Media Criticism

It is time to look at John McCain as the Republican nominee, no offense to Mike Huckabee and his valiant efforts on Super Tuesday. McCain was able to beat Mitt Romney and Huckabee in a diverse range of states from California to New Hampshire with the help of Republican voters. The fact that some independents voted for him is overblown considering the largesse of independents voting on the Democratic side of the ballot. Mitt Romney’s victories in places like Montana and Alaska along with Huckabee’s victories in Dixie don’t give the Republicans anything they don’t already have.

It is time for conservative pundits and commentators to realize that they have no value in helping the Republican Party. I will extend this beyond talking heads of the right to people on television who are dogmatic in their political beliefs. Ann Coulter saying that she would stump for Clinton instead of voting for McCain and Rush Limbaugh bloviating on about the destruction of the Republican Party show the ridiculous vacuum these “analysts� live within.

Imagine Ann Coulter running for Senate in whatever state she was spawned. It is difficult, isn’t it? Coulter emerging from the conservative coterie to debate a living, breathing Democrat who is experienced in dealing logically with alternative view points is unlikely in this lifetime. I cannot imagine Ann Coulter trying to glad-hand people for donations. I won’t even get into Rush Limbaugh’s limited potential as a candidate given his inability to stay on ESPN after comments about Donovan McNabb. These well-fed commentators know nothing of the challenges of the real world. They only know challenges to their narrow and previously untouched viewpoints that are as ridiculous as the platform of Lyndon Larouche.

The purpose of parties (and their advocates) is to represent a viewpoint unrepresented in the current political dialogue. The purpose of political leaders is to bring together multiple parties when possible to fix problems in an ad hoc manner. The reality is that political leaders ride parties until the realities of national politics make kowtowing unnecessary. Americans say they are sick of the two-party system but they are really sick of dogmatic party leaders. I think that the nominee for the Democrats and John McCain need to demonstrate that they are political leaders and not party leaders to amass any semblance of a mandate after January 2009.