John McCain the Jacksonian

September 6th, 2008 at 09:04am Mark Noonan

As in Old Hickory, Andrew Jackson, as noted by Jay Cost:

McCain did three things: (a) Reminded us that he’s a maverick; (b) Told us what the maverick would do if we elect him; (c) Told us why he’s a maverick. [So, contrary to some pundits, it was actually a very well-organized speech.] The confession at the end was the “why.” He fights for the country, not for a party, because it was in Hanoi that his country saved him. Country first, party second.

This might not resonate with strong partisans who see their party as the protector of the national interest, but there is a huge subset of voters who see politics the way McCain describes it. Get average people talking, and sooner or later you’ll hear them say, “Nobody stands for all of us. Everybody stands for their narrow faction.”

Ultimately, this speech was very Jacksonian to me. It was Jackson, as much as anybody, who made the president the representative of all the people. This notion can be oversimplified, for sure, but at its root it is accurate. The president should not speak for a mere faction, but should articulate the true public voice. I don’t know whether McCain can actually do that, but he clearly sees this task as his top priority, which puts him a notch or two above many previous nominees of both parties.

Final point. Contrary to some critiques I read, McCain’s middle “laundry list” section of the speech definitely defied Republican orthodoxy at key points. There might be plenty of reasons not to like this speech, but lines like this are not the things we hear from Republicans:

-I know some of you have been left behind in the changing economy and it often seems your government hasn’t even noticed. Government assistance for unemployed workers was designed for the economy of the 1950s. That’s going to change on my watch.

-We will prepare them for the jobs of today. We will use our community colleges to help train people for new opportunities in their communities.

-For workers in industries that have been hard hit, we’ll help make up part of the difference in wages between their old job and a temporary, lower paid one while they receive retraining that will help them find secure new employment at a decent wage.

That middle one is actually quite noteworthy. Just a few months ago, I heard the exact same policy proposal…during a keynote address of a Democratic think tank! I thought to myself, “Now…that’s a good idea! Why doesn’t somebody do that?”

It was the last bullet point quoted that struck me last night - both in how it will not go down well with some of my fellow conservatives - those who lean too far towards libertarianism - but also how well it goes down with anyone who wants to help out his fellows who are hard working, yet temporarily down on their luck. It was Thursday night, after the speech, that I, my father and my father-in-law were chatting about it when my father noted that McCain’s speech hadn’t been given in the United States since the days of Andrew Jackson. Dad, being an ancient Democrat, was naturally delighted - and, I imagine, also a bit amused that it will be the GOP which will become the party of the common man. The world turns in strange ways, and who would have thought that the GOP - reaching back to its roots in pre-Civil War America and turning towards TR’s vigorous battle against special interests - would start to develop a popular conservatism to strip the political left of its commanding position in American culture and government?

It was Jackson, of course, who stripped the White House away from America’s first ruling elite - the well-connected and well-monied men who took over the government in the aftermath of the Revolutionary War and who did some good, but also lost touch with the aspirations of the common man in America. Jackson made some stunning errors - most notably his part in the horrible act known to history as the Trail of Tears, but he also understood wherein lies the danger to our Great Republic:

You have no longer any cause to fear danger from abroad; your strength and power are well known throughout the civilized world, as well as the high and gallant bearing of your sons. It is from within, among yourselves, from cupidity, from corruption, from disappointed ambition, and inordinate thirst for power, that factions will be formed and liberty endangered. It is against such designs, whatever disguise the actors may assume, that you have especially to guard yourselves. You have the highest of human trusts committed to your care. Providence has showered on this favored land blessings without number, and has chosen you, as the guardians of freedom, to preserve it for the benefit of the human race. May he who holds in his hands the destinies of nations make you worthy of the favors he has bestowed, and enable you, with pure hearts, and pure hands, and sleepless vigilance, to guard and defend to the end of time the great charge he has committed to your keeping.

Human beings can get things wrong, even if they start out with the best of intentions - whatever noble work was done in the past by the left, by big government and by America’s large corporations, they aren’t doing good work now and have, indeed, become threats to American liberty and American prosperity. The people who run the show - who are not always the people elected or appointed to be in charge - are entrenched and mostly concerned with protecting and advancing themselves and their selected groups and/or causes. In the quest for money and power, this ruling elite has little time or inclination to show concern for those average Americans who do the work of the nation - and, in fact, this ruling elite considers average Americans to be the great stumbling block. If only we would do as we’re told, all would be well.

In ages past Andy Jackson challenged these entrenched interests. So, too, did Theodore Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan. So did the Republican Party as a whole in 1994 - but only for a brief, shining moment before we were captured by the ruling elite and became all to much like them. John McCain and Sarah Palin propose to once again challenge the elites - and while holding the hand out to all in friendship, they also propose to remake the GOP into the party of the average American, committed not to this or that power center, but to the aspirations of the common men and women of the United States.

Get ready for the battle, fellow conservatives, fellow Republicans - and those Democrats and independents out there who have decided to join the great fight. Obama has now become the rallying point of all those who want to keep power in the hands of those who currently have power - and more than a few alleged Republicans will be found, in the end, ranged on Obama’s side. Elites don’t often voluntarily surrender their pre-eminent position and we can expect, even if we win in November, that our current elites will do all the can to preserve and protect their place in America. John McCain and Sarah Palin - and especially Sarah Palin - have shook America’s political structure to the core. Our elites - and especially the liberal elites who live off government as a leech lives off the lifeblood of its host - look at the massive enthusiasm building for McCain/Palin, see that in the end McCain/Palin far outpaces Obama/Biden in popular appeal…and they grow fearful. If you think the smears launched against Palin this past week were bad, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Especially if it starts to look like McCain/Palin are heading for victory, you will see a smear campaign unimagined in our nation’s history.

And you want to know something? It won’t make a bit of difference - the government will, once again, be of, by and for the people, no matter what the elites try to do.

Tags: 2008 Campaign, Sarah Palin

Entry Filed under: Campaign 2008, Republicans