Talking McCain, From Gutfeld to Moyers

God help me, but I'll be on Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld show at 3 a.m. tonight.

Speaking of God, I'll also be on the Bill Moyers Journal tomorrow night on PBS, talking about John McCain and his relationship (and lack thereof) with the religious right, as well as the future of the increasingly fragile Reagan Coalition. With me will be former Republican Congressman Mickey Edwards, author of Reclaiming Conservatism: How a Great American Political Movement Got Lost--And How It Can Find Its Way Back. Edwards on McCain here. Check your local listings.

While I'm at it, you can read my McCain shtick in French! Or hear it in Canadian on Western Standard radio!

Comments

[hale]

I wonder if the "Reagan coalition" is really as fragile as it's been made out to be lately. The story I keep hearing is that the libertarians (or "fiscal conservatives" as that's sometimes euphamised), national-defenseniks and religious conservatives are no longer on friendly terms, but that seems to me like a willful inaccuracy. It isn't in any sense as though there no longer remains any fiscal component to the conservative coalition; it's just that those who remain are the vaguely Hamiltonian "national economic trust" types. Didn't those guys always constitute the bulk of the economic wing of American conservatism? Is the supposed alienation of the libertarian movement from the Reagan coalition really anything but a blip?

[joe]

You know what doesn't get enough press when people talk about the changing American political landscape?

The decline in the crime rate. The crime wave of about 1970-1995 was probably THE biggest issue in making the law-and-order Republicans the majority. And now, the Bush Justice Department can't even get any juice from the release of crack convicts.

Imagine how Rudi Guiliani's campaign would have played out if we had 1988's crime rates.

[Harpua]

Stick a Jackson in a piggybank every time Welch posts something about McCain. You'll have enough for a nice vacation in a month's time.

[Real American Patriot]

First Weigel on Al Jazeera
Now Welch on Bill Moyers Journal
If REASON was around in the 1940s you guys would be doing Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw Haw's radio shows.

[Genuinely Real Bona Fide Ameri]

If REASON was around in the 1940s you guys would be doing Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw Haw's radio shows.

Real American Patriot, I notice that your lapel pin was [ominous music] Made in China. If you will quietly come with me, sir.

[Even More Bona Fide American P]

Genuine Real Bona Fide American Patriot, I noticed that your car has parts manufactured in Mexico. I'm taking you both to the patriotism jail!

[Got Upright Nipples for Americ]

Which one of ya had a burrito this morning? Just stay your place while I get the gun.

[Doc]

Please don't wear that members only leather jacket. *please*

[Texan]

What kind of pussy isn't already carrying his gun?

[Got Upright Nipples for Americ]

don't really need it 'xept for executions, pussy. My tits do the shredding.

[John McCain, For Real]

You know Matt, if you think that your words can't hurt my feelings, you're wrong.

[Kaganspawn]

Well, we know why Ms. Howley gets invited on Red Eye (because she has a bewitching gaze to go with her keen insight). But McCain becoming the nominee was a big boost for Mr. Welch's public profile. All of a sudden everyone wants to know about McCain, and here is Welch having already written the book. Nice.

[Jonathan Hohensee]

You know Matt, if you think that your words can't hurt my feelings, you're wrong.

I had doubts that you where the real John McCain until I read that your email account is from "ImReallyJohnMcCainForReal.com."

[alan]

Matt rolled the dice and came up a winner on that one. A bio of McCain could have easily been a losing proposition.

As for John McCain, For Real from ImReallyJohnMcCainForReal.com which means you have to be the one true John McCain, I know what you are thinking. You please the NeoCons and it is smooth sailing from then on. Well, there has never been a case where the Neocons didn't stab a president in the back who played footsies with them. At some point John McCain, For Real from ImReallyJohnMcCainForReal.com which means, of course, you have to be the one true John McCain you will fall out of favor.

I know, you are thinking, I'll just be even a bigger hawk than the Pod but, no that wont happen. Something will rile them. It is bound to happen. Say, a political appointee that is close to you gets a gig at the State Department. Someone spots him ordering falafel at the cafeteria. That is all it would take.

[Click \'n\' Learn]

If REASON was around in the 1940s you guys would be doing Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw Haw's radio shows.

And, on their blog they'd be promoting just how wonderful BASF and Krupp were.

[dmoynihan]

[suck up]
Hey, any way some of us could buy signed copies of the McCain book for our Democratic-leaning families this Mother's/Father's day season?
[/suck up]

... parents have everything so I only give signed books...

[Click \'n\' Learn]

~~~~ Big Cosmotarian Party Tomorrow! ~~~~

Join Reason, Cato, the CenterForAmericanProgress, the ACLU, the SPLC, and CynthiaMcKinney tomorrow to celebrate Ron Paul withdrawing from the race. Tomorrow at noon! Directions: take the Orange Line.

[Fluffy]

The Corner is reporting a rumor that McCain will pick Carly Fiorina as his VP.

Considering what a dismal failure Fiorina was as HP CEO, this is about par for the course for the Fail-Up Party.

Fiorina was high tech's Condoleeza Rice. I guess since Rice is out of the question even for a crazy person like McCain, Fiorina is the next best thing.

[Episiarch]

Considering what a dismal failure Fiorina was as HP CEO, this is about par for the course for the Fail-Up Party.

This is why the software for my HP All-in-one printer sucks so bad! Fuck you, Carly!

[the innominate one]

While I'm at it, you can read my McCain shtick in French! Or hear it in Canadian on Western Standard radio!

Who was your translator for Canadian? Was it Donderroooooooooooooooooo? I heard he's fluent in 10-15 languages.

[Taktix?]

I heard he's fluent in 10-15 languages.

That's an average of 12.5 languages!

[Warren]

God help me, but I'll be on Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld show at 3 a.m. tonight.

No no no... Not you too. Say it ain't so Matt

[R C Dean]

The decline in the crime rate. The crime wave of about 1970-1995 was probably THE biggest issue in making the law-and-order Republicans the majority.

It probably helped, but (also) probably not all that much.

What really changed the Republican Party was the rise of the political evangelical wing of the Party, which has no particular fiscal conservatism, but overlaps strongly with l-'n-o Republicans.

The l-'n-o crowd also overlaps with the national security crowd, which is also not particularly fiscally conservative.

Fiscal conservatism was more or less collateral damage when electoral victories were being won when evangelicals were added to the national security base of the Republicans.

[LarryA]

First Weigel on Al Jazeera. Now Welch on Bill Moyers Journal. If REASON was around in the 1940s you guys would be doing Tokyo Rose and Lord Haw Haw's radio shows.

Someone has to go and preach among the heathen.

[Jennifer]

you can read my McCain shtick in French!

Ah-HA! I knew it!

[John]

I didn't know Mickey Edwards was still around. He used to be my Congressman back in Oklahoma. He got voted out of office in 1994 (one of the few Republicans to lose that year and lose in an overwelmingly Republican District no less) because he was one of the worst miscrents in the house banking scandal. I somehow don't look at him as much of an authority on how the Conservative movement lost its way. What Mickey you mean things like conservative Congressman who went to Washington and became bigger crooks than their Democratic counterparts?

[bookworm]

John, where in Oklahoma are you from? I grew up in Oklahoma and lived all over the state.

[John]

I spent one year of high school in Edmond. Then I went to OSU in Stillwater and OCU to grad school. Lived in Norman for a about a year and a half before I left.

[Isaac Bartram]

Speaking of God, I'll also be on the Bill Moyers Journal tomorrow night on PBS,..

God I hate that smarmy selfrighteous old fraud, but seeing as how Matt Welch is on I'm going to have to sit and watch this.

[Isaac Bartram]

Just watched it. Good show, Matt.

I must confess, I don't find Moyers nearly as irritating as I used to. And for some reason he doesn't sound so much like the Baptist preacher I recall.

He does seem to have mellowed some. And I should always remind myself that he said good things about Ed Clark in '80.

I might add though, I don't ever want to see anything like that Hagee guy's followers ever again. I would have been perfectly happy to remain in blissful ignorance of the existence of such as those. Dear God in heaven, what a glorious mixture of ignorance, stupidity and insanity.

[Matt Welch]

Isaac -- Thanks. Moyers, like the People for the American Way crowd, is spooked to his boots by the Christian Right, especially as it intersects with foreign policy in the Middle East. He's very gracious and genuinely curious in person.

[Isaac Bartram]

Thanks for the feed back, Matt.

I think a lot of my animosity towards Moyers is based on his service to LBJ. He was possibly as responsible as anyone for the character assassination of Barry Goldwater. Except for the Rockefeller faction of the Republican that is.

[green mamba]

I wasn't able to watch "Red Eye". How was it?