Man Bites Blog

I am somewhat sympathetic to the notion that, in spite of his utterly unacceptable position on abortion, Barack Obama is a good choice for Catholics, so I was interested to see Douglas W. Kmiec’s piece arguing the same in Slate.

I found some things in the piece to agree with, but wasn’t blown away by it.

Reading two responses he sent to the Corner, I was even less impressed. I kind of have to agree with Ramesh Ponnuru’s conclusion that, “once you take away Kmiec’s sour grapes over the primaries and his fuzzy thinking, there’s nothing left to his case.”

I could see a Catholic coming to the conclusion that Obama was the best candidate. I could see a conservative being driven to the Democrats by McCain’s nomination. What I cannot see is the nomination of McCain over Romney causing someone thinking as a Catholic to jump to Obama.

The main conservative critiques of McCain, as I understand them, were his support form campaign finance reform, his support for comprehensive immigration reform, and a general tendency to prefer the approval of the mainstream press to that of his own party. Well, Catholicism probably doesn’t have much to do with campaign finance reform, or McCain’s relationships with the press and his own party, and the bishops have taken a fairly severe pro-immigration stance. Add in McCain’s rejection of torture and Romney’s support for it, and the idea that a Catholic would work for Romney’s campaign but find McCain unacceptable is indeed odd.

It’s true that Romney is still on his first marriage, but it seems odd that would matter to someone calling himself a “Reaganite.”

One of the big oddities is Kmiec’s contention that Romney had a superior position to McCain on Iraq:

especially when the candidate of the status quo has a military occupation position (”100 years, sure, maybe a 1000″) that is far too flippant for an issue of human life or national security and that is directly contrary to an equally resolute teaching of the Church. So if the primary process takes out a candidate like Governor Romney who had a grasp of the kind of humanitarian rebuilding necessary to stabilize (and not merely occupy) Iraq,

If Romney possesed such a grasp, he did a damn fine job of hiding it during the primary campaign. My recollection is that Romney always tried to present himself as the most hawkish, most unfriendly to immigrants, most willing to torture, person on the stage. Wasn’t it Romney who said he wanted to “double Guantanomo?” Talk about “far too flippant for an issue of human life or national security” — it’s also worth noting that Romney took a significant detour from answering the question that was posed in order to deliver that line, clearly something he had planned to say at some point in the debate, and not a case of a question taking him off guard.

And that lie the Romney campaign spend the final weeks of its campaign whining to the refs about was that Romney wanted timetables instead of milestones for the surge. So which is it — was Romney’s position on the invasion and the surge distinguishable from McCain’s or not?

There may be a case that Obama is the choice for Catholics, but the Republicans nominating John McCain rather than Mitt Romney isn’t it.

I’ve been hard on Mitt Romney. Which isn’t entirely fairs, since every time I’ve seen him, including his speech today, he’s seemed to be a decent competent guy. It’s more his boosters that made drove me batty.

But I’m still glad he’s not going to be president.

An except from his speech today:

I disagree with Senator McCain on a number of issues, as you know. But I agree with him on doing whatever it takes to be successful in Iraq, on finding and executing Osama bin Laden, and on eliminating Al Qaeda and terror. If I fight on in my campaign, all the way to the convention, I would forestall the launch of a national campaign and make it more likely that Senator Clinton or Obama would win. And in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign, be a part of aiding a surrender to terror.

This shows it all — Romney being a decent person and team players, but also a bit scary.

If there’s one thing scarier than a president with hawkish tendencies, it’s one who has to prove what a hawk he is. A President Romney, unlike a President McCain, would have had to prove what a “tough guy” he is, and maybe gotten us into even more trouble abroad. The talk above, as well as his discussions of “doubling Guantanamo” smacked of someone with something to prove. We sure as hell don’t need that.

As far as his recent conversion to socially conservative position, it’s not the idea of “flip-flopping” that bothers me so much, but that he has not had to defend his newly discovered positions in a hostile environment. It’s one thing to argue the pro-life position in a primary; it’s another to do it when scientists find another wonderful use for embryos and people are running ads with sick kids who would be cured if only those darn pro-lifers would quit holding things up. That can only be proven over time. If he had stood on that stage and defended conservative positions against Ted Kennedy, then I could believe he would do it again. Someone like Huckabee has done that. Romney has not proven that he would.

There was also the sense of entitlement from his supporters that I found quit distasteful. People seemed positively shocked that people weren’t flocking to support Romney for the nomination, and blamed everything from anti-Mormon bigotry to McCain’s dishonesty.

What they forget is that Romney became linked to the Republican establishment, and the Republican establishment isn’t that popular in the midst of a war that, while improved, is still a mess, and economic trouble.

There was also something a bit too familiar about how the Romney candidacy emerged. Check out this list:

• Touted success in business
• Successful governor who worked with Democrats
• Experienced a “conversion” from previous unconservative ways.
• Son of another successful Republican politician
• Suddenly presented as The Chosen One by the conservative press a year before the election

Sounds a little bit too much like how George W. Bush was foisted on us, and most of us don’t want to go down that road again.

Conservatives need to abandon McCain and support Mitt Romney, a True Conservative…

But we should reject a McCain because he said something in a private meeting (that nobody will go on the record about) that might suggest thatg he prefers Justice Roberts to Justice Alito.

Rarely have I seen people more in need of some time in the wilderness.

K-Lo, who has been spending the last several weeks (unsuccessfully) trying to convince readers that John McCain is some combination of Ted Kennedy and Hillary Clinton, writes of the pro-choice, pro-torture, pro same-sex marriage, twice divorced Rudy Giuliani:

It’s a big party… ‘I’m even in this party. It’s a great party.’ It’s a gracious, dignified speech. I disagree with him on some issues, but he ran a race he can be proud of.

First of all, it would be difficult to imagine how Giuliani’s campaign could have been worse.  He staked everything on winning Florida, and won 15% of the vote.  If that’s something to be proud of, then Scott Linehan’s the coach of the year.

Second, this is yet another illustration of what really matters to conservatives.  An anonymous source says that John McCain might not have appreciated Alito, even though he was very publicly supportive, and he’s a weasel.  But since Giuliani is no longer a threat to thre Great Mitt Romney, he’s a great guy.

I hope McCain picks Lieberman as a running mate just to stick it to these people.

I’ll tell you, if the Democrats have the opportunity to nominate this guy…

and then decide, “No, we’d rather nominate Hillary Clinton,” they will deserve whatever they get. The land is hungry for this brand of leadership, Democrats. Please give it to us.

For my part, I plan to vote for Obama in Missouri’s open primary on Super Tuesday.

Contrast this with the current whinefest over on the Corner over whether it was “dishonest” of McCain to say that Romney wanted a “timetable” for withdrawal from Iraq, when all he really wanted was “milestones.” Could I care less?

Mark R. Levin challenges those who think Huckabee is a good choice for pro-lifers to “explain how Huckabee’s views on abortion and same-sex marriage differ from Thompson’s and Romney’s.”

Well, Huckabee never ran for office touting himself as to the left on Teddy Kennedy on abortion.  He never worked as a lobbyist for pro-choice organizations.  He didn’t go on Meet the Press and talk about how he wouldn’t want to send doctors to jail. 

Also, when he talks about thing like abortion, he doesn’t look like he’d rather be passing a kidney stone.

Plus, he’s against torture and waterboarding, which positions him better to advocate for life.

There seems to be this notion that George W. Bush is the absolute standard against which the pro-life credentials of cadidates should be measured.  But last time I looked, there hasn’t been a decrease in abortions under Bush, nor any meaningful restrictions or changes to the cultural landscape.  So, given the open field, I’m hoping for something better.

I know a million lives a year is a piddling thing compared to the need to keep the winning coalition together and beat Hillary, but that’s where we are.