why, let alone do so on principle.
Fake capitalist Trump was topped by fake capitalist Carly Fiorina, an ex-CEO who was fired and ran for the U.S. Senate in a race she lost (by a wide margin). Everything she said, including her debate theme to challenge the status quo, is unconvincing. Ms. Fiorina had been elevated in stature by an earlier attack by Trump on her looks which allowed her to play to her essential value proposition in this presidential campaign: the fact that she is a woman. Everything she says and does is calculated to magnify this fact, despite her assertion that she’s the anti-Hillary Clinton. Actually, Carly Fiorina, who made an emotional rant against fetal tissue research, is very much like Mrs. Clinton, whom she rightly accused of being devoid of accomplishment.
That the most serious anti-abortion female presidential candidate later claimed in her Lady Liberty/Lady Justice pitch that she seeks to offer everyone the “opportunity to live the life she chooses” underscores that this candidate is a fraud as an advocate for individual rights. Everything from a line for women about Trump’s comment on her face, an easy shot against Trump, to her being the only candidate to decline to name a woman to put on paper currency, amounts to an appeal based solely on her sex. Ms. Fiorina proved again that she can come up with lines fast but she’s putting on an act; she seeks power for its own sake.
Sen. Ted Cruz denounced the Iran deal in strong terms, looking into the camera and speaking in measured language naming national security as a paramount concern, sharply asking an Iran deal apologist: “How do we know if they cheat?” Cruz’s closing statement, framed by Tapper as a hypothetical post-presidency assessment, was good, with no mention of his recent plan to elect the Supreme Court. He invoked Winston Churchill, pledged to open a U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, Israel, and named “radical Islamic terrorism”, which President Obama refuses to do. He promised that he would “never, ever, ever” let Iran’s ayatollahs acquire nuclear weapons, proposed a flat tax, abolition of the IRS and repeal of “every word of ObamaCare”. But in touting the fact that he’s been fighting the status quo, he reminded the audience that he is not winning.
Jeb Bush blurted out the debate’s biggest applause line with the lie that his brother “kept us safe” from attack, an outrageous if widely accepted claim given that the nation’s worst attack happened on Bush’s brother’s watch, not counting numerous attacks (DC sniper, anthrax attack, various passenger jet attacks stopped by passengers, not government) that followed. Trump replied with the question “do you feel safe right now?”, a legitimate counterpoint to the Bush presidency which no one answered.
On the positive side, Gov. John Kasich evoked a sense of optimism and called for a return to an American, can-do approach to getting things done and the questions and format were more serious than the personality-driven event co-sponsored by Fox News and Facebook. The debate’s best short line came from Sen. Marco Rubio, who noted that “we have a president who is more respectful of the ayatollah than of the prime minister of Israel”.
But Sen. Rubio also said that U.S. foreign policy “must find moderate elements in the Middle East” and arm them, without mentioning that the evidence that moderate elements exist is scant. Ben Carson equivocated and endorsed raising the minimum wage, adding that the U.S. government should impose two minimum wages! Gov. Kasich, who said he would put Mother Teresa on the ten dollar bill, proposed that America adopt Judeo Christianity’s ethics of selflessness to stop Islamic barbarians from recruiting Americans to sacrifice themselves in acts of Islamic jihad. Is Ohio’s governor, a serious contender polling well in New Hampshire, preaching religion and selflessness to stop violent acts of religion and selflessness?
Yes, seriously and unfortunately. Stand by for the Democrats in October.
So far, the 2016 presidential election campaign is devoid of debate. The first “debate”, an event co-sponsored by Facebook and Fox News, was not a debate—it was a personality quiz show—and the fact that Donald Trump dominates the campaign underscores the blankness.
But someone is going to be elected president of the United States next November. With Obama’s presidency as an example of radical change for the worse, electing a new president sets the nation’s course and decides one’s future. A presidential election is important. With next week’s Republican debate in Southern California, these are my thoughts on the early campaign, current field of presidential candidates and CNN’s September 16 debate.
Democrats
Lincoln Chafee, former governor of Rhode Island. This former Republican, chiefly known for opposing the Iraq war, is the last vestige of the once-dominant noblesse oblige, New England Republican—Yankee types such as Prescott Bush, Nelson Rockefeller and the Harrimans—that gradually migrated to the explicitly statist Democratic Party.
Martin O’Malley, former governor of Maryland. This populist is typical of post-2008 crash anti-capitalism. Though O’Malley blames Wall Street for problems caused by government intervention in economics, an entrenched Democrat theme, he has become a symbol of another favorite leftist bogeyman: the white male. In one of his better moments, O’Malley countered that “all lives matter” to a Black Lives Matter movement racist. But he soon apologized for the reply.
Jim Webb, former senator from Virginia. If the only non-leftist Democratic candidate for president, who is reasonable on certain issues including his non-interventionist opposition to the war in Iraq, gains an audience as an alternative to this year’s leftist-socialist-fascist axis, he could surprise as an insurrectionist from the right or get noticed as a potential running mate. This is unlikely.
Hillary Clinton, former secretary of state. It’s tempting to take pity on the former First Lady. She so nakedly lusts for power and is so ill-equipped to compete in terms of personality that it’s obvious she expected a coronation. She lost in 2008 to Obama for the same reason. Her tacit entitlement mentality premise that she paid her dues and it’s her rightful place to become the first woman president may again make way for an upstart from the left. This woman’s whole undistinguished career is based on grafting herself onto the names, works and lives of others, like a parasite, and all it adds up to is a brittle legacy of one who blindly stood by her man, whether it was Bill Clinton or Barack Obama, making her 1992 assertion (“I’m not Tammy Wynette…”) to the contrary a projection of the blank woman she really is.
Bernie Sanders, senator from Vermont. This man is a socialist. He taps the New Left’s hatred for capitalism and, as made evident by the re-election of Barack Obama, there is an appetite for the theft and seizure of Americans’ property and wealth. Sanders can win the nomination and the election. What happened in the U.K. this week can happen here. It already is happening and by “it” I mean total government control of people’s money and the means of making it. That his sincerity is his asset ought to motivate every decent American. Sanders, if elected, is intent on destroying capitalism.
Joe Biden, Vice-President. Biden’s best moments were during his Senate Judiciary Committee opposition to Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork. That was a long time ago. Since then, his plagiarism of the Labor Party’s Neil Kinnock and obedient service to the Obama administration diminish his record. The Vice-President’s overall reputation as a jovial politician who blankly smiles at everything—MSNBC’s Chris Matthews compared him this week to a St. Bernard that licks everyone—does not help him to be taken seriously. But this quality may endear him to voters who are weary of controversy and prefer a lighter, airier version of more of the same.
Republicans
Donald Trump, businessman. I think Trump is an unprincipled candidate (read my first assessment of Trump, which I posted earlier this summer, here) who is emblematic of today’s intellectual bankruptcy. I admit, though, that I have been shocked by how easily the establishment, and by ‘establishment’ I mean Washington, DC, but also the leftist-conservative media, plays into his manipulations. They are perplexed by his appeal. I am not. Trump at his worst still speaks plainly and this, in a culture that’s been dumbed down by the media and intellectuals and reduced to quasi and self-censorship, hugely appeals to the vast, silent majority of (otherwise) reasonable Americans who remember better candidates who didn’t parse every word and split every hair to get votes, get on TV or ingratiate themselves to the establishment. The public is electrified that crony Trump names, upends and masters the crony game. I think people yearn for someone to take control of the country, which to many decent people has derailed in almost every way, and fix America. Of course, no leader can fix America. To look to one leader to do so is a grave and potentially dangerous mistake. Yet this is what people like about Donald Trump. It’s not that people think he’s authentic—I think people are in on the joke and know that he’s a showman and a pushy New Yorker—it’s that many American voters have become convinced that America needs someone who can push people around and get things done, no matter how crude, ridiculous and unrealistic his approach. I don’t think it dawns on most people that the anti-intellectual Trump is a highly risky proposition; how could it? Most people don’t think, let alone think in principles. What will bring him down is the campaign that persuades the GOP voter that Trump is likely to lose to a principled candidate even if those principles are total statism—or that, worse, unfiltered Trump the unprincipled candidate wins and that, when he wins, as with Obama, everything people think they like about Trump becomes what they come to hate.
Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida. Bush, like Clinton, is the establishment candidate with no real record of achievement. He does not stand for any single principle. Bush differentiates himself from the field and his brother and father ex-presidents Bush only in his more explicit endorsement of the status quo. A vote for Jeb Bush is like a vote for more of what preceded and brought on Barack Obama.
Scott Walker, governor of Wisconsin. Despite a record of defeating the leftist machine and a spirited campaign launch with an endorsement of Wisconsin’s Kevin Hermening, an American held prisoner in Teheran by Iran’s Islamic terrorists at the U.S. embassy from 1979-1981, Walker lacks conviction, or at least a proper philosophical orientation, as I wrote in 2012 (read it here) when he was re-elected. Hermening’s presence at Walker’s launch was an especially good counterpoint to Obama’s Iran deal. Hermening told a newspaper that he likes Gov. Walker because Walker “lifts up and holds steadfast to the principles of a capitalist economic system and a peace through strength military posture.” That Walker fails to communicate this ideal is a bad sign.
Ben Carson, retired neurosurgeon. This year’s inexperienced if congenial presidential candidate gaining a following based on an appealing biography is a Christian neurosurgeon named Ben Carson, not Barack Obama, though the similarities don’t end there. Both are black, raised by mothers, educated in law or medicine and acquired an early status as challenger to the party’s frontrunner in Iowa, the nation’s first caucus state. Carson’s relaxed television persona belies his hostile or ill-considered comments on his opposition to abortion, about gays and faith—and his apparent conviction that belief without evidence qualifies him for the presidency—and suggest that the supposedly mild-mannered doctor can come off as a passive-aggressive believer who is unfit to lead.
Ted Cruz, senator from Texas. I agree with Thomas Sowell, an economist who once questioned Sen. Cruz’s record of getting results in the U.S. Senate. Those who support Cruz tend to ignore that his role as an avenger is largely unsuccessful. He sounds excellent in his opposition to ObamaCare and the Iran deal, but he has failed to stop them. He has failed to make a persuasive case to his party, his legislative colleagues and leaders and the general public. This undercuts his best qualities, which certainly include an insightful grasp of what’s wrong with America’s foreign and domestic policies. Leadership means persuading people to vote for the best course of action, whether rallying and guiding the nation and Congress to an act of war or abolition of a terrible government program. Sen. Cruz, whom I first criticized in 2013 (read my post, “Ted Cruz and Praying for Time”, here), additionally seeks to put Supreme Court justices to an election, ban abortion and same-sex marriage, and generally impose religion in government. How can someone who puts faith above reason with a fundamental opposition to the founding ideals of the republic be counted on to enact—and persuade others to support—legislation and acts that restore reason to the nation founded upon individual rights?
Marco Rubio, senator from Florida. Though he was elected as a Tea Party insurgent, Rubio has struggled to integrate his views on immigration, health care and privacy into a coherent political philosophy. Like all Republican candidates except Pataki, he opposes a woman’s right to an abortion. He also supports mass, indiscriminate surveillance by the state. So, despite his Tea Party origins and opposition to ObamaCare, he’s fading as a serious contender for leading America out of darkness.
Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas. This Christian welfare-statist appeared on Fox News with his own show after he ran for president. Now, he grandstands with Kentucky’s Christian clerk who refuses to perform her job and abide the law. Huckabee appears willing to do anything to get elected. He was the kind Christian governor who liked government programs that help the poor. He was the open-hearted folk host who welcomed gays on his broadcast. Now he puts on a show for a Democrat religious zealot who flouts the law because she doesn’t approve of the gays getting legally married.
Rand Paul, senator from Kentucky. His best views are his arguments against the surveillance state. His isolationist foreign policy views are a major drawback. Worst of all, he seems unable to make an argument on principle. It is not clear that he has principles.
John Kasich, governor of Ohio. He touts his support for government programs on religious grounds and, like other candidates, sees himself as a vessel of a supernatural being. Never popular with Tea Party conservatives, he’s a possible dark horse candidate because he truly sees himself as a humble, religious servant of statism—to a slightly lesser degree than the Democrats—which means his sincere Christianity may garner support.
Chris Christie, governor of New Jersey. This pushy pragmatist practices short, snappy answers and lines. Beware of his support for the mosque near where radical Moslems destroyed the World Trade Center and dubious past, including the bridge scandal, shadowy supporters and his explicit favoritism toward Obama.
Carly Fiorina, former business executive. Like Christie, Fiorina is practiced at delivering zippy lines. But she has no real, consistent ideas. She was a terrible Senate candidate against Barbara Boxer in California and she will be an equally ineffectual nominee.
Rick Perry, governor of Texas. A fundamentalist who suspended his campaign and spoke of sunsets in Texas because he challenged Trump with nothing but platitudes—and lost.
Rick Santorum, former senator from Pennsylvania. A fundamentalist who opposes contraceptives (read my 2012 thoughts about Santorum here).
Bobby Jindal, governor of Louisiana. An opportunistic advocate for bigger government in economics and religion.
George Pataki, former governor of New York. The GOP’s only pro-choice candidate is also an advocate of Big Government.
Lindsey Graham, senator from South Carolina. Defender of the disaster that was the Iraq war.
Overall, I think it’s a mistake to look for a leader to advance real, positive political change. The president makes a difference in everyday life, no doubt about it, and each candidate has major flaws from the rational or Objectivist perspective. Choices are limited and this doesn’t mean it is acceptable not to vote. Though there exists no orientation among the candidates for individual rights, one of them will win and each voter must decide the best candidate.
The field is terrible, as I am confident that this week’s “debate” or televised show will demonstrate. The event is scheduled for broadcast from the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California and will be moderated by CNN’s Jake Tapper, a former politico himself and a decent broadcast journalist at his best, though he recently disappointed me (read my review of his recent debut here).
The 2016 presidential election, if it happens without corruption or interference, will decide the next president, who may be more likely to deal with the ominous prospect of an economic and/or military defense catastrophe. America needs not a clown, a dictator or a congenial host or snappy hostess to Big Government. America needs a serious leader who will dismantle the welfare state, buy time to set things right without being torn apart from within or blown apart from outside attack. America needs a president who recognizes the rights of man and grasps the proper role of government. No one candidate meets this requirement. On September 16, every American voter should watch CNN to take measure of those campaigning to see who comes closest to being an advocate, if not a champion—which is what each voter must himself become—of individual rights.
Unfortunately, Sunday’s premiere of CNN’s reconfigured State of the Union, which premiered in 2009, represents everything wrong with television, broadcast journalism and, in particular, political journalism. The one-hour Sunday morning news program, which is putting it generously, was soft, weak and incestuous. Billed as an exclusive interview with a former president, whose spouse is running for president, with another segment featuring the brother of a former president, the entire show centered upon access by the new host, who failed to disclose that he worked for the former president’s son-in-law’s mother.
One might be able to overlook such a transgression if the host were not as capable a journalist as Jake Tapper, who hosts CNN’s The Lead and does an excellent job in general, too. But, as I wrote about Megyn Kelly and Maria Bartiromo in their lackluster debuts on Fox News, one expects the best to be better than the competition. Tapper is among the best in TV’s journalism. Last month, he invited and interviewed Islamic jihadist target Pamela Geller after the Texas attack by Moslem terrorists on her free speech event; he was even-handed and respectful and asked good questions in what is one of her most passionate, articulate and persuasive interviews. He consistently asks questions that are sharp, independent and challenging, always questioning the state and showing a grasp of what it means to reduce the news to the individual. Though he’s a former Democratic Party operative and congressional Democrat’s press secretary, and his career includes jobs in both journalism and activism, he frequently asks pointed, intelligent questions like he’s in the Tea Party. Tapper’s coverage and analysis of war news, including CNN reporter Drew Griffin’s fine work exposing the Obama administration’s incompetence and conspiracy to deprive basic care to war veterans, is also very good.
This is why his failure to ask Bill Clinton even one question about his dreadful war and military record in the aftermath of the debacle of Iraq is so disappointing. It’s bad enough that Tapper failed to disclose the interview nature, agreement and audience terms and conditions involved with President Clinton, let alone his professional affiliation with the Clintons’ daughter’s husband’s mother or the fact that he dated the president’s mistress, an intern whose relationship with the president led to testimony which led to impeachment. Tapper’s exclusive interview with Clinton, packed with an audience of questionable origin and totally predicated on questions pertaining to Clinton’s dubious organization, amount to an infomercial for Clinton’s group. The connections among Monica Lewinsky, bombing and refusing to annihilate Islamic terrorists that would launch an attack on 9/11, Hillary Clinton, the jihadists’ Benghazi slaughter of Americans and Mrs. Clinton’s subsequent attack on free speech, are a thinking journalist’s dream. Whatever the ground rules for Tapper’s interview with the ex-president, he didn’t ask about any of those issues. This despite the attack on CNN by the president’s wife’s administration when she was secretary of state.
There is too much cronyism in Washington and Jake Tapper’s Bill Clinton interview reeks of it. This was underscored in a sidebar on another Bush presidential candidate, affectionately referred to here the entire time in subtitle as “Jeb”. The Jeb tag is presumably in accordance with the Jeb Bush for President campaign’s instructions to CNN to reduce and nearly eliminate any reference to that shriek-inducing last name. That the Jeb piece was conducted by the ultimate Washington toadying type, Dana Bash, an imperiously vacuous reporter whose Jeb Bush interview would have been more revealing if done by a high school student, just made the whole show worse.
“Dynastic” is the word Jake Tapper used in opening comments to describe the state of the union in State of the Union, 2015 version. This was before the soft, adoring, obsequious Clinton and Bush interviews and more of the same middling pundits chimed in. If only Jake Tapper had led with his mind the way he does on The Lead, if only he had really delved into the state of the union, not the state of the status quo. I had been looking forward to this program and had anticipated hard-hitting, radical challenges and questions and discourse from the reporter from Philadelphia. Judging by the first new show, Tapper merely strives for more of the same. The opposite is what viewers deserve.
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Tonight’s GOP debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in Ventura County, Southern California, was better as a debate, thanks to moderator Jake Tapper, who decided to be journalist rather than part of the status quo. But it reveals the Republican Party’s fundamental bankruptcy (read my pre-debate analysis of each candidate here).
Republicans
Unfortunately, Sunday’s premiere of CNN’s reconfigured State of the Union, which premiered in 2009, represents everything wrong with television, broadcast journalism and, in particular, political journalism. The one-hour Sunday morning news program, which is putting it generously, was soft, weak and incestuous. Billed as an exclusive interview with a former president, whose spouse is running for president, with another segment featuring the brother of a former president, the entire show centered upon access by the new host, who failed to disclose that he worked for the former president’s son-in-law’s mother.