Jon Huntsman’s presidential announcment was met with resounding approval from those who wish to see four more years of the Obama Administration. Among the rest of America, the reaction ranged from ennui to observations like “It’s good to see the Cryptkeeper getting work again.” Regardless, Huntsman’s candidacy fuels some of the most intense liberal fantasies outside of Anthony Wiener’s hard drive.
For the liberals and the MSM – as if the two were different – Huntsman represents the ultimate in a win-win GOP candidate. They win because head-to-head against Obama, Huntsman would get pummeled like a handicapped Tea Partier at a SEIU anti-violence rally. And, in the off-chance some unlikely event takes place that allows Huntsman to beat Obama – like a surprise unicorn invasion or a sudden onset of accurate and complete reporting by the MSM – the GOP still loses. The only thing worse than Obama implementing neo-socialist economic policies, spending like an alcoholic lottery winner, providing amnesty to every illegal north of the Rio Grande and buying into the global warming scam is having a nominal Republican do those things.
The very worst case scenario for the MSM is that ex-Utah governor Huntsman still provides it with a ready, willing and able yardstick of sober rectitude and utter supine submission by which to measure – and find wanting – the Republican candidates with the stones to actually fight for conservative principles. His schoolmarm presidential announcement was really just a lecture directed at the American people – in particular, the ones upset about the destruction of our traditions and our future – instructing them not to get uppity, to be “respectful” to those who disrespect them, and to accept that we are morally obligated to ignore the evidence before our eyes that our opponents intend to fundamentally alter our country for the worst. Pretty presumptuous for a guy who Don Quixote would assess as having no chance in hell.
To Huntsman and his squishy ilk, we’re the problem. Our role is to come out and vote for the pseudo-conservatives, then to sit down, shut up and take what we are spoonfed by our D.C. betters. And the MSM rewards this attitude by bestowing upon these fifth columnists the proverbial “strange new respect” that distinguishes a Republican who has accepted leftist dhimmitude.
On that note, has anyone seen a negative story about Boehner since he started golfing with the One and flailing helplessly before the liberal onslaught? The countdown has begun to a WaPo headline reading “Speaker Boehner Soberly Tries To Balances Duty To America Versus Unreasonable Demands of Hate-Filled GOP Right-Wing Fringe Lunatics.”
Huntsman simply represents the latest in the sorry line of domesticated Republican pushovers embraced by the MSM as long as they acquiesce to certain failure. On the journalism side we have conservanerds David Brooks and David Frum. On the political side, you had Bob Bennett and you have Orrin Hatch – what the hell is it with Utah anyway? Hatch has reinvented himself as Tea Partier and is tapdancing like Gregory Hines on meth to escape accusations of accommodationism that could put him out of his job and on the whining-about-how-the-GOP-left-me express with his pal Bobby.
John McCain found out just how much the love and respect of the MSM is worth during his run – while the vice-presidency may be worth a bucket of warm spit, MSM favor for a Republican is worth that less the bucket. The second he secured the nomination it was open season, and the effort redoubled when he dare blow minds with his one move that was both truly maverick and truly not idiotic – picking Sarah Palin.
So it’s not fair to compare Jon to John – Huntsman doesn’t have it in him to pick a true conservative veep nominee and he doesn’t have the sterling war record that, regardless of our disagreements with his policies and maverick antics, has earned McCain the sincere respect and thanks of conservatives (Hugh Hewitt calls him”a great American, a lousy senator and a terrible Republican“).
On the plus side, there’s no indication that Huntsman has an obnoxious daughter who is as publicly chatty as she is publicly embarrassing.
Huntsman’s role is not to win the nomination – he’s the only person on earth who actually believes he can do that and it’s even doubtful he’s that dumb. Huntsman’s role is to be the boring, ineffective moderate that the MSM can use to unfavorably compare to the real conservatives. Every time he is crushed by GOP primary voters it will be cited as undisputable evidence that the Republican party has veered off into a netherworld of primordial rightwingery that no sane person could possibly want any part of. His eventual defeat will be the final piece of evidence convicting the GOP of crimes against the mainstream. Can you trust a party so unwise as to reject Jon Huntsman? Mark this – I’ve got $5 that says that, stung by his forthcoming rejection, we will see Jon Huntsman sadly inform the MSM that he must reluctantly support President Obama because whoever gets the GOP nomination is “just too extreme” during a time when “we need to be united, not divided.” Of course, by then inflation will make that $5 worth $2.
The promotion of Huntsman is like the condescending whisper of a sanctimonious unionized schoolteacher telling you to “use your inside voice.” But the last thing the GOP needs now is the voice of the party to be muted, quiet and inoffensive. Which is exactly why the MSM wants so very badly for Jon Huntsman to be that voice.
In the end there is no question about Huntsman’s natural constituency among Republicans. It’s the guys who feel that we, as the GOP, are honor-bound to lose at all costs. And the MSM is going to aid and abet them right up until the moment that Huntsman actually – through a miracle of such magnitude it would convince Christopher Hitchens to leap into a confessional and beg forgiveness from the Almighty – appears to be a threat to a second Obama term.