Oh, No
Posted on March 27th, 2008
by Daniel Larison |
|
Jim Antle passes on some depressing news: Alan Keyes will be joining the Constitution Party and possibly running for its nomination. Where do I turn in my (non-existent) membership card?
To the extent that I have ever been a partisan, I have been registered with the New Mexico Taxpayers’ Party (as the national party used to be known) when I started voting, so I suppose I am still technically a member of that party, and I did cast my vote for Peroutka in 2004. I will go on record right now and say that if they nominate Keyes I won’t ever vote for a Constitution Party nominee again. More or less pointless protest candidacies based in principle are one thing. Tying yourself to a ludicrous fraud in the process is something else all together. I say this as someone who once bought what Keyes was selling. Happily, I am done with that phase.
Jim is right that “he would still be the biggest name candidate the Constitution Party has ever attracted,” but in this case that is definitely not a good thing. Most people have no idea what the Constitution Party is. With a Keyes candidacy it will become known as “the vehicle for the looney’s latest ego trip and money-making scheme.” If he wins the Libertarian nomination Mike Gravel has to be hoping that Keyes gets the CP nod, since it will easily make Gravel the one considered credible and sane among the third party candidates.
Filed under: politics
It may be the vehicle for Keyes latest ego trip, but he also is a good match for the party. On name alone the Constitution Party sounds like it would be great. But the Party, like Keyes, gets very preachy.
From the Constitution Party Platform Preamble:http://www.constitutionparty.com/party_platform.php
The Constitution Party gratefully acknowledges the blessing of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ as Creator, Preserver and Ruler of the Universe and of these United States. We hereby appeal to Him for mercy, aid, comfort, guidance and the protection of His Providence as we work to restore and preserve these United States.
This great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians; not on religions but on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. For this very reason peoples of other faiths have been and are afforded asylum, prosperity, and freedom of worship here.
The goal of the Constitution Party is to restore American jurisprudence to its Biblical foundations and to limit the federal government to its Constitutional boundaries.
I can picture Keyes reading it in his usual style.
Oh, yes, Keyes’ usual spiel fits the party well. He’s very good at manipulating the hopes of Christian conservatives who are deeply frustrated by the status quo, but I think it’s just a racket for him.
Daniel, could you say a bit more about why you have such a distaste for Keyes? I’m not questioning whether it’s justified; I’m just interested to know what’s behind it. Some years ago when I was an undergraduate, I thought his rhetoric was terrific. I imagine that now I’d find his showmanship a bit overblown, to say the least, but I’m wondering if there’s anything specific that has made you go from someone who – like me – once “bought what [he] was selling” to your current view of him (”ludicrous fraud”, and all that). Again, not challenging – just wondering …
Alan Keyes is a lunatic and his ‘96 campaign insured that Bob Dole won Iowa. If Buchanan had won Iowa instead, American politics might look different today.
Thanks, Tom. Those are a couple good reasons. My earlier remarks on Keyes at the time of his carpetbagging run for Illinois Senate are here.
Dispite superficial appearances, Keyes is a horrible fit for the Constitution Party on the religion issue and others. The CP is a particularly Christian party as any conservative party in America should be as the country they are attempting to conserve is (was?) a particularly Christian country. Keyes is a universalist Straussian. While he is more theistic than many Straussians and more explicitly Christian, at base he is still a Straussian. He is also a baptized member of the Lincoln Cult.
The CP is anti-Iraq War and anti-intervention. Keyes is wrong on both these issues.
Daniel and Tom, if you have any influence at all with Howard Phillips or any of the other CP leadership, I hope you will contact them and let them know what a disaster a Keyes nomination will be. Or if you have influence with someone else who has influence with them.
I count on being able to vote for the CP nominee every four years. Losing them as an option will really hurt.
[...] Eunomia sounds the alarm on Keyes winning the CP nomination: [...]
Red,
I have no influence over the Constitution Party, other than voting for the party’s presidential nominee in ‘96 and ‘04 and planning to do so again this year, until I read here that Alan Keyes might be the nominee. I suggest contacting Phillips yourself and sending him this thread. Thomas Fleming’s description of Keyes contained in the post Daniel linked to is entirely accurate.
Wow, I had forgotten about Keyes aside from being the answer to the trivia question, “Who was the carpetbagger sacrificed against Obama in 2004?” I figured the CP would go with Roy Moore.
Following the links around, I was amused by the fact that there is a Libertarian Party candidate named “Jingozian.” Then considering how many LP candidates there are in a given Presidential election, it isn’t surprising. There are probably two or three commenters on this blog running for the LP nomination.
Herman, the problem is that Roy Moore has not yet been convinced to run.
And there’s something wrong with that name because, well, why exactly?