The Blind Bob Beckel
July 5th, 2008 at 11:53am Matt Margolis
Bob Beckel, taking a page right out of Barack Obama’s strategy book (the chapter on playing the victim card at every turn) whines about angry readers who wrote to him in response to a poorly written post at The Fox Forum about the “arrogance” of George Bush. He opined,
Is it my imagination, or are many of you angry? If I were a Republican and facing the rejection of conservatism on an unprecedented scale this coming November, I suppose I’d be angry as well. Perhaps I can help you understand why your political philosophy is about to be rejected by the American people.
Yeah, we heard the same “you’re going to lose big time in November” line before back in 2004. But, Beckel’s wishful thinking is combined with a lack of understanding of what is really going on. Conservatism is not being rejected. Far from it. The truth is conservatives are frustrated when Republicans they elected stray from conservative principles. If conservatism was being rejected, as Beckel wants to believe, then Barack Obama wouldn’t be trying to win votes shifting his positions towards the center, and taking more conservative positions on the Second Amendment, tax cuts, even abortion.
1. Conservatives are supposed to be fiscally responsible yet when your crowd inherited a trillion-dollar surplus from Bill Clinton, Bush/Cheney and a Republican Congress turned it into a $3-trillion-dollar deficit.
You certainly won’t find fiscal conservatives justifying the increases in spending, but Beckel is absolutely ignoring the impact of the 2000-2001 Recession and 9/11. It is also worth noting that two key economic achievements of the 1990s, welfare reform and the balanced budget, while signed by Bill Clinton, came to be because of the efforts of the Republican Congress.
2. Conservatives strongly support the war in Iraq but won’t help pay for it. Never has our country been at war without asking and getting our citizens to help bear the financial burden…until this war. Conservatives don’t want to give up Bush’s tax cuts for the top 5% of wage earners to help pay for this war. Why?
I guess I must be in the top 5% of wage earners, because how else can I explain the tax cut that I received? But, I’m not in the top 5%, so, enough with that argument. Also, Beckel is either choosing to ignore the record economic growth that resulted from Bush’s tax cuts. And of course, Beckel’s argument loses all credibility when you consider government tax receipts went up as a result of those tax cuts.
3. The American people got tired of being lectured on “family values” by conservative clergy and Republican members of Congress, e.g. Larry Craig, who didn’t practice what they preached.
I’m sure the American people are tired of being lecture about the rich paying “their fair share” of taxes by rich Democrats in Congression who keep large chunks of their personal wealth in off-shore tax shelters to avoid paying taxes on it. I also can’t help mentioning Democrat governor Eliot Spitzer, who built his career on breaking up prostitution rings, only to be involved in one himself. Though, it may be true that conservatives are more likely to punish the hypocrites in their party than liberals are to punish the hypocrites in their party.
4. Or maybe the voters got tired of Republicans controlling the US House of Representatives for 12 years during which they handed out more wasteful pork projects than all the pork handed out by Democrats in the 42 years preceding the GOP takeover.
And what have Democrats done to control spending and cut pork since returning to the majority? Oh yeah, nothing.
5. Or maybe voters got angry when they learned the Vice President of the United States manipulated intelligence and misled the American people on why war with Iraq was in our national security interests.
Despite several investigations by various bipartisan and independent commissions and committees, all concluded that there was no manipulation of intelligence, and that statements made by the administration were supported by the intelligence available at the time.
6. Or maybe the public didn’t like George Bush vetoing legislation to provide health insurance for millions of kids.
Another ridiculous point predicated on the belief that health insurance should be funded by the government regardless of whether federal assistance is necessary. The Democrats’ proposed expansion of SCHIP would have provided taxpayer funded health insurance to children in families who didn’t need such government assistance - but also would have left many who needed it, with no such assistence.
7. Or maybe the public got embarrassed by Republicans in the Bush Administration who refused, in the face of overwhelming evidence, to accept the reality of global warming, aka “The Flat Earth Society”.
No, what’s more embarrassing are Democrats who think global warming is a bigger threat than terrorism, and who are afraid to debate skeptics of global warming.
Beckel then concludes his poorly written list with a self-righteous rant filled with feigned resignation about his alleged experience with conservatives. If the situation were reversed, and a conservative pundit attempted to generalize liberals based on experiences with a select few, Beckel might have written something about how you can’t judge an entire party or ideology, based on an angry, vocal minority.
I expect Beckel to look at things through a partisan lens, but now I think he’s just blind. As a liberal, he certainly finds it in his best interest to talk about elections with an attitude of inevitability of the eventual positive for his party, but doing so really destroy’s his credibility as a political strategist and pundit.
Entry Filed under: Campaign 2008, Democrats, Kook Left, Media
16 Comments
1. Retired Spook | July 5th, 2008 at 12:42 pm
And Beckel’s one of the more reasonable Lefties.
2. neocon | July 5th, 2008 at 1:46 pm
Bob Bechel managed Walter Mondale’s campaign.
Nuff said
Next
3. Mark Noonan | July 5th, 2008 at 1:48 pm
Spook,
Yep - but he’s been on this kick for a couple months now. At least in his public statements and writings, he is trumpeting not just Democratic victory in November, but a crushing anti-GOP blowout. I don’t think he’s proposed a set of numbers (ie, what percentages Obama and McCain will get, how many House and Senate seats he expects the Democrats to win), but from his writings you get the clear impression that he believes a very large Democratic landslide is in the making.
Is he right? I don’t think so, but we’ll only be able to tell in November - if we’re looking at a sad GOP remnant in Congress as President Obama is sworn in on January 20th, then we’ll all have to acknowledge that Beckel saw further and deeper than us…personally, I don’t think its going to come out like that at all - not in the sense that the Democrats won’t or can’t win, but that if they do win, it will be by a narrow margin.
4. Ricorun | July 5th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
I have a hard time disagreeing with any of Beckel’s points. Rightly or wrongly those are the predominant perceptions — and Republican leaders certainly contributed to them. We could argue (accurately) about the surplus/deficit numbers and their causes, but the Republican leaders didn’t help. The war has largely been deficit funded. The number of “family values” scandals by those who preached them but didn’t practice them is embarrassing. The explosion of pork projects during the years when Republicans controlled everything is so embarrassing that even the usually reliable party-line Heritage Foundation is aghast. It’s hard to blame the intelligence failures on the VP or anyone else, but it did expose a failure of objectivity. And it was embarrassing. The S-CHIP thing, well, one could debate about the details, but the main hypocrisy there is that you can’t insist on the rights of the unborn without addressing the rights of the born. As for “global warming” I think it’s better characterized as a failure in energy leadership. Global warming may be a part of it, but only a part. If people catch on to the fact that “drill, drill, drill” is at best only a stop-gap measure (and irrespective of its effects on global warming at that), the Republicans are going to be in trouble on that score, too.
I’m sure that ideological purists will mightily try to criticize my comments. If so, have at it. But that doesn’t change the reality. And while it may be true that everyone has their opinion about how to perceive reality, I would say that if your ideological purism gets you too far afield, you end up looking ridiculous — and thus hurting the cause you are trying to help.
5. Rana Quijotesca | July 5th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Mark-
You know that most economists don’t attribute higher revenues to Bush’s tax cuts. The increase in total receipts were the result of FICA tax receipts, which have been increasing since the Clinton Administration–this easily absorbed the losses incurred by the Bush tax cuts.
In fact, according to Greg Mankiw, one of Bush’s former economic advisors, the Bush tax cuts haven’t yet paid for themselves.
6. neocon | July 5th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
Since we’re critiquing a Democratic startegist…..
let’s at least spell is name right
IT’S BECHEL……not beckel
have a day
peace, neocon
7. Ricorun | July 5th, 2008 at 7:34 pm
neocon: Since we’re critiquing a Democratic startegist…..let’s at least spell is name right
IT’S BECHEL……not beckel
Oh goodness. Considering it’s all about spelling I think it’s reasonable to ask neocon… are you a troll?
If not perhaps you could explain… why does spelling matter? Maybe I’m crazy but I think meaning is more important than spelling (lucky for you).
That’s the good news. The bad news is I still don’t know what you’re talking about.
8. neocon | July 5th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Rico,
You are a hyper-sensitive little one aren’t you.
I was actually going to complement you on your earlier post, and still will for that matter, it contained a lot of valid points.
But someone recently said: words matter.
Just kidding, anyway the man is on tv almost daily and is well read in many publications, so he deserves a little more respect than just completely misspelling, what is actually a pretty easy name.
9. gman | July 5th, 2008 at 8:25 pm
Neocon, your wrong about Beckel’s name. It’s spelled B-E-C-K-E-L, not bechel.
10. Kurt | July 5th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Bob Beckel managed a campaign that lost 49 states. His view is not worth a dime.
11. LewWaters | July 5th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
“A trillion dollar surplus from Clinton?”
What are these people smoking? A projected surplus at best with the nation still deep in debt is what Bush was handed.
http://www.letxa.com/articles/16
12. arcman46 | July 5th, 2008 at 11:55 pm
That’s the magic of accounting Lew. Clinton can have a “trillion dollar surplus”, but Bush can have a “trillion dollar deficit” and no money has changed hands anywhere.
13. Bloodthirsty Warmonger | July 6th, 2008 at 12:08 am
Matt, I take my hat off to you (and expose my balding head) because you have demonstrated supreme patience in deconstructing Beckel’s screed.
14. John personal trainer Austin TX | July 7th, 2008 at 9:44 am
Bob B. ” Perhaps I can help you understand why your political philosophy is about to be rejected”
That is a hoot lecturing about rejection when Mondale lost in a landslide of siemic proportions.
“Help you understand” - that is the arrogance I expect from him.
He serves one purpose. The fact that he is on Fox along with Susan E. and the like proved that Fox has more balance than the other cable channels.
15. Jay Gaultieri | July 7th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
“Family Values” is basically a con to win the votes of evangelicals. It’s proven very effective at getting people elected, but ineffective at actually changing America’s sexual practices, TV viewing habits, Internet surfing, video game playing, movie watching, or book reading.
16. starspangbanner | August 19th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Ole Bob said he thought catfish was awful, looks like he hasnt missed many meals of other things though. I think this fat boy wants a job if NOBAMA is elected. He couldnt get his boy Mondale elected so guess he is joining the Nobama train in hopes of employment