Jonah Goldberg Concedes Defeat for McCain With Warnings Against Extremism

Conservatives such as Jonah Goldberg and The New York Post apparently recognize that Barack Obama will be elected president next week. Goldberg writes a speculative/paranoid view of Obama Four Years Later: A Look Back At His Presidency. He portrays a term so extremist and  unsuccessful that Joe Biden is forced to resign and that, after being denied the vice presidency a second time, Hillary Clinton successfully challenges Obama for the Democratic nomination 2012.

Besides virtually acknowledging that McCain will lose, articles such as this demonstrate how out of touch with reality conservatives are if they think that, even granting some intentional hyperbole, this in any way resembles what an Obama administration would be like. Do they really believe their own talking points when Republicans run for office by distorting the views of their opponent?

Vice presidents resigning? Does Goldberg really want to remind readers that the only vice president to resign was Republican Sprio Agnew who has many similarities to Sarah Palin, including being used as an attack dog/pit bull to bash the opposition and the press while ultimately facing ethics scandals in his own state?

Failed presidencies? You would think they would want to avoid any thought of George Bush.

Even the extremism argument works against the Republicans. Repeatedly we have had Republicans make promises of a kinder, gentler government, and with George W. Bush a promise of compassionate conservatism. Now John McCain runs as a Maverick against his own party’s rule.  It should be a tip off that something is wrong with conservatism when most of the Republican candidates feel compelled to run against it or promise they are somehow different.

George Bush ran as a compassionate conservative and then governed as possibly the most extremist president in our history, thinking he could govern with the support of fifty percent plus one, ultimately causing his support to fall below that of even Richard Nixon (another Republican forced to resign from office). If voters want to get away from extremism the choice is clear in backing a centrist government under someone like Barack Obama who has showed he is open to ideas from both the left and the right, as opposed to gambling on yet another Republican who claims he is different.

1 Comment

  1. 1
    jdan 1001 says:

    John C. Calhoun, Jackson’s VP also resigned.

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