Narrowing the field

So who do I support for the Republican nomination?

Well, let's look at the field. (This will not be a systematic look. Just my thoughts.)

John McCain- On the plus side, he's strong on defense. On the downside, he's John McCain. Yes, he's a war hero, and not the John Kerry kind who came home to bash the troops and whose heroics many doubt, but an honest to goodness POW and hero. Of course, he seems to think that qualifies him to be president, which is a dubious proposition.  But being McCain also means Campaign Finance "Reform", giving a group of "moderate" democrats an effective veto on many judicial nominations while Republicans held the Senate, and, of course, his ego which is roughly the size of Jupiter. The country can, and has, done far worse as Presidents go, but I can't support him for the nomination.

Rudy Giuliani - Strong on defense, although I've never seen any evidence that he's smart on defense. You might argue that this can be cured by choosing smart advisers in the area.  I might even fall for that if not for GWB. Bush's choice of Condoleeza Rice as his National Security Adviser and the Sec. of State should have given him a lot of strength. Instead, Rice seems to have been ensnared by the establishment and losing IQ points on a daily basis.  Again, we can, and have, done worse for President, but ultimately his support for abortion rights, gun bans, and his positions on gay rights make it hard for me to support him for the nomination. I'm not even sure I could vote for him in the general election.

Mike Huckabee - Joe Carter's efforts aside, I just can't take this man seriously. Putting aside for the moment that I'm afraid they may have permanently damaged Joe's ability to intelligently defend his positions (the quality of Joe's discourse has been in steady decline), there numerous reasons I have trouble supporting Huckabee. There's his approach to foreign policy which is truly naive, his dubious outside income while governor of Arkansas, (There may be a good explanation for all this, but I haven't heard it yet.) his misuse of religion, and from what I've read an inability to separate in his mind the difference between rejoicing over the changed lives of criminals and deciding to let them off the hook for their crimes. As far as I can tell, Mike Huckabee crosses the worst traits of Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter. That I happen to hold some of the same political positions as he does doesn't let him off the hook for this.

Duncan Hunter - Actually, most of what I know of Hunter from a policy position seems pretty good. I honestly don't know too much about him, but given his amoebic polling, I haven't seen much point in finding out more.

Ron Paul - The man believes that tucking our head in the sand will be enough to defend us from harm, and in fact, doesn't appear to believe there's much in the way of anyone actually wanting to do us harm. (Except for those evil North American Union Types.) His response every time someone asks him if he would fight a war under a specific set of circumstances is that he would, "if Congress declares war." He keeps falling back on the constitutionally true statement that "presidents can't declare war." The question is though, is there any war the man thinks is worth fighting? Would he ever ask Congress to declare war? As far as I can tell, not unless we were actually invaded and I'm not even sure he would then. The man is running for an office that would make him commander-in-chief of the most powerful military in the world but he doesn't seem to understand what armies are for. (Also, he apparently thinks our enemies don't have also raise armies, navies, etc.)

Mitt Romney- The candidate of THE ESTABLISHMENT^TM. Frankly, I don't care what Romney's positions are on anything. I don't believe the man can be trusted, so his positions are irrelevant. I feel slimy just thinking about him. Still, the country could, and has, done worse.

Fred Thompson - When National Review endorsed Mitt Romney, they essentially said that Fred Thompson was just as good on policy as Romney but lacked management experience and they didn't think he could win. The experience factor should not be discounted. It is the reason former governors almost always have an edge in these races. The personality and skill sets of those who have been governors are typically different from, and better suited than, those of legislators to fill the presidency. Still, that's not an end all analysis. From what I've seen, Fred shows a remarkable ability to know when to stand up and when to step aside and let others do the work. I think he'll do fine in that regard. My only real concern with Fred is his support for McCain-Feingold. Ultimately, though, he seems to be the best of the candidates on the issues overall, one of the few I would trust to truly defends us. (He understands we're in a WAR!)

Overall, gotta go Fred.

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Comments

[spacemonkey]

Knew I liked you for some reason Jeffrey.