U.S. Senate See Full Big Line

(D) J. Hickenlooper*

(R) Somebody

80%

20%

Governor See Full Big Line
(D) Michael Bennet

(D) Phil Weiser

60%↑

50%↓

Att. General See Full Big Line

(D) M. Dougherty

(D) Jena Griswold

(D) David Seligman

40%

40%

30%

Sec. of State See Full Big Line
(D) A. Gonzalez

(D) J. Danielson

(R) Sheri Davis
50%

40%

30%
State Treasurer See Full Big Line

(D) Brianna Titone

(D) Jeff Bridges

(R) Kevin Grantham

40%

40%

30%

CO-01 (Denver) See Full Big Line

(D) Diana DeGette*

(R) Somebody

90%

2%

CO-02 (Boulder-ish) See Full Big Line

(D) Joe Neguse*

(R) Somebody

90%

2%

CO-03 (West & Southern CO) See Full Big Line

(R) Jeff Hurd*

(D) Somebody

80%

40%

CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado) See Full Big Line

(R) Lauren Boebert*

(D) Trisha Calvarese

(D) Eileen Laubacher

90%

20%

20%

CO-05 (Colorado Springs) See Full Big Line

(R) Jeff Crank*

(D) Somebody

80%

20%

CO-06 (Aurora) See Full Big Line

(D) Jason Crow*

(R) Somebody

90%

10%

CO-07 (Jefferson County) See Full Big Line

(D) B. Pettersen*

(R) Somebody

90%

10%

CO-08 (Northern Colo.) See Full Big Line

(R) Gabe Evans*

(D) Manny Rutinel

(D) Shannon Bird

45%↓

40%

30%

State Senate Majority See Full Big Line

DEMOCRATS

REPUBLICANS

80%

20%

State House Majority See Full Big Line

DEMOCRATS

REPUBLICANS

95%

5%

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
February 07, 2008 10:42 AM UTC

I am not the biggest Ann Coulter fan, but I agree with everything she says here.

  • 25 Comments
  • by: Goldwater Conservative


From Goldwater Girl to Hillary Girl

Nominating McCain is the gesture of a desperate party.

Republicans are so shell-shocked and demoralized by the success of the Bush Derangement Syndrome, they think they can fool the voters by nominating an open-borders, anti-tax cut, anti-free speech, global-warming hysteric, pro-human experimentation “Republican.” Which is to say, a Democrat.

As the expression goes, given a choice between a Democrat and a Democrat, voters will always choose the Democrat. The only question remaining is: Hillary or Obama?

On the litmus test issues of our time, only partially excluding Iraq, McCain is a liberal.

— He excoriated Samuel Alito as too “conservative.”

— He promoted amnesty for 20 million illegal immigrants.

— He abridged citizens’ free speech (in favor of the media) with McCain-Feingold.

— He hysterically opposes waterboarding terrorists and wants to shut down Guantanamo.

Can I take a breath now?

— He denounced the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.

— He opposes ANWR and supports the global warming cult, even posturing with fellow mountebank Arnold Schwarzenegger in front of solar panels.

The only site that would have been more appropriate for Schwarzenegger in endorsing McCain would have been in front of an abortion clinic.

Although McCain has the minimum pro-life record demanded by the voters of Arizona, in 2006, McCain voted in favor of using taxpayer funds to harvest stem cells from human embryos. He opposes a constitutional amendment to protect human life. And he frets that if Roe v. Wade were overruled, women’s lives would be “endangered.” This is the same John McCain who chides Mitt Romney today for “flip-flopping” on abortion. At least Romney flips and stays there.

Of course the most important issue for pro-lifers is the Supreme Court. As long as Roe v. Wade is the law of the land, it doesn’t matter how many hearts and minds we’ve changed. So it’s not insignificant that McCain has called Justice Samuel Alito too conservative.

We ended up with David Hackett Souter when a Republican president was actually looking for an Alito. Imagine how bad it will be when the “Republican” president isn’t even trying.

McCain uses the boilerplate language of all Republicans in saying he will appoint “strict constructionists.” This is supposed to end all discussion of the courts. But if he’s picking strict constructionists, he will have to appoint judges who will commit to overturning McCain-Feingold.

That could be our litmus test: Will you hold President McCain’s signature legislation restricting speech unconstitutional?

In 2004, McCain criticized the federal marriage amendment, saying, it was “antithetical in every way to the core philosophy of Republicans.” Really? Preventing the redefinition of a 10,000-year-old institution — marriage, that is, not John McCain — is part of the core philosophy of being a Republican? I had no idea.

I’m not a lawyer — oh wait, yes, I am — but Republicans were proposing to amend the Constitution, a process the Constitution specifically describes.

It’s like saying it’s antithetical to the core philosophy of Republicans to require presidents to be at least 35 years old. It’s in the Constitution! And Republicans — other than the ones who voted for McCain-Feingold — support the Constitution. You might say it’s part of our core philosophy.

Of course, back in 2004, McCain was considering running on a presidential ticket with John Kerry. Realizing that this would not help his chances to run as a Republican in 2008, when he would be a mere 120 years old, McCain quickly withdrew his interest in being on Kerry’s ticket.

But he defended Kerry from the Bush campaign’s suggestion that Kerry was not tip-top on national security, saying on the “Today” show: “No, I do not believe that he is, quote, weak on defense.” So that was helpful.

McCain also explained to an admiring press corps why he wouldn’t want to be anyone’s vice president, not even a national defense champion like Kerry, citing the meager constitutional duties of the vice president as: (1) to assume the presidency if the president is incapacitated and (2) “to break a tie vote in the Senate.” (At which point several members of the fawning horde were heard to remark, “What is this ‘Constitution’ you speak of, Senator?”)

But McCain conveniently forgot the second of these constitutional duties just a year later when Vice President Cheney was required “to break a tie vote in the Senate” on a matter of utmost importance to liberals: federal judges.

Just one year after McCain had correctly identified one of two jobs of the vice president, he was indignant that a Republican vice president might actually exercise one of them. Better to let a gaggle of 14 Senate malcontents pick the president’s judges for him.

As part of the “Gang of 14,” McCain hysterically opposed allowing the vice president to break a tie on judicial nominations. Following the Constitution with regard to the role of the vice president, McCain said, “would be a terrible precedent.” Yes, if members of Congress actually read the Constitution, they might realize McCain-Feingold is unconstitutional.

If Hillary is elected president, we’ll have a four-year disaster, with Republicans ferociously opposing her, followed by Republicans zooming back into power, as we did in 1980 and 1994, and 2000. (I also predict more Oval Office incidents with female interns.)

If McCain is elected president, we’ll have a four-year disaster, with the Republicans in Congress co-opted by “our” president, followed by 30 years of Democratic rule.

There’s your choice, America.

By Ann Coulter

Tweet
Share

Comments

25 thoughts on “I am not the biggest Ann Coulter fan, but I agree with everything she says here.”

  1. I just want to note that I do respect McCain’s service in the military. I have a soft spot in my heart for war heroes, POWs, and fighter pilots.

    But with all the views, bills, and rhetoric that he has spit out in the last few years, I think it is clear that he is a liberal and RINO. The fact of the matter is, he is not a conservative and I’m not sure if I can pull the lever for him in November. 🙁

    1. that’s a pretty short list of specific hot-button topics being pushed by one who can truly be described as far right (Coulter, that is). Few would agree with the notion that restricting campaign donations is a violation of free speech (a noxious concept IMO – it means that more money = more free speech, a concept Orwell would have loved to use were he alive today); few believe that global warming is anything but reality and few believe that spoiling ANWR forever will do anything meaningful for our energy policy, unless setting even higher profit records the oil companies is someone’s idea of meaningful.

      And I don’t know where immigration fits in with classical conservatism – social conservatism, sure, but social conservatism is a very different beast than classical conservatism (every time ‘pubs remind Dems about the racists in the Democratic party, they’re almost always talking about the social cons who became Republicans in the 60s and 70s – maybe they should just become their own party, like Dobson threatened a while ago..) And, oh, yeah, were the Swift Boaters somehow proven correct? I noticed lately that a lot of ‘pubs have been defending them lately but I haven’t seen any neutral assessment of their allegations anywhere. (Honest question here – if you know something about that, please share, but sorry but Kerry’s failure to disclose his records, while not helpful to his case, is also not helpful to the Swift Boaters either.)

      Quick side note – I’m going on the record that being concerned about immigration does not make you a racist or xenophobe. However I believe that many politicians are using the issue to appeal to that element in the national electorate. In short, I’m not calling you, Coulter, or anyone else racist in the above paragraph.

      I think McCain’s commanding lead in the primaries is a sign that the grip of the hard right on the GOP is loosening, and the hard right noisemakers who thought they were more influential are going nuts. Look at McCain’s long record in the Senate. He’s conservative. But more importantly (and this, I believe, is his great sin with the hard right), he’s pragmatic. He’s going to be the GOP’s Bill Clinton if elected, excoriated by the fanatics of his party but likely to have a highly successful presidency.

      1. McCain Feingold restricts a person or groups ability to use an incumbents name in a paid advertisement 60 days before an election.

        Any restriction on what can be said, how , when, or where, is by definition a restriction on freedom of speech.

        Some speech is restricted (Fire in a crowded theater).

        The basic premise McCain sold this bill on, that” we (Politicians) are all good people, its the money that is corrupting us”, is ludicrous on its face.

        The only answer that meets a constitutional test is to remove all restrictions on amount that can be given to the political partys or directly to the candidate, but require strict reporting of who is giving how much, and let the voters decide.  This will effectively cut the lifeblood (or much of it) from the 527’s.

        1. so why not within 60 days of an election?

          I just ask that rhetorically.  I don’t really have an opinion one way or the other on that issue.

          Frankly, I struggle with campaign donations and limiting “speech.”  It seems that the more we tinker, the more workarounds the monied find.

          I would like to see a prohibition of corporations funding anything whiffing of political elections.  Oddly, Texas has such a law. When corporate kids can go die in Iraq, I’ll change my mind.  

      2. Here’s something I posted earlier

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who didn’t believe in fighting the war on terror in every way, with every mean available, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who would shut down Gitmo and treat terrorists like common criminals, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate that supported illegal immigration, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who opposed tax cuts, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who wouldn’t have appointed judges like Samuel Alito, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who has block qualified “letter of the law” judges from taking the bench, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who would assault our first amendment rights, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who bought into global warming and would sign bogus treaties taking away our competitive edge, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to vote for a candidate who got a “F” rating by the Gun Owners of America for sponsoring gun control legistlation, I would vote for a Democrat.

        If I wanted to support a candidate so liberal that they were almost selected to be the Democrat’s V.P. nominee, I would vote for that Democrat.

        That doesn’t strike me as a short list.  McCain disagrees with the Republican party on a whole list of important issues.  I’ve tried to look at it from the view point of “what do we agree on?”.  We agree on Iraq, on abortion (he’s against it), spending, and……….. dang, I really don’t know.  That’s pretty weak for someone who is saying they’re a conservative.

        I respect the man’s military service.  But I’m electing a president to run the country, and their views are what matters the most.

        Anyone want to try and play devil’s advocate and see if they can point out other areas in which McCain agrees with conservatives?

        1. I’m sorry that you have so many disagreements with him, but you have to look at the evidence of his popularity within your party and ask yourself how liberal he really is.

          BTW, I think copying and pasting something as unreasonable as this is – I don’t know, lazy? Beneath your intellect? I mean, what “assault on the First Amendment” have the Democrats committed? You can argue (as Newsman does above) that McCain-Feingold is an unreasonable restriction, but an assault?

          Get back to what I said. His record is solidly fiscal conservative, and his policy standings are pragmatic, not dogmatic.

          1. I wrote it, posted it elsewhere, then copied and pasted it here.  I’m sorry you view it as lazy or beneath my intellect, but it’s how I feel.  McCain not only sponsored McCain-Feingold, but he’s also said that he supports the idea of the fairness-doctrine.  That’s an assualt on free speech in my book.  McCain is not a conservative.

            In my mind, his so called popularity isn’t a reflection of his conservatism.  I don’t see the link between the two.

            I think people in my party view McCain as the best chance of keeping the White House and are voting for him because of that fact.

            1. It just read like something some columnist would write. You know that I esteem you highly and I should have kept that in mind when I read your post.

              Hugs? 🙂

              But anyway, I stand by what I said about McCain. He is a conservative. Maybe not your style of conservative, but conservative and not liberal.

              1. If I came across as upset, then I should apologize for writing sloppy.  No hugs needed but what the hell, right?

                I tried to write it as a column, I thought about submitting it.  Be honest with me though, was it a bad article?  I kind of liked how it came out, but I always appreciate constructive feedback on my writing.  Was it just that one part that was confusing or unclear?

                However, I really don’t see how McCain can be called a conservative.  At best he’s a moderate.  There are some areas in which he is conservative (such as spending), but he’s not a conservative

                1. Your list was excellent.

                  But too late to publish it.

                  Our only hope, is that McCain sees the writing on the wall and chooses Mitt Romney, Fred Thompson, or Duncan Hunter as VP.

                  If that does not happen.  Better practice saying President Obama.

                2. it was more strident than what you usually write. But that’s tone and content, and you only need to please yourself on those counts. It otherwise was well written.

                  1. It reflected my mood and feelings towards McCain, it was kind of a political vomit-fest that had been brewing but I didn’t know how to put it into words.

                    I hope McCain sees the light and picks Romney as his V.P.  I don’t care if they have a good relationship or not-it’s the only way conservatives are going to even think about supporting McCain!

          2. Okay, now that I have stopped crying over Romney, I want to point out that the evidence of McCain’s popularity is in the fact that:

            For grand totals, vastly more Democrats than Republicans voted yesterday;

            Democratic votes for Clinton and Obama: 14,622,822 (63.6%)

            Republican votes for McCain, Romney and Huckabee: 8,370,022 (36.4%)

            Put another way, the Clinton/Obama race drew 76% more voters than the McCain/Romney/Huckabee race.

            From: http://www.time-blog.com/swamp…

            The fact of the matter is that only a very small cross section of the GOP went out to vote. I think it is obvious that the right-wing conservative base, for the very most part, stayed home. Why did they stay home? Answer: Because there were no true conservative in the race, including Romney. So the fact of the matter is, that the true conservative base will choose the next president of the United States of America. Sorry folks, but we conservatives are still relevant!

            1. But from all accounts the attendance and participation have been much higher this time than they have been for many cycles. If hardcore conservatives stayed home, more pragmatic ones must have shown up.

  3. That’s the one bright spot.

    Hillary Clinton will energise the Republican party to defeat her, even if we have to vote for Lucifer.

    (OK, just kidding on the Lucifer, he’s not running for President, he’s too busy with other things.)

  4. Most people write about McCain and complain about whether is a “true” conservative.

    My concern is that he — and Clinton and Obama BTW — are Senators, a job that does not prepare one to be President, and is probably antithetical to being an effective President.

    In my view, being an effective President requires leadership/vision, decision-making skills, making the hard decisions and the ability to recognize and surround oneself with an effective staff and advisors.

    In contrast, being a successful Senator means being a political compromiser (translation: “I don’t actually stand for anything but will do what’s politically expedient to make a deal.”), being a career politician looking to the next election, and being part of the debating society that our Senate has become.

    I believe that “former Senator” is not common on bios of respected Presidents …

    Reagan (Actor, Governor)

    Kennedy (Rich guy, Senator)

    F.D. Roosevelt (Rich guy, Lawyer)

    Wilson (Governor, Professor)

    T. Roosevelt (Governor, Curmudgeon)

    Lincoln (Lawyer)

    Jefferson (Philosopher, Renaissance Man)

    1. Don’t forget that LBJ was a Senator, too. I don’t think 1000 days as Veep did much to prepare him for the Presidency (and like him or not, he was an effective if not entirely successful President).

      But I see your point about McCain, who’s been in the Senate for as long as I can remember. The leading Dem candidates, in contrast, are clearly ambitious people who have seen their time in the Senate as the springboard to the White House, so I don’t think they focused so much on cutting deals and becoming compromisers. That’s not to say that they’re any more prepared for the Presidency, as we know both Obama and Clinton have no executive experience in government, but it is to say that your observations about Senators are less applicable to them then they are to McCain.

  5. But we have 3 Senator left in the 2 parties races that have any chance of becoming President.

    The Senator From AZ

    The Senator From IL

    and

    The Senator From NY

    Take your pick.

    I prefer AZ.  

    1. By Brian Wingfield

      Washington, D.C. –

      Here’s a bit of amazing trivia for the historic election of 2008: It’s the first time two sitting senators will run against each other as their party’s nominee for president.

      In fact, only two sitting senators have ever been elected president–John F. Kennedy, who ran against then Vice-President Richard Nixon in 1960, and Warren G. Harding, an Ohio Republican who beat the Democratic governor from his home state to win the 1920 election.

      This time, things will be different. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has essentially wrapped up the Republican nomination with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney out of the picture. On the Democratic side, only Sen. Hillary Clinton, N.Y., and Sen. Barack Obama, Ill., remain in the field.

      It’s easy to get elected from the Senate if you’re only running against other senators; the task proves far more difficult if your opposition is a governor or an incumbent national office holder. In the last 30 years, only two sitting senators have received their party’s nomination: Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., in 2004, and Sen. Robert Dole, R-Kan., in 1996. (Dole left the Senate mid-term to run for president.) Before that, you have to go back to the 1972 bid of Sen. George McGovern, D-S.D.

      And just look at the list of presidential hopefuls from the Senate who have tried and failed in recent years: Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., Sen. Joseph Biden, D-Del., Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, just to name a few. The list is heavily Democratic in recent years only because Republican incumbents ran for the presidency in 1984, 1988, 1992 and 2004.

      Senators are high-profile politicians with Washington smarts. So why is it so tough for them to get elected president? For those very reasons.

      With six-year terms, senators have long histories of roll-call votes. They often appear to flip-flop on issues, or will vote against a slightly different version of a bill–remember John Kerry’s claim about voting for war funding before he voted against it? Other times, a senator will vote for a bill simply because there is an amendment attached that would be favorable to his or her constituents.

      This amounts to a field day for opposition research teams: Few things are easier to twist in a 30-second campaign spot than a Senate voting record.

      There’s also the problem of being a Washington insider. If voters are disillusioned with the government, a senator is easily seen as part of the problem. Witness the 1976 campaign of Georgia Gov. Jimmy Carter, who ran on the premise of being a Beltway outsider.

      Senators can be considered stuffy, and they’re often too far removed from the political lay of the land. And they’re legislators (read: compromisers)–not executives, a role required of the president. The skills that make them successful in the Senate chamber do not necessarily serve them well on the campaign trail.

      That might be one reason why former and sitting governors–like Carter, Reagan, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush–have found success. Barry Burden, a professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin, notes in a 2002 article in Political Science Quarterly that governors have the executive experience voters want to see. They’re sometimes younger, but more importantly, they’re “closer” to voters, giving them an edge in selling themselves outside their home states.

      Moreover, there’s a greater pool of current and former governors that might consider running for president. The Senate has 100 members, but not all of them are up for re-election at the same time. And end of term makes a nice departure point for a senator to launch a presidential bid, provided an election is on the horizon.

      And remember this: Sitting senators already have cushy jobs. “They can abandon their quest pretty early and go back to a career in the Senate,” says Burden. That certainly happened this year, with Biden, Brownback, Dodd bowing out of the race before the primary season really got underway.

      According to Burden, the typical problems that befall senators in their aspirations for the White House might not be so pronounced this year. “It’s possible that Clinton and Obama are advantaged because they both have relatively short terms in the Senate,” he says. And McCain? Because of his strong personality “he may be one of the few people that can overcome” the traditional Senate-to-White House difficulties, Burden says.

      There is one very dark fact about the two senators who have attained the presidency–each has died in his first term as president. Kennedy was assassinated before serving three full years in office. Harding was felled by a heart attack in 1923.

      If there is some kind of “curse” against sitting senators who become president, let’s hope it’s broken in 2008.

      http://www.forbes.com/2008/02/…

      1. 1988 was an open election year like 2000 and 2008, and Dole ran then. I don’t recall who else ran for the GOP that year except Jack Kemp who was a Congressman. But there may have been another ‘pub Senator in the mix…

          1. A memorable election for me since it was my first. I sometimes still wonder how Hart would have done if he hadn’t literally screwed himself out of the nomination…

            Dole did run for the GOP nomination in 1988 but lost to the heir-apparent, George H. W. Bush. That’s all I was referring to. I can’t recall if any other ‘pub Senators ran that year, but the authors of the article seem to have not checked out that year in their mistaken belief that an incumbent was running for reelection then.

Leave a Comment

Recent Comments


Posts about

Donald Trump
SEE MORE

Posts about

Rep. Lauren Boebert
SEE MORE

Posts about

Rep. Gabe Evans
SEE MORE

Posts about

Colorado House
SEE MORE

Posts about

Colorado Senate
SEE MORE

133 readers online now

Newsletter

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter to stay in the loop with regular updates!

Colorado Pols