Novak - iland..A False Conservative

Nobody would be too surprised that a left wing blog would laugh at Robert Novak, and I am. But why I'm laughing might surprise you, he doesn't like Mike Huckabee because he's not a conservative. In a WaPo Editorial Novak states that Huckabee is, "far removed from the conservative-libertarian model of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan," which is an odd linking of those two men. Barry Goldwater has in common with Ronald Reagan the (R) after their name and Presidential campaigns. Ronald Reagan gets included because that's the Republican pantheon rather than any factual connection. Let's see how this works, Ronnie never saw a tax break for the rich he didn't like or a spending program that he'd veto - rather BushCo-ish, he ran off on foreign adventures but didn't have the nerve to hit the terrorists who blew up the barracks in Lebanon, rather he "cut and ran," he spent a fortune on defence with no revenue to back it, he stepped outside the Constitution in Iran-contra, he instituted an illegal immigrant amnesty with no enforcement beginning a true flood, in fact RR's conservatism amounted to doddering around the White House tossing platitudes to the Religious Right and tax breaks. Oh I know the Republicans kneel to the Reagan myth, but it is that and Novak knows it, but he's a shill.

Novak is offended that Huckabee called the Club for Growth the "Club for Greed," and pointed to their contributor list and their policies. He is particularly incensed that Huckabee increased taxes in Arkansas, since Novak's heroes (other than Goldwater) didn't balance budgets, they just spent reduced revenue like drunken sailors. What Huckabee does according to Novakiland thinking is, "Huckabee clearly departs from the mainstream of the conservative movement in his confusion of "growth" with "greed." Such ad hominem attacks are part of his intuitive response to criticism from the Club for Growth and the libertarian Cato Institute about his record as governor." You see "growth" for Novak is measured by income increases in the top 0.1% of the taxpayers, it certainly need not include the dirty masses, other than their minimum wage opportunities increasing - providing there is no actual minimum wage.

This you have to love coming right after the "ad hominem attacks" paragraph:

Quin Hillyer, a former Arkansas journalist writing in the conservative American Spectator, called Huckabee "a guy with a thin skin, a nasty vindictive streak." Huckabee's retort was to attack Hillyer's journalistic procedures, fitting a mean-spirited image when he responds to conservative criticism.

Despite Bill Buckley's editorship that thing is a rag, the entire useful content of which is an occasional Bill article. If you're a fan of rabid right blogs and their intellectual content it's the magazine for you. Despite my complete contempt for Robert Novak as a commentator or journalist he's a big step up from that bunch. Boy that's a compliment by insult.

Here's the kind of thing that sends Novak over the edge:

But Huckabee simply does not fit within normal boundaries of economic conservatism, such as when he criticized President Bush's veto of a Democratic expansion of the State Children's Health Insurance Program. Calling global warming a "moral issue" mandating "a biblical duty" to prevent climate change, he has endorsed a cap-and-trade system that is anathema to the free market.

Now I think SCHIP is flawed in its single narrow source funding, but it is funded rather than the BushCo Iraq war and just about every other program he's advanced. But what you might miss in the picture is that Huckabee's 'conservative failure' is that the program is aimed at something other than the 0.1% plutocracy, which is Novak's real complaint. Bush did the Democratic Party a real favor with his veto, which was naturally not on the basis of what his wrong with the thing but that 'slippery slope into socialized medicine' nonsense, since George II is about as free market oriented as Karl Marx. If you righties think that's some kind of slur, the difference between them is which favored single entity gets the free ride and which way the income redistribution goes.

Mike Huckabee gets an almost free pass from the loon devil:

Nevertheless, he is getting remarkably warm reviews in the news media as the most humorous, entertaining and interesting GOP presidential hopeful. Contrary to descriptions by old associates, he is now called "jovial" or "good-natured." Any Republican who does not sound much like a Republican is bound to get friendly press, as Sen. John McCain did in 2000 (but not today, with his return to acting more like a conventional Republican).

Anybody notice the 'devil's' heading on the publisher of this Novak junk? Why it's that bastion of liberal bias and loon reporting 'The Washington Post' and I'm pretty sure they wrote a check with Novak's name on it.

I enjoy Mike Huckabee to a certain extent, he's not quite a loon and certainly can be abrasive but there is some sort of genuineness to him. I wouldn't vote for him for a more important office than City Council, but that's not a platform where his politics of religion have enough impact to over-ride his better qualities. As for Novak, evidently somebody (him) voted him off the island - of this plane of reality - right into Novakiland.