THE PLANK NOVEMBER 5, 2008
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CNN:
Randy Scheunemann, a senior foreign policy adviser to John McCain,
was fired from the Arizona senator's campaign last week for what one
aide called "trashing" the campaign staff, three senior McCain advisers
tell CNN.One of the aides tells CNN that campaign manager Rick Davis fired
Scheunemann after determining that he had been in direct contact with
journalists spreading "disinformation" about campaign aides, including
Nicolle Wallace and other officials."He was positioning himself with Palin at the expense of John McCain's campaign message," said one of the aides.
Senior campaign officials blame Schuenemann specifically for stories
about the way Wallace and chief campaign strategist Steve Schmidt
mishandled Palin's rollout — stories that the campaign says threw them
off message in the critical final weeks of the campaign.
--Christopher Orr
9 comments
Would they think that Scheunemann was a source for the Making of McCain article in the NY Times magazine a couple of weeks ago?
- satyendra
November 5, 2008 at 11:57pm
The coming (nascent?) GOP civil war is going to be so incredibly entertaining. And the thought that Palin could unset President Obama is just ridiculous. Do her people think voters rejected the GOP ticket because she was too low on it?
- ackyri
November 6, 2008 at 12:23am
There is an amazing fraction who do, ackyri. They think that if 'Sarah has been Sarah', she would have ripped the skin off Obama and met with the president of Africa. Schuenemann is one of those nitwits, who is about winning at the expense of values and conservatism. Remember, the NEOcons love her since she can be 'molded', has the star power (maybe) to bring in a lot of working stiff votes, and has 'impeccable' credentials: mom, moosehunter, mammaries... On the one hand, I hope the GOP chases that chimera, it will lead them into a decade of minority status, but on the other, the GOP of the last 8 years reminds me of what happens when there isn't an effective, loyal opposition: cronyism, entitlement, scandal, decay. I really hope that true conservatism gets more sway not less. What I found interesting was the piece on Fox ripping the hide off Palin, why is Fox already choosing sides and shy not Palin's side where they would usually sit?
- dbhuff
November 6, 2008 at 7:38am
Over at Slate, Jim Manzi, Douglas Kmiec, Ross Douthat, and Christine Todd Whitman are discussing the Conservative Crackup and what is to be done to avoid it. Except for Kmiec, they offer the same old same old (vouchers, deductions for private health insurance, reduced regulation, tax reform, and immigration reform). Vouchers is of course code for breaking the teachers' union. Deductions for private health insurance is of course code for breaking medicare, or at least avoiding universal health care. Tax reform is of course code for lowering the top income tax rates and the capital gains tax rate and eliminating the estate tax. And immigration reform is of course simply a little red meat for the base. Gov. Whitman poses the question for conservatives: "Has the country really embraced the idea of "redistributing the wealth"? Are Americans convinced that Washington is going to have the answers to all our needs? I don't think so." As if those are our only choices. I realize that the day after the election offers little time for serious reflection, but if these are the conservatives' ideas for avoiding the conservative crackup, the Democrats and liberals are in much better shape than I would have supposed.
- raylward
November 6, 2008 at 8:32am
On the one hand, I'm entertained by it all - kinda like watching a train-wreck happen in slo-mo. On the other hand, I'm disgusted by two things: McCain's "country first" placing of the Palin within his own heartbeat away from the Presidency; and of course the pathetic trashiness of it all. Good riddance to all of them. I liked especially the blathering in Slate - these people have no clue what just happened.
- icarusr
November 6, 2008 at 8:50am
db - You're spot on, the party in power - ideology aside - always needs a credible and competent loyal opposition to keep them honest. The empty husk which the Republican Party has become is ill-suited to this role and evidently will be for some time. But the last 8 years have driven many moderates and moderate conservatism over to the Democrats, and Obama impresses me as someone genuinely interested in bipartisanship. This should provide a moderating influence.
- WayneJM
November 6, 2008 at 10:41am
The CNN story I linked to yesterday reporting that top McCain foreign policy adviser Randy Scheunemann
- Anonymous
November 6, 2008 at 11:03am
ackyri said: "Do her people think voters rejected the GOP ticket because she was too low on it?"
Yes, as a matter of fact, they do.
What the Right seems not to have grasped yet, is that they are not -- and perhaps never were -- as popular as they think they are. I keep hearing, with a faint tone of desperation, the mantra, "This is a center-right country," which is another code meaning "real Americans are Republicans but every now and then they get deluded or tricked; but Democratic victories are all basically flukes and anomalies."
The only philosophical core now active on the Right is the urge for power. They have no vision of a better country to offer the electorate, only a vision of a country less bad than the evil Dems will make it. How embarrassing to have to try to win by painting the opponent as terrorist, communist servant of evil. On an unconscious level they must know that trying to get a prom date by telling the girl that the guy she really wants to go with has AIDS is a pitiful display of low self-esteem.
- Wasatcher
November 6, 2008 at 11:05am
Whitman is an overated hack of the first order and she just re-proves that to me with this predictably brain dead, witless analysis. She's an idiot. And an idiot that tens of thousands of New Yorkers have a lawsuit against that looks like it has a good shot of succeeding.
She deeply shamed herself and destroyed any credibility she had when she claimed that downtown Manhattan was perfectly safe to go in to about 24 hours post 9/11.
Now, I lived 20 blocks away at the time, had already been disgusted by Bush's compulsive and constant lying way before 9/11 and my first words were "Yeah right Christy, if it's still there tomorrow, I have a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn." We all thought it was a sick joke that she even said that. The stench of burning metal and toxic fumes were constant and so bad, we had to get a hotel room across town intermittently for months.
Yet hundreds of heroic workers took her word as EPA administrator and dove in with no protection because they wanted to save thier friends and do their duty for their country - and now they are dying from it. All because Whitman was kissing ass to Bush and Co and had no courage or integrity to stand up to them.
Yeah Republicans, keep listening to the dead enders in your party, its fine with me. You want to ignore the fact that Democrats just won by 8 MILLION votes and pretend its all about electing a black guy - be my guest. Have a nice time in the pergutory you so richly deserve.
These people have no credible philosophical grounding and are in total denial. It's not only Reagan that's dead, it's Reaganism that's dead. The only way the Republicans get anywhere is by flushing garbage and dead wood like Whitman out to sea and growing new talent that accepts this reality.
- Wandreycer1
November 6, 2008 at 11:47am