Great news: McCain set to remake GOP in his own centrist image

Allahpundit, consider the source. The Politico article’s conclusion about John McCain seeking to remake the GOP is based on McCain supporting certain candidates who supported McCain in the past and who incidentally on their merits deserve support. The candidates include: Vaughn Ward, a Marine who ran McCain’s Nevada campaign, for a U.S. House seat from Nevada; Meg Whitman, the best GOP candidate out there for the California Governorship; and Van Tran, a Vietnamese-American challenging Democrat Loretta Sanchez for the U.S. House seat from Orange County, California.
Such support, however, does not mean McCain is out to remake the GOP as a more moderate party. That is just wishing by Politico, a liberal leaning outfit.

So Rush Limbaugh can relax and maybe think about McCain’s conservative voting record this year. McCain voted AGAINST every Obama bailout bill. McCain voted AGAINST every Obama deficit spending bill, denouncing the multi-trillion dollar deficit spending as “generational theft,” a phrase thereafter used by Sean Hannity and more recently by Rush Limbaugh. McCain voted AGAINST the confirmations of tax cheat Geithner, radical pro-abortion advocate Sebellius, leftist Kagan and transnational legal theorist Koh to their respective positions in the Obama Administration. McCain voted AGAINST the confirmation of Sotomayer to the U.S. Supreme Court. McCain has announced he is opposed to Obama’s cap and trade bill and opposed to ObamaCare. If more Republicans are elected and vote like that, then we will be fine.

Phil Byler on October 3, 2009 at 7:38 AM

To William2006 on October 3, 2009 at 5:31 PM;

If you rationally paid attention to McCain’s conservative voting record and foreign policy history, you would realize that there is no place at all in the Democrat Party for a foreign policy hawk, pro-life fiscal conservative. You, like too many conservatives, have anomisties to McCain that are not supported by the facts and are counter-productive as we go forward. McCain does know what he is doing concerning foreign policy, military matters and national security, and Obama does not. As Obama becomes an iincreasing disaster in foreign plicy, military matters and national security, you want to rid the GOP of a strong knowledgeable foreign policy voice in McCain. That is really very, very stupid.

Phil Byler on October 3, 2009 at 8:16 PM

To Dr. Evil on October 3, 2009 at 5:22 PM:

McCain is not playing with perception. He is simply doing what he did in 2004 in campaigning hard for Bush for President and in 2006 with Bush in campaigning hard for GOP congressional candidates: being a Republican supporting other Republican.

Phil Byler on October 3, 2009 at 8:25 PM

To Chris_Balsz on October 4, 2009 at 12:13 AM:

If you want to look at the whole package, fine. But do so with the facts.

Amnesty? McCain is NOT for amnesty. You are relying on the criticism of the 2007 immigration bill, which was what President Bush wanted to help get Hispanic votes for the GOP but which was attacked on the ground it would de facto result in amnesty. The bill’s supporters denied that was the case because of the law enforcement provisions. The problem was the historical experience of the last major immigration reform law, which was enacted during the Reagan Administration and signed by President Reagan; the law enforcement provisions of that Reagan era law were not enforced, and that is what created the current problem. So when the 2007 immigration bill faced the firestorm of opposition, McCain and other stepped back, and McCain went to the position of law enforcement coming first, citing the Reagan era law experience, said he would not vote for the 2007 bill, and accepting the political reality that without law enforcement, no other steps in immigration were acceptable and would result in the amnesty that McCain ostensibly opposed. All of this, however, is a world apart from where Obama and many Democrats are: they support outright amnesty.

Repression of political speech? The intention of the campaign finance reform law was to cut the influence of money on political decision-making: like Chris Dodd and AIG; like Soros. There was and is a real problem that the law was intended to address. To be sure, the campaign finance reform law — voted for by among others Fred Thompson and signed by President Bush — did not work well, but it did not so much repress poitical speech as channel political activities and contributions in a way that did not accomplsih the object of the law.

Destruction of the judicial reform movement? Please, that is way off base. Back in 2005, Democrat Senator Chuck Schumer led a Democrat filibuster of Bush judicial nominees. While it was said that the fillibuster had not been invoked historically with respect to judicial nominations, that was because judicial nominations were once not political. They have become so because of the Democrats, and Schumer intended to block conservative nominees. In response, there was under consideration in 2005 a so-called “constitutional option” of changing the filibuster rules so that they could not be invoked as to judicial nominees. The problems with that “option” were: (i) that it was not known whether it would have been passed — many Senators were quietly leery of changing filibuster rules, which had not been done before; and (ii) if it did pass, if there were a Democrat Congress with the White House in Democrat hands, the road would be open to appoint left wingers to the U.S. Supreme Court and to the U.S. Courts of Appeals. (We of course now have a Democrat Congress as a result of the 2006 and 2008 elections and have an Obama Presidency as a result of the 2008 election.) Also, had the constitutional option not been passed, it would have meant a blockage of all or almost all of Bush’s judicial nominees. So a compromise brokered by a group of Republican and Democrat Senators to allow Bush nominees to be voted on and thus approved unless there be “extraordinary circumstances.” That way, the Bush nominees to the U.S. Supreme Court and most of the Bush nominees to the U.S. Courts of Appeals could be confirmed without changing fillibuster rules or running the risk of having a complete blockage on conservative confirmations. In fact, John Roberts and Sam Alito were confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court and a great number of Bush nominees to the U.S. Courts of Appeals were confirmed. As a result, Chuckie Schumer complained that the Democrats were snookered.

Cap and Trade? McCain opposes Obama cap and trade. He did support a far, far more limited cap and trade bill in 2008, but that cannot be what you are referring to. The concern going forward is what Obama and the Democrats now want, and McCain has announced opposition — it goes way too far for any reasonable conservationist.

Support of Pro-Choice GOPers? I am pro-life. I assume you are. McCain is pro-life. The problem is that there are Republicans who are pro-abortion, at least to the degree of preserving Roe v. Wade, but in other ways are good Republicans. What do you do if in a race there is not a viable pro-life Republican? Do you tell pro-choice Rudi Guiliani to go become a Democrat? McCain has chosen to support some pro-choice Republicans. I do not see that decision as a basis for attacking McCain.

Violate a commitment to upholding the U.S. Constitution? I don’t see that. To the contrary, I see someone who is a patriot war hero from a distinguished American militayr family, who put his life on the life as a U.S. Navy combat aviator and who endured real torture as a P.O.W. for 5 1/2 years at the hands of the North Vietnamese.

As to your concern McCain is intending to install centrists, I don’t think that is what McCain is doing. What Politico is writing is off base. McCain is simply supporting good GOP candidates and that McCain is simply doing what he did in 2004 in campaigning hard for Bush for President and in 2006 with Bush in campaigning hard for GOP congressional candidates — being a Republican supporting other Republicans.

I know that Rush Limbaugh keeps attacking McCain, and Rush does so unfairly. As much as Rush is absolutely right about Obama, the Democrats and the state supporting media, Rush is wrong about McCain because Rush has a weakness in an anomosity to McCain that does not relate to current issues. Further, the Democrats are wise to what is a weakness on Rush’s part. Did it ever occur to you that the Politico article was a Democrat plant to get Rush ticked off? Politico is spinning McCain’s support of some Republican candidates into something that the people at Politico knew would get Rush ticked off — hence the quick call to Rush to get his comment — knowing the time that Rush spends in attacking McCain is taken away from attacking Obama, the Democrats and the major media and could cause discord among Republicans at a time when McCain is voting reliably conservative, is seeking to keep unity in the Republican Party for future races and is well regarded by many Americans as a patriot war hero.

While I myself have no patience for the likes of Colin Powell, Olympia Snowe and Arlen Specter, I otherwise am interested in seeing a ceasefire among Republicans so that we concentrate on attacking Obama, the Democrats and the major media and we stop the socialist and appeasement agendas of the Obama Democrats.

Phil Byler on October 4, 2009 at 8:42 AM