May 21, 2007 [LINK / comment]
New Dominion podcast
This morning I was interviewed by Chris and Crystal Graham of The New Dominion, and you can listen to it directly (or download it for later use) at their podcast link page. Most of their questions centered around the Hanger vs. Sayre race for the state senate, and the blogospheric controversies and partisan infighting surrounding that. I expressed guarded hope that the party will come back together after the June 12 primary, and cast doubt on the idea that Sen. Hanger might run as an independent candidate if he loses to Scott Sayre. Of course, that will depend in part on whether the campaign stays relatively clean.
I hope I avoided any major gaffes about facts or party doctrine such as Chris Green committed two weeks ago. I took a beating for calling attention to that from D.J. McGuire, who said what I wrote was an "intellectually dishonest half-truth." I asked him to explain or to apologize, and I am still waiting. There are plenty of sophomoric jeers in the rest of the comments on that page, in case you're in need of amusement. That is the sort of political discourse that voters will be able to either endorse or reject when they go into the polls on June 12.
By the way, when I wrote of "apostates" in the GOP ranks, I chose my words carefully. Many party members emphatically reject the traditional principles which The Party of Lincoln has long embodied, and some of them are quite conscious of this fact. That is why they cannot tolerate the presence of fiscal conservatives who actually take such principles at face value, because they know they will be called on it eventually, and there will be hell to pay.
For you folks in Rio Linda, apostasy is defined by Webster's New World Dictionary (Third College Edition) as: "an abandoning of what one has believed in, as a faith, cause, principles, etc." I distinctly recall that the Republicans used to be the party of fiscal responsibility, sometimes taking their lumps at the polls on Election Day for having done the right thing on Capitol Hill. If you're under 40, you might not even be aware of that heritage. Back in the 1990s my heroes were Warren Rudman (co-founder of the Concord Coalition, to which I once belonged), Newt Gingrich, and John Kasich, but the GOP has sadly gotten off track under Bush II, and now many people are terribly confused.
UPDATE: Chris Graham has written up his summary of the interview he did with me, entitled "Blogger4Hanger." It's fair and accurate, though it's a bit uncomfortable for me to see all the unfortunate hard feelings among local party members broadcast for all the world to see.