The Friday Letter / No. 551 / Aug. 25, 2023
Updated at 11:42 a.m. EDT to clarify paraphrased remarks of Gov. Burgum
Following any public event where two or more people meet to air differing opinions and policy prescriptions, among the chattering classes there is the irresistible urge to pontificate on who won, who lost, who scored points, who delivered a fatal blow, and so forth. No thinking is needed here. We'll do it for you.
I write these words Thursday morning knowing that the many internet news sites I read each day are brimming with “analysis,” that is, the writer's opinion on how the GOP presidential debate came down on Wednesday night. I haven't looked at any, but I am confident most of them have advice on what I should think.
The important point here is that everyone who watched the television “debate” (a loose and inaccurate term) came away with a unique experience. Everyone sees the same performance differently, just as we do in witnessing a theatre production or viewing an art piece.
Which renders absurd any attempt to tell you, cherished reader, what to think about the performance. You don't need my opinion in order to form your own.
(Spoiler alert: I’m offering it anyway.)
I do have some thoughts on this, but these are only my opinions, not instructions. As Bruce Williams used to say, I am an expert in my own opinions. These are my own observations not influenced by the self-styled media experts. You may have completely different observations, to the point where you think mine are ridiculous. Fine with me.
You see, it would be easy to pick the winners and losers here. My own biased opinion is that the winners were Ron DeSantis and Doug Burgum. The losers were Donald Trump (AWOL), Chris Christie, and Asa Hutchinson.
Pence, Haley, Ramaswamy, and Scott all held their own, exciting nobody but not making fools of themselves as did Christie and Hutchinson.
I told my wife that the first casualty would be the first to invoke the name of Darth Vader, aka Donald Trump. That would be Hutchinson, who at around 8:52 p.m. EDT in a wholly predictable, although weak tirade, ranted about lawlessness and criminality. This was predictable because Hutchinson, with zero chance to become the GOP nominee, arrived on this stage with one arrow in his quiver: his demand that President Trump go to prison for the rest of his life for having dared upset the cozy GOP establishment.
Hutchinson had to wait nearly until half way through the spectacle because not even the anti-Trump moderators cared much to hear what he had to say and only called on him because the rules required it. Otherwise, his presence was irrelevant, a detractor from the serious candidates. And every one of the other candidates except for Christie is a serious candidate.
(When Christie, whose sole purpose is to send Trump to prison, shared his view that Trump's conduct “is beneath the office of President of the United States,” Ramaswamy shot back with an appropriate put down: “Your entire campaign is based on vengeance.”)
So we could start by saying the next debate should include DeSantis, Burgum, Pence, Haley, Ramaswamy, and Scott. Sen. Scott has no chance to become the nominee and in fact brings no governing or management experience to the table. But he's worth keeping around as a potential VP pick.
If you think I've left somebody off here, you're right. Donald Trump's absence kept this event from becoming a circus. We heard some serious ideas batted about. Not that this lacked drama. Haley had to put down Ramaswamy's false claim that she sits on the boards of major defense contractors.
Nikki has reaped millions in speaking fees and royalties and positions (with United Homes Group). But so has nearly every other presidential candidate, unbeknownst to The Washington Post, which implied malfeasance in its hit piece on her financial success.
“You have no foreign policy experience and it shows,” she lectured Ramaswamy.
DeSantis wisely avoided the get-Trump gotcha questions. This election, he said, is about the next election, not the last one. When the moderators tried to goad him into attacking Pence about his certification of the election results, DeSantis said, “I've got no beef with that.” His point was that this debate was wasting time refighting old wars when the next one will determine whether the US remains a sovereign nation or sinks further into tyranny and anarchy.
Please don’t confuse this policy stand with the need for every American patriot to defend President Trump from the co-ordinated conspiracy of his federal and state persecutors.
DeSantis was ready for the poison arrows that would invade – and sully – this debate. Martha McCallum asked the candidates to raise their hands if they “believe” in climate change. Before anyone could respond, DeSantis shot back that “We're not school children,” saving every one of them from falling into this ridiculous juvenile trap. The question was typical of establishment television: Shallow, meaningless, not designed to reveal truths about anything.
The two big winners, from where we sit, were DeSantis and Burgum. This would be a great ticket of two strong, successful governors, one of them a lieutenant commander and advisor to Navy SEALs, the other an enormously successful entrepreneur who knows how to create jobs and wealth.
Both said, without hesitation, that they would send troops to the southern border, Both, in fact, already have.
Changes in attitudes, changes in latitudes
Before this debate I dismissed North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum as an outlier who bought his way onto the stage with $20 gift cards for anyone who sent his campaign a dollar. This violates at least the spirit of the rules, which the RNC is clueless to understand anyway.
Then I listened to his arguments. He is for real. What most impressed me was his explanation of why the Dobbs decision in overturning Roe v. Wade was the correct one. DeSantis comes close, but Burgum laid out the issue with clarity. The GOP's failure to understand the legal concept and explain it to voters will result in four more years of Harris-Biden.
Better than anyone else I have heard, Burgum explained the constitutional arguments behind the Roe repeal: the 10th Amendment right of each state to write its own laws without interference from the courts or federal government. He noted that (paraphrased) states like North Dakota and New York have different constituencies and will serve them accordingly. Without using the term, Burgum showed a keen grasp of federalism.
McCallum tried to pester Burgum into defending his position, seemingly unaware of the 10th Amendment ramifications. To me, this showed she doesn't understand the constitutional issue. But what else is new in television “news”?
Both Scott and Pence fail to understand the concept. Both want to inflict the same wrong as Roe: federal control of abortion policy. For to say that the federal government should impose a one-size-fits-all ban on abortion is the same affront to 10th Amendment federalism as Roe was in its bizarre finding of a constitutional right to abortion. (No such right ever existed. The universal right to late-term abortion resulted from the law of rule, not the rule of law.)
Both DeSantis and Haley dodged the question.
Back to Burgum. He appears to support federalism across the board. Unlike the Michelle Bachmann doctrine of “Turn out the lights and lock the doors” of the Education Department when she sought the 2016 nomination, Burgum favors a more measured approach. “Some states are doing a good job,” he said. “The states are different.”
Steady at the helm. (We still support the Bachmann Doctrine.)
What's missing? No candidate was asked about fracking or restoring the oil and gas pipelines. Ramaswamy wasn't asked to explain his support of allowing transvestites and other sexual deviants to serve in the military. Only Burgum and Haley were unequivocal in saying they will keep boys out of girls sports in schools. And Desantis, by implication.
And so, what meaning can we take from the debate? Each will have his own conclusion. Mine is that the GOP and the country can safely move on without Donald Trump. If you listen to any conservative talk radio such as Clay Travis and Buck Sexton, you will get heartburn over the Ever-Trumpsters who say they won't vote for the COP candidate if it's not Trump. Many will come around, but in the meantime the nominee – with exactly zero help from the Republican National Committee – must figure how to get back especially the single women who knee-jerk voted for Biden in 2024.
A final thought
The Milwaukee audience was a distraction with the constant whooping, yelling, and interruptions of hysterical women who behaved like teenagers at a Taylor Swift concert. Event organizers must find a way to keep them from the second debate, and enforce the rules of decorum. Baier and McCollum had lost control of this event just 23 minutes into it, and they never regained control of the audience. Only once did they try.
>> For an opposing viewpoint on this story, see Jason Whitlock's piece today at The Blaze.
Short takes on the news
WTHR-TV
Great moments in gun control (continued). A woman identified only as the wife of a homeowner didn't like what she saw coming down in her yard in Salem, Ind. Michael Chastain, 45, drove his car onto the property, dropped the homeowner to the ground and was getting ready to shoot him. The homeowner's wife was quicker on the draw, so to speak. She grabbed her own handgun and ended the threat right there. Mr. Chastain, a well-known criminal in the area, was taken to a hospital, where he expired.
Breitbart
Great moments in crime prevention. A neighborhood group in the Rogers Park area of Chicago, which calls itself Native Sons, is asking Chicago gang members not to shoot anyone between 9 a.m. And 9 p.m. Can we get “please” with that request? Our reading is that the cease fire would only apply on weekdays. Gang members are free to shoot one another and innocent Chicagoans anytime on weekends. Chicago had 23 shootings last weekend.
The solution to Chicago’s violent crime problem is to keep electing Democrats, as they have since the beginning of time. Pritzke’s illegal alien cops should help here.
The Daily Mail
You may not recognize the name of UFC mixed martial arts fighter Themba Gorimbo. After a bout in May, he sold his fight gear for $7,000, not to pay for housing or living expenses, but to build a water pump for his village back in Zimbabwe in East Africa. The project left him with $7.49 in his bank account and no way to earn a living. When Dwayne Johnson (The Rock) got wind, he paid Themba a surprise visit at the gym where Themba was living, his sleeping arrangements a couch. The third-generation WWE champ then took Themba to an apartment in a ruse to meet a supposed friend of his. Turns out Johnson had another surprise for Themba – a fully furnished apartment already decorated with his family photos and such. “He never asked for anything, but I just wanted to help the guy out,” Johnson explained.
Breitbart
Our recommendation for the first question to ask your doctor next visit is, “Are you a member of the American Medical Association?” The woke left AMA is floating the idea of having the federal government pay for uterus transplants for men who think they are women. This is not a Babylon Bee gag. Just be sure to make your co-payment with a credit card, not cash, in order to flee the scene with your bank account and health in tact.
Washington Free Beacon
In what appears to be acting on behalf of her Chinese handlers, Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm held talks with National Energy Administration chairman Zhang Jianhua over capitulating to Chinese demands.
Recommended
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Hunter Biden is the wrong target. So is Joe Biden. The real target should be Merrick Garland, explained here for Fox News junkies and other who don't really understand what's going on.
Headline of the week
Babylon Bee – Fake news you can trust
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Hello readers. I have been too ill to write the Friday Letter for the last two weeks, or even to write a note explaining my absence. I am taking a new brand of chemotherapy which is both working as intended and knocking me to the ground at the same time. I am back, but in the future I cannot commit to a weekly column. Thanks for your understanding.