WSJ Worried—Peasants Who Sank Scozzafava Might Get Ideas About Immigration
11/02/2009
A+
|
a-
Print Friendly and PDF
With Dede Scozzafava's coming out of the closet and endorsing the Democratic candidate in the NY-23rd special election, the humiliation of the RNC's Michael Steele and much of the Establishment Right is now complete. The Wall Street Journal, usually part of the problem, editorializes:
The voter revolt ought to be a lesson to the GOP's backroom boys...Beltway bigs misjudged public dismay against the Democratic agenda in Washington. Nominating a candidate who "can win" in the Northeast does not have to mean someone whose voting record is more liberal on taxes and unions than that of most Blue Dog Democrats.
Revolt in New York, November 1, 2009.

Sounds good — for a second. Then the WSJ Edit Page goes on:

But that lesson will be for naught if conservatives conclude that their victory is reason to challenge any candidate who doesn't agree with them on every issue. The truth is that some conservatives are as bloody-minded and intolerant of all dissent as the hard left is at the Daily Kos. A majority political party requires a far more diverse coalition than the audience for your average right-wing blogger or talk show host....If conservatives now revolt against every GOP candidate who disagrees with them on trade, immigration or abortion, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid will keep their majorities for a very long time.
In other words, it's OK for peasants to revolt on "taxes and unions" but not on trade, immigration or abortion. Is the WSJ Edit Page trying to appear a mouthpiece for Big Business?

VDARE.COM does not take a position on trade or abortion. And as far as we can see, the Conservative Party challenger in NY-23 is wrong on immigration (although he certainly has all the right enemies and Minuteman PAC endorsed him, saying he opposes amnesty).

But the WSJ Edit Page is right to be worried. The Democratic pollster Stanley Greenberg does interesting work - for example, he identified Affirmative Action as a key issue in the 1980s, something that both Democratic and Republican Establishments absolutely did not wish to hear. His recent report Why Republican Leaders will have Trouble Speaking to the Rest of America got some publicity because he found that "the self-identifying conservative Republicans who make up the base of the Republican Party" and who drive current unrest are not "racist".

In a little-noted passage, Greenberg wrote:

Asked about the issues of greatest importance to them in choosing a candidate for Congress, health care ranked sixth among the Republicans, below issues such as tax cuts, immigration, and a candidate’s personal values and faith
(VDARE.COM Emphasis added).

Greenberg went on:

And yet remarkably, these voters had virtually nothing positive to say about the Republican Party. They see their own party as weak, old, and out of touch. They feel it has lost sight of conservative values and conservative voters and is in desperate need of new leadership.
Of course, it's not remarkable — the GOP leadership (which for practical purposes includes the WSJ Edit Page) is out of touch. That's why it so stubbornly and savagely resists patriotic immigration reform.

You can complain to the WSJ Edit Page (scroll to end) and many readers already have. It won't listen but, who knows, Rupert Murdoch might decide to end the Bob Bartley Edit Page hangover, as he has so much else since buying Dow Jones.

Print Friendly and PDF