Cross-posted at Democrashield
Recently, James Dobson--Christian conservative and head of the extremist group Focus on the Family--endorsed Mike Huckabee, saying that he would never vote for John McCain. At the Conservative Political Action Conference, the GOP rank-and-file booed McCain during his speech. On show after show, right-wing talking head Rush Limbaugh trashes McCain. Republican stormtrooper Ann Coulter said she would rather vote for Hillary Clinton than John McCain.
More below the fold...
In addition, Disgraced former House Speaker Newt Gingrich says the GOP needs to "shrug off McCain," while disgraced former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay refused to say he'd vote for McCain, even if it would "keep the Clintons out of the White House."
Why are conservatives kneecapping McCain?
While McCain does have a long record of making enemies within the Republican Party, he has an extremely conservative voting record and he sides with the GOP more often than not. He's the presumptive Republican nominee--in all likelihood, he'll be carrying the Republican banner this election. So why would they hurt their own party by attacking their Presidential nominee right out of the gate?
Well, the people kneecapping McCain aren't just Republicans--they're movement conservatives. They don't care about winning the next election, they care about advancing conservative ideas. The movementarians know that their power and influence comes from being the leaders of the conservative movement, and they'll fight to advance that movement--at any cost.Though McCain's a conservative, he's not a movement conservative--he's an establishmentarian who, despite his pandering, doesn't always subscribe to the movement's orthodoxy. He's willing to contradict them, to throw them under the bus, to fall short of the extreme partisanship demanded by the likes of Limbaugh and DeLay. That's not to say he doesn't ever do those things--he just doesn't do them enough.
McCain will do almost anything to get ahead. In this post-Bush world--where conservative ideas are nowhere near as popular as they once were--McCain wouldn't be above throwing the conservative movement under the bus, even going as far as to work with some Democrats now and again (instead of shutting them out in true conservative fashion).
So the conservative movement is kneecapping McCain because they don't care if he loses. In fact, it would be better for them if he lost. Why?
First--as soon as a Democratic President is inaugurated--the conseravtives will lay all the country's problems at his/her feet. They'll blame him/her for all the problems he/she would inherit from the Bush administration, browbeating him/her for failing solve those problems quickly or completely enough. With both a Democratic Congress and a Democratic President, the conservative movement will be able to spend the next 4 years doing what they do best--complaining and attacking Democrats. It would be like the Clinton years all over again.
Second, if McCain were to lose the conservative movement will claim victory. They'll spend the next 4 years browbeating Republicans, telling them that they lost because they didn't nominate a "true conservative." Come 2012, the movementarians will push their extremist candidate of choice on the voters, pointing to the failed McCain candidacy as proof that Republican voters better listen to them--or else.
Third, the movementarians aren't stupid; they see the writing on the wall. They see massive Democratic fundraising and pitiful Republican fundraising. They see huge turnout on the Democratic side and tepid interest on the Republican side. They see two Democratic candidates with thriving movements and one Republican candidate with lukewarm support and a lagging campaign. They know that 2008 is going to be an uphill battle for the Republican Party, and that it's becoming increasingly unlikely they can win the next election.
So, as Digby puts it:
Do you get the feeling that the conservatives are gaming this thing? I knew that you would.
They know they are going to lose. They will blame the loss on the fact that McCain wasn't a real conservative (just like Bush.) They know when to fall back and regroup. They're already playing for the next election.
Everybody sing: Conservatism can never fail, it can only be failed.
The movementarians are throwing McCain under the bus--before he can throw them under the bus--for the sake of their movement. Sure, they'll be locked out of government for a few years--possibly a good number of years--but they and their ideas will live on to fight another day. They're trying to make McCain's loss not a failure of Republicanism or conservatism, but a failure of moderation. In 2012, they'll be back in full force, demanding that the GOP voters pay fealty to their extremist, cutthroat politics once again.
The conservative movement is dying, and the movementarians are desperately trying to stop the bleeding. Will their gamble pay off? Will they be successful? Or will their contribution to a John McCain loss usher in a new Democratic coalition that could lock conservatives out of government for years to come? Only time will tell.