Loading ...
Enough. Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel is not a maverick. He is not a rebel. He is not a moderate. He is not John McCain circa 2000. He does not benefit from a strong “Draft Hagel” movement. He is not a Republican Democrats can like. To borrow the words of Republican presidential candidate Sam Brownback, we need to take the “Chuck Hagel is a maverick” meme behind a barn and kill it with a dull axe
Chuck Hagel’s voting record is clear. He votes with Bush and he votes the way conservatives want him to vote. Hagel votes against abortion rights, against civil rights, and against environmental protections. Hagel’s beliefs are squarely in line with the Republican Party platform. Period.
Hagel is certainly occupying an important political space by opposing the Bush/McCain plan to escalate the war in Iraq. He is vocally and visibly against sending tens of thousands of more American troops into the meat grinder of Iraq. Doing so gives other Republicans cover to take similar positions. Hagel is embracing a correct position on Iraq, but it is not based on his ideology and it tells us nothing about what Chuck Hagel believes about how government should work and what policies we should be deploying to make our country a better place. Opposing the president as a member of the Republican Party is a rarity today and I can appreciate the pleasure Democrats feel when Bush is getting whipped by a Republican. Let’s be clear: Iraq is one issue and Chuck Hagel is a lock-step conservative on every other issue Republicans care about.
Hagel’s opposition to Iraq is not centrism, it’s the minimum threshold for being a human being with power to influence the course of events in a war. In this context, Hagel is only a maverick to the extent that the party with which he shares his deepest seated beliefs on the economy, taxation, and the role of the federal government is filled with people who have spent the last five years prioritizing the powers of the presidency over their own, while seeking the approbation of the man who continually benefits from their negligence as legislators. That, then, is a statement about the Republican Party and not Chuck Hagel.
It is important that we ask who Chuck Hagel is because praise of a Republican presidential candidate does not do our movement any good. Praising Hagel on Iraq gives him cover to be a right-wing ideologue on all other issues. The last thing that America needs is another Republican masquerading as a moderate while holding the line at the policy bastions of the conservative movement.
Please, the next time you hear Chris Matthews, Tim Russert, or even a Republican blogger claim that Hagel is a moderate, a maverick, or any other adjective that paints him as an anti-Republican figure, remember that it simply is not true. He remains a purebred Republican despite his correct positioning on Iraq. As edifying as it is to watch Hagel denounce Bush’s Iraq plan, our satisfaction must be short lived and it must not guide us towards falsely deifying this doctrinaire Republican.
Cross posted at The Huffington Post.
5 Responses to “Ending the “Chuck Hagel Is A Maverick” Meme”
[…] After a big build-up of expectation that Senator Chuck Hagel would announce something about his intentions for 2008 today - presidential campaign, senatorial campaign, or retirement - Hagel punted his decision until later this year. As someone who does not understand why Hagel would run for president, I see this as a sensible play. Hagel’s false image as a moderate and maverick block acceptance with much of the Republican base, despite the fact that Hagel voted with President Bush more than any other senator. Hagel’s media persona severs natural support that he would have for his positions on abortion, civil rights, and environmental protections within GOP primary voters. […]
[…] After a big build-up of expectation that Senator Chuck Hagel would announce something about his intentions for 2008 today - presidential campaign, senatorial campaign, or retirement - Hagel punted his decision until later this year. As someone who does not understand why Hagel would run for president, I see this as a sensible play. Hagel’s false image as a moderate and maverick block acceptance with much of the Republican base, despite the fact that Hagel voted with President Bush more than any other senator. Hagel’s media persona severs natural support that he would have for his positions on abortion, civil rights, and environmental protections within GOP primary voters. […]
[…] The problem Hagel faces is that Fred Thompson would likely sucked up oxygen and get these voters without having to do as much leg work to begin with. Hagel will have to run on his arch-conservative voting record and fight the media’s representation of him as a moderate and a maverick. Doing so will mean a diminished emphasis on the war, as he spends time talking about what makes him a good conservative. […]
[…] Comments Matt Ortega on More Q-PollMatt Browner Hamlin on More Q-PollDan on Thompson Influencing Hagel’s Decisionmatt on More Q-PollEmboldened » Blog Archive » Thompson Influencing Hagel’sDecision on Ending the “Chuck Hagel Is A Maverick” Meme The Right’s Field Asks: […]
Something to say?
Disclosure up front: I’m a Hagel supporter.
I disagree with your statement “Hagel is embracing a correct position on Iraq, but it is not based on his ideology and it tells us nothing about what Chuck Hagel believes about how government should work and what policies we should be deploying to make our country a better place.” The assumption you are making is that there is only one school of thought that can be called “conservative” and that Hagel is simply being a bit of an unorthodox conservative. The fact is, Hagel, Bush and Pat Buchanan are all “conservatives,” but they differ in their views in important ways because they hold to somewhat different sets of ideological assumptions. Since we like to flatten politics into a one-dimensional spectrum, and since the war is such a critical issue, this leads to a variety of characterizations of who is “moderate” and who is “conservative.”
A similar thing plays out amongst the Democrats regarding who is a “liberal” and who is a “moderate.”
Since I guess that I’m an outsider to the “movement,” I’ll end this comment with a friendly plea to everyone to consider Hagel. One key thing missing in both major political parties is genuine leadership, and Hagel has demonstrated such leadership on the most important issue of our day by being both a principled and courageous critic of the war.
Left by Andy
February 2, 2007 at 7:53pm