November 1, 2004

The Left’s unloseable election?

By: David Freddoso

It’s a bit unsettling to think that almost anything could happen tomorrow. And I don’t mean the election results–I mean the looting, the riots, the fistfights afterward, and yes, even the mass suicides.

Beginning with the primaries more than a year ago, we’ve all endured perhaps the most vociferous and hysterical spell of Left-wing whining in this nation’s history. We’ve seen some of the ugliest election violence I can remember, including physical assaults, costly vandalism performed in broad daylight, and gunshots fired at Republican headquarters in two states.

These people are really about to crack. I believe Elizabeth Edwards, who recently told a supporter that he needn’t fear violence as long as the Democrats win.

What Would Walker Do?

My earlier prediction of a wide margin appears unlikely (still, note that Bill Kristol echoed my summer prediction this weekend). But I do think Bush is going to win, and I write based on that assumption. (If I’m wrong, I guess this article remains published as my penance.) My only question is, why will Bush’s victory so upset the Left? How can a moderate politician, with basically a center-left agenda of entitlements and political correctness, generate such heartfelt outrage among liberals?

I may finally understand. I had a revelation while watching the first presidential debate–the one that cost Bush his easy re-elect. Bush’s performance was so embarrassingly bad that I could only laugh. As I watched him smirk and scowl and repeat himself, and use terms like “the Brits” without even batting an eyelash, and get lost in the middle of his own sentences, and blink, choose the wrong answers.

Well, anyway, I tried to put myself in the leftists’ shoes, and I suddenly came up with as good an analogy as I can think of. How would conservatives react if Charles “Champ” Walker (D – Ga.) were president?

Walker, the son of Georgia’s former state senate president, is one of my favorite political stories. After the 2000 census, Democrats controlled the entire state government, and Walker’s daddy wanted to start a dynasty. So he carved an Augusta-area congressional district just for Champ–a district that is 40% black and supposedly unwinnable for any Republican.

Champ, who like Bush wears a stupid grin, soon made a visit to Washington during which he saw Speaker Dennis Hastert at the Old Ebbitt and introduced himself as the next congressman from Georgia. “Excuse me, sir,” Hastert replied, “but I don’t know that that election has happened yet.”

Walker blew off scheduled debates and interviews during the campaign, simply failing to show up. He gave obvious lies as excuses.

Then Champ’s arrest history was discovered and exploited by his opponent–the mug shots ended up on television. In the end, not only did Walker lose (and big), but his daddy lost his seat, and Democrats lost the state senate. It was a massacre.

The analogy is imprecise, but I am certain that to a left-winger, Bush appears to be every bit as stupid and arrogant as Champ Walker appears to me. The two men’s powerful fathers even add that extra touch of similarity. The main difference is that Bush succeeded, Walker failed.

If Walker had won that race in spite of everything, conservatives would be quite upset, his exact political leanings notwithstanding. If he had just barely become President, we’d be downright steamed. And if he were re-elected after a thoroughly mediocre term, I’d be banging my head against the wall.

In Spite of Everything

Likewise, the Left, faced with the prospect of losing an un-loseable election, is boiling over with hatred that may just explode. Whether Bush is moderate or conservative makes no difference to them. (There is an up side to this, incidentally: we can hope that in the future we will elect someone a little more conservative and a little smarter, and they might even respect him.)

Think about it: Bush staged a counterproductive invasion of Iraq on false pretenses, and the whole situation there is now a mess. Soldiers are dying. The economy has lost jobs. The price of oil is hitting new highs every week, making everything more expensive. The administration is more interested in dealing with radio obscenity. Bush is eroding everyone’s civil liberties through the Patriot Act.

The media have been sufficiently merciless to Bush, bent on his downfall, providing non-stop negative coverage. They published fake documents to ruin him. Without having all the facts in hand, they broke damaging stories–like the latest one about the al Qa Qaa explosives–that turn out to have been false. They took as gospel the words of a now-proven liar about his trip to Niger. They tried as hard as they could to ignore and then disdain the Swift Boat Veterans (not one of whose charges has been discredited). Their great prophet of old, Walter Cronkite, is even suggesting that Karl Rove “set up bin Laden to this thing,” meaning the new Osama tape.

The Redskins even lost yesterday, which should mean that Kerry wins.

Yet despite everything, Bush is going to win. Nearly destroyed by his misadventures in Iraq, Bush will be saved in the Midwest–it may be the Upper Midwest–by his opposition to gay marriage and abortion. Bush can also thank his lucky stars that he’s running against John Kerry.

One more thing: I know that many Brainwash readers want to punish Bush for one reason or another. I cannot fault any man for voting his conscience. Mine tells to vote Bush, and I will. Despite his many shortcomings, his fate and the fate of the American Right are now inseparable.

But were I cruel, I would tell you to go ahead and vote third party, especially if you live around here. Let’s hope for the narrowest victory possible. A huge popular vote loss and an Electoral College tie–a distinct mathematical possibility at this point–would shake out in Bush’s favor and simultaneously send thousands of socialists into mental institutions.
But that would be mean.

David Freddoso, a native of Indiana, is a political reporter for Evans and Novak Inside Report.