« Previous — Next »

Conservative Angst

31 January 2008

It seems that the conservative pundits are united in agreement with me. From Michelle Malkin to Rush Limbaugh to Ann Coulter, they will not vote for John McCain. Good for them! Ann Coulter went so far as to virtually endorse Hillary Clinton on Hannity & Colmes tonight. My dad called me nearly apoplectic that Coulter was going to vote for Hillary!

Another blog that I help out at, Ft Hard Knox, had a post today by founder Jenn Sierra entitled When We Cut Off Our Nose to Spite Our Face in which she argued that this makes us look ridiculous. She posted incredulously about Coulter’s appearance on Hannity & Colmes as well. Jenn is one of my favorite people on the web but I have to disagree.

Ann Coulter had some good points in her column this week, Among other things, she had this to say:

At least under President Hillary, Republicans in Congress would know that they’re supposed to fight back. When President McCain proposes the same ideas — tax hikes, liberal judges and Social Security for illegals — Republicans in Congress will support “our” president — just as they supported, if only briefly, Bush’s great ideas on amnesty and Harriet Miers.

Now I’m never going to vote for Hillary Clinton but Coulter makes a good point. At least if Hillary or Obama is in the White House there will be some sense among congressional Republicans that they need to provide some opposition. With McCain at the helm it will be smooth sailing for every hair brained liberal policy you can imagine.

The big fear, of course, is judicial nominations. I guess some people really believe McCain when he says he’ll appoint justices in the mold of Roberts and Alito. They may believe him but I don’t. Does anyone remember the Gang of 14? McCain was personally responsible for a number of well qualified justices “in the mold of Roberts and Alito” being blocked. Why should we believe he’d be different later? No, I expect we’d get the same kind of appointments from McCain as we’d get from Clinton or Obama.

The bottom line is, I see no upside to voting for McCain and plenty of downside.

It’s a shame conservatives are in such a spot and I fear there may be some serious hard feelings for a long time to come over it. I hope not because regardless of who ends up winning in November, we need a solid conservative base working together. In the lead up to the election there is going to be a lot of hand wringing and finger pointing. Following the election there may be even more finger pointing. But we each have to follow our principles. If you’re a principled conservative and you really believe you need to vote for McCain, I’m not going to hold that against you. But do it because you really believe it’s the right thing to do, not because you think you have no other choice.

As for me, I’m following my principles and my conscience. I’m refusing to vote for McCain because to do so would violate those principles and my conscience and I simply cannot do that. If some of you think I’m ridiculous because of that, I’ll just have to deal with it. Better that than be like McCain and do what’s expedient.