Robertson wants to further divide the right

October 13, 2005

As you may have already heard, TV preacher Pat Robertson went on the offensive on behalf of Harriet Miers yesterday, suggesting that Republican senators had better get in line behind the White House agenda. Or else.

“You know, when you look at the people who are supporting Miers — Richard Land, who is faith commissioner for the Southern Baptists, which is 14, 15, 16 million members; Jerry Falwell has endorsed her; Jim Dobson has endorsed her; Jay Sekulow has endorsed her; yours truly has endorsed her.

“And I think these so-called ‘movement conservatives’ don’t have much of a following, the ones that I’m aware of. And you just marvel, these are the senators, some of them, who voted to confirm the general counsel of the ACLU to the Supreme Court. And she was voted in almost unanimously.

“And you say, now they’re going to turn against a Christian? Who is a conservative? Picked by a conservative president? And they’re going to vote against her for confirmation? Not on your sweet life — if they want to stay in office.”

On the surface, it’s fascinating enough that Robertson would make such a threat, but I think this is important for a few other reasons.

Robertson has identified the division within the right — and seems intent on exacerbating it. Notice, for example, that he highlighted the support Miers has received from five high-profile conservatives. What do all five have in common? Land, Falwell, Dobson, Sekulow, and Robertson are all from the religious right faction of the GOP. The fight, in other words, pits the Taliban wing against everyone else.

Indeed, Robertson seemed intent on picking a fight, dismissing “so-called ‘movement conservatives'” as unimportant, at least as compared to the theocratic wing of the party. Sorry, Limbaugh, Kristol, Will, Noonan, Buchanan, Krauthammer, and conservative bloggers everywhere; as far as Robertson is concerned, you have no followers, no clout, and no credibility.

Newsweek’s Howard Fineman said yesterday that the “long-predicted ‘conservative crackup’ is at hand.” For his part, Robertson is swinging a sledgehammer, hoping to move the collapse along.

Also worth considering is how this pulls far-right senators in competing directions. Fineman also said that he expects that “any GOP 2008 hopeful who wants evangelical support — people like Sam Brownback, Rick Santorum and maybe even George Allen — will vote against Miers’s confirmation in the Senate.”

From where I sit, this makes sense. Most of the far-right base is livid with Bush, and presidential hopefuls are looking at this as an ideal opportunity to show some independence from the White House and impress primary voters with a stand on principle. Robertson is saying the opposite; that these would-be Republican nominees will suffer unless they follow his advice and that of Dobson, Falwell, et al.

Brownback, Santorum, Allen, and others will have to decide which power brokers really have power. Vote against Miers and earn the support of Limbaugh’s listeners and Weekly Standard readers or vote for her and pick up the 700 Club crowd.

Which side carries more weight? We’re about to find out, but if I were a betting man, I wouldn’t put money on Robertson.

Buckley’s carefully crafted unity is finally falling apart. Six years too late, if you ask me, but better late than never.

I guess when you build a house on a fat, squishy foundation of lies and greed then you shouldn’t be suprised when if falls down.

  • While it’s obvious there’s a rift developing between two of the crazier factions of the GOP, I don’t think the dobsonites are going anywhere.

    Where can they go?

    They can remain burrowed in the belly of the GOP, say they’re influencing policy (because they are), and they’re “this close” to defeating the liberal scourge – year after year after year.

    Your small donation, of course, will help them achieve this goal…

    They’ve got a symbiotic relationship with their party – they need the GOP & the GOP needs them. The leaders of both “factions” understand this. It won’t be until one decides that it can live without the other that this will break.

    I’m just some dummy on the internets, but I don’t see this happening any time soon.

  • The crack-up should be between fiscal conservatives and social conservatives. I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying here, though — or maybe I’m just not following this closely enough — because Miers’ record is in support of fiscal conservatism but not social conservatism, yet you seem to be saying that her support is from the social conservatives and it’s the fiscal conservatives who are against her.

    Doesn’t make a lot of sense.

    In any case, I just read a Newsweek article on her and I think I have a handle on what she’s about. I think she is naturally to the left of Sandra Day O’Connor, but that she falls in love. Apparently there was a man named Hecht, who is now a state supreme court judge, who she approached to find out what church he went to when she was still a Catholic. My feeling is that she’d fallen in love with him and wanted to be closer. His church was evangelical Christian, so that’s where she went. Apparently during the services she took care of the kids and at the Bible Study groups she didn’t speak up, but did things like serve the coffee and clean up afterward. My interpretation is that this was all about being love with this guy, Hecht, who she dated for years. A man who won’t actually come out and say they dated.

    Then we have her saying these odd gushing things to Bush. He’d paid some attention to her, and I think she also had a crush on him. So she says these effusive things about his intelligence — that’s love.

    So how would she perform on the Court? Without influence, I think she’d perform as a moderate Democrat. Now if the Repubs were to hire someone to romance her, it’s quite possible she might be influenced. Who is there on the Court that she might fall in love with? I think I’ve heard that Scalia can be personable, so I suppose there’s some danger there. But then again, even though she attended this conservative church with Hecht, she made a point of not coming forward and stating her positions. Even under someone’s influence, she might still be independent if she had to sign her name to an opinion. And there’s always the possibility some nice liberal gentleman would show an interest….

    (Sorry if this all sounds weirdly sexist, but we all know what it’s like to have a crush on someone, so it’s silly to deny that this can be a motivator. And the pattern of this particular individual’s behavior, I think, suggests that is what has driven her toward conservatives.)

  • If a very small percentage of the GOP sits out the next election, it’s all over for them. Sounds to me as though this rift could achieve that. Thank you, “Rev.” Robertson.

  • >>her support is from the social conservatives and it’s the fiscal conservatives who are against her

    religionists have a fairly simply worldview that judges people based upon labels rather than empiricism. In simple illustration, someone who goes to (the right) church must therefore be morally good in all of the rest of their life and is given that benefit of the doubt – even though it seems many of the mass murderers and sexual molesters are fine upstanding church-goers – whereas someone who exhibits liberal tendencies, or, heaven forbid, actual strays outside the biblical norm in their sexual behavior (regardless of whether it is in a otherwise healthy committed relationship) is automatically branded immoral and untrustworthy in all other aspects of their life. Consider the boy scouts attitudes toward sexuality, for example.
    So to religionists, just the fact that Harriet goes to the proper church is more than enough to vouch for her character on all other issues, regardless of her judicial philosphy, skill, or acumen. It’s the label that counts, and because she wears that label, it is unnecessary to them to consider or weigh anything else about her. ‘Nuff said. The movement conservatives, representing business, moneyed interests, and people to whom “political philosophy” actually has something to do with the body politic rather than “Jesus Christ because he changed my heart” of course have a much more vested interest in the legal system and who actually gets on the courts and are much more interested in credentials and legal philosphy of the main actors in the judicial system.

    In many ways, the pick of Miers and her advancement, based, it seems, exclusively on her religion and lack of paper trail is the (so-far) ultimate act of anti-intellectualism that this regime has practiced so well. And as long as they stick to their “label”, their base won’t really question anything else.

  • I have a few friends on the other side of the aisle. Most are rich, secular, porn-surfing, beer-and-wine-drinking, occasionally pot-smoking California yuppies– all business owners and most with kids.

    They are either hiding their faces in shame, or in outright rebellion about their party.

    All they wanted was to get out of having to pay taxes, and maybe sit by the TV and watch some litle brown people get blown up so we can march in and take their oil. Instead they got James Dobson and all this Christian shit– and a ridiculously expensive and unnecessary and utterly mismanaged war.

    In the Repug coalition of God, Guns, and Greed (religious whackos, imperialists, and rich “free-marketeers”), my right-wing friends are firmly in the Greed camp (with a few of the younger and more macho ones in the Guns camp). The God camp has always made them a little nervous. Now they’re just horrified by it. And the Guns camp has created a disaster in Iraq, and all of America knows it. And even the Greed camp– so beloved by my right-wing friends– has discredited itself with Brownie, DeLay, Frist, and all the pocket-lining and graft-taking. Grover Norquist’s “Wednesday morning” coalition is taking a beating from all sides.

    Kos talks about Lincoln 1860 as the best strategy, but I disagree. I think this is our Nixon 1968.

    The religious whackos are as obviously “out of the mainstream” as the Weathermen and Chicago rioters were in the 60’s– and they are scaring the “silent majority” of decent, tolerant, ecumenical America. Vietnam and the “generation gap” tore the Democratic party apart. The Neocons and the Christian Soldiers are tearing the Repugs apart.

    I agree with Kos that a Western strategy is best for Democrats. Run on a a platform of Civil Liberties, rugged energy self-sufficiency and conservation, and good government, and pick up all the moderates who are scared of the religious right and the Neocon imperialists. I’d love to see a Western primary instead of New Hampshire.

  • Goatchowder — Hear several of the western states are working on such a primary. Spearheaded by Richardson, who no doubt expects to reap the rewards of such a primary. Clark, who tends to think several steps ahead of everybody else, is working on his southern strategy for winning the actual election — one where he pulls in several red states so that we don’t have to rely on places like Florida.

    Andy– The ultimate act of anti-intellectualism was when a Supreme Court full of intellectuals picked George W. Bush for president. Miers, while never having acted as a judge, does seem to have some impressive creds as a lawyer.

  • Miers, while never having acted as a judge, does seem to have some impressive creds as a lawyer.

    I’m alone among the people I discuss this with in that I actually do think Miers is quite “qualified” to be on the Supreme Court – she may not be the best candidate out there, but she’s certainly qualified, and I think the cronyism factor matters less in this sort of pick than, say, running FEMA, because one doesn’t need special demonstrated administrative skills to be a Supreme Court Justice. But advancing her appointment based on the strength of her religion as opposed to anything else, is, to me, an insult.

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