Powell on the GOP

"Can we continue to listen to Rush Limbaugh? Is this really the kind of party that we want to be when these kinds of spokespersons seem to appeal to our lesser instincts rather than our better instincts?"

-- Colin Powell, on the problems of the Republican party.

Hagel Unplugged

With only two months left in his Senate career, and with a potential Obama cabinet appointment on the horizon, Chuck Hagel is certainly not suppressing his feelings. In fact, it's quite the opposite. As reported in the Huffington Post, Hagel's latest targets include everyone from President Bush to Rush Limbaugh.

Appearing at a forum at the Johns Hopkins School of Advances International Studies, the outgoing Nebraska Republican leveled harsh criticism at his own party, the lack of intellectual curiosity among some of his colleagues, the Bush administration's handling of nearly every aspect of governance and -- perhaps most bitingly -- the conservative radio voices that often dictate the GOP agenda.

"We are educated by the great entertainers like Rush Limbaugh," said Hagel, sarcastically referencing the talk radio host who once called him "Senator Betrayus." "You know, I wish Rush Limbaugh and others like that would run for office. They have so much to contribute and so much leadership and they have an answer for everything. And they would be elected overwhelmingly," he offered. "[The truth is] they try to rip everyone down and make fools of everybody but they don't have any answers."

It wasn't all an exercise in unloading pent-up frustrations. Hagel offered praise for Robert Gates -- creating the impression that he would like the current Pentagon chief to remain at the post once President-elect Barack Obama takes office. He also deflected questions about whether he would serve in the Obama administration or what he thought of the possibility of Hillary Clinton at Secretary of State. Moreover, Hagel offered what amounted to an hour-long plea for the next administration and Congress to reconfigure the way it works together and within the international framework when it comes to foreign affairs.

"Eighty-seven percent of the American people said America is going in the wrong direction," said Hagel. "You don't need to know another number about anything, and so the election was pretty predictable: the American people don't like what is going on... they want us to start doing what leaders are expected to do, address the problems, find some consensus to governing. Get along. There will be disagreements, sure... but in the end we can't hold ourselves captives to this raw, partisan, political paralysis."

But the truly memorable bits came when -- unrestrained by formalities -- he deployed a sharp tongue while riffing on the GOP. Reflecting on the Bush administration, Hagel, one of the earliest critics of the Iraq war, held back few punches. "Yes, there have been some differences and some pretty significant ones in [the Republican Party]. But when you ask the question: 'Has [our approach] worked? I don't think many people will say it has worked," he said, adding later: "God knows I would never question the quality of our elected officials, that's why I'm so popular with many of them."

The main thrust of his critiques was aimed not at any individual specifically, but at a closed-off mindset that he believed had taken hold of Republican politics and, consequently, the GOP's approach to foreign policy. "Engagement is not appeasement," he said. " Diplomacy is not retreat. Somehow too many in this town and in this country have disconnected all of that.” Later in the question-and-answer session, he offered an example to illustrate this quip, gently mocking those officials and voters who, for one reason or another, had problems with things from France or people who were Muslim.

"There is always going to be a certain know-nothing element to democracy," said Hagel. "That is their choice. But in a world that is so vitally interconnected, it does help if you try to understand the other side... Ask them: 'What is it that scares you about the French so much?'"

North Carolina and Indiana: Winners and Losers

The Fix lays out the winners and losers from the North Carolina and Indiana primaries.

WINNERS

Black Voters: Time and time again, African American voters have propelled Obama in the nomination fight. From South Carolina's primary through Feb. 5 states like Georgia and Alabama and into Tuesday night's result in North Carolina, black voters turned out in record numbers and lined up solidly behind Obama. One-in-every-three voters in North Carolina were black and Obama won a whopping 91 percent of them. Make no mistake: If and when Obama formally becomes the nominee, he will owe the black community a significant debt of gratitude.

"Dream Ticket": The polite victory speeches of Clinton and Obama - full of kind words for each other and gestures of potential outreach - drove cable commentators wild about the possibility of the New York senator accepting a spot on the ticket as vice president. Harold Ford Jr., a former Democratic congressman from Tennessee, broached the possibility during an appearance on MSNBC, telling hosts Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann that a shared ticket is "something that this party is going to have to think very seriously about in the next few weeks." Somewhere House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Calif.) is rolling her eyes.

Rush Limbaugh: Whether or not you believe in "Operation Chaos," the conservative talk radio host got lots and lots of credit for disrupting the Democratic race. Obama's campaign sent out several e-mails touting Limbaugh's call for Republicans to cross over and support Clinton (thereby extending the Democratic contest). And exit polling showed that Republicans made up 11 percent of the vote in Indiana, and that bloc went to Clinton by a 53 percent to 45 percent margin. The Limbaugh Effect? That probably gives the conservative talker a bit too much credit, but the publicity he got last night from cable television was priceless.

Young Voters: No age group has been more ridiculed for their lack of participation than those under 30. But in Indiana that age group comprised 16 percent of the overall vote while those 65 or older comprised 15 percent. Under 30s went for Obama 61 percent to 39 percent, a margin that all but neutralized Clinton's 44 percent margin among older Hoosiers.

Gary, Indiana: Not since the Jackson Five or perhaps "The Music Man" has this northwestern Indiana city got so much national attention. For a few hours last night, the Mayor of Gary was the biggest "get" in the world of cable television and print reporting.

The Picket Fence Play: Were we the only ones who, in the wee hours of Wednesday morning, started making comparisons between Obama's Lake County comeback and the play Dennis Hopper drew up to win the championship game for Hickory High in "Hoosiers"?

LOSERS

Evan Bayh: The Indiana senator put his own political chops on the line in the two weeks between Pennsylvania and Tuesday night's vote - serving as an aggressive voice for Clinton (and against Obama) in the hurly burly leading up to the primary. Despite reports from both campaigns about Bayh's popularity among state voters, he simply wasn't able to deliver his candidate the sort of victory she needed to claim momentum going forward.

Mike Easley: The North Carolina governor's decision to endorse Clinton was seen as a potential turning point in the race. Or not. Obama hammered Clinton in the Tarheel State, and Easley, who will be looking for a job when his second term expires later this year, did himself no favors in positioning for a possible Obama cabinet. (On a more positive note, Easley's heir apparent - Lt. Gov. Bev Perdue - claimed a solid win in the Democratic gubernatorial primary.)

The Wright Controversy: Exit polling in Indiana and North Carolina suggests that the comments made by Rev. Jeremiah Wright last week weren't the anchor around Obama's ankle that many believed they would be. About a third of voters in both states said Wright was "very important" in deciding their vote, and those blocs went strongly for Clinton. About a third of voters said Wright was "not at all important" in their choice of candidate, and they opted for Obama by even wider margins. What do all those number say? That if you came into the Wright controversy favoring Clinton, you came out of it thinking the same thing. And if you were an Obama supporter before the Wright reemergence, you remained one afterwards. Put simply - much ado over not all that much.

The "Unholy Alliance"

In a recent Sunday Times column, Andrew Sullivan discusses the “unholy alliance” of Hillary Clinton and the far Right.

Last week was officially the moment that the race for the Democratic nomination slipped through the looking glass into surrealism. Here is a brief list of those people who are now actively supporting Hillary Clinton’s candidacy: Pat Buchanan, a charming man slightly to the right of Genghis Khan; Rush Limbaugh, the most voluble and incendiary of right-wing talk-show hosts; Richard Mellon Scaife, the media mogul who financed the virulently antiClinton crusades of the 1990s; and, if you read between the lines, even Karl Rove, the “architect” of the past decade or so of Republican dominance in electoral politics.

Am I hallucinating? I promise you I’m not. The merging of the forces that once persecuted the Clintons with the Clinton campaign itself has been a wonder to behold. Some on the once solidly anti-Clinton right have even been directly urging people to register as Democrats to vote for her. Limbaugh began his pro-Clinton campaign when Ohio and Texas were at stake. Last Wednesday he claimed success in getting enough Republicans to vote for Clinton in Pennsylvania to keep her candidacy alive. Limbaugh calls his initiative Operation Chaos. “Were it not for Operation Chaos, [Barack] Obama could win this by winning the primary process. But he can’t now,” he bragged last week. Yes, this is the same Limbaugh who rose to fame hawking White-water and Lewinsky for eight years. Now he wants to save the couple he once wanted to impeach.

Or take Rove. In a brilliant opinion piece last week in The Wall Street Journal he insisted Obama could not win white ethnic voters in the autumn, and he even endorsed one of the Clinton campaign’s least persuasive arguments: that the votes in the Michigan and Florida primaries – deemed illegitimate by party bosses ahead of time because the states broke the rules by scheduling their primaries out of order – should be counted in the popular vote tally. I don’t know anyone outside Clinton’s inner circle who actually believes that those states’ decision to violate the rules (and her choice to put her name on the illegitimate Michigan ballot) should now count retroactively in her favour. But Rove now does – and is clearly doing what he can to legitimise Clinton’s only chance of winning the nomination.

You have to pinch yourself as Buchanan – the former senior adviser to Presidents Nixon, Ford and Reagan, and a man who clearly believes John McCain is a flaming liberal – all but endorses Clinton night after night on television. Buchanan’s rationale: “Obama cannot concede that the anger of white America – that its right to equal justice has been sacrificed to salve the consciences of guilt-besotted liberals – is a legitimate anger.”

Meanwhile we witnessed another surreal inversion. Last Tuesday night Terry McAuliffe, the Clintons’ money man, appeared on a network that many Democrats view as anathema and said: “Let me congratulate Fox [the TV network], because you were the first to call it for Hillary Clinton. Fair and balanced Fox: you beat them all.” Fox is now using the Clinton spokesman as part of an ad promo.

The icing on the cake was the endorsement of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, owned by Scaife, the man who bankrolled the impeachment of Bill Clinton in the 1990s. Hillary even sat down with Scaife for a fawning interview. His paper concluded: “Clinton’s decision to sit down with the Trib was courageous, given our long-standing criticism of her . . . Political courage is essential in a president. Clinton has demonstrated it; Obama has not. She has a real record. He doesn’t. She has experience of value to a president. He doesn’t.”

The Clintons are pragmatists, to put it kindly, when it comes to advancing their own interests and have long played the politics of “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. It’s also indisputable that Obama gave them a gift with his unforced error about “bitter” Pennsylvania voters. The shrewd and subtle invocation of racial tropes against Obama is also something that these Arkansan operators know well. One recalls that Bill Clinton interrupted his primary campaign in 1992 to return to Arkansas to preside over the execution of a mentally retarded black man. He was a master at bonding with African-Ameri-cans while signalling to white voters that he was also a Bubba underneath. This time, after telling North Carolina voters last week that a black candidate doesn’t care about “people like you”, he has allowed Bubba to become the public face. His wife’s emergence in Pennsylvania as a tribune of the white working classes is part of the Clintons’, er, flexibility.

But what explains the Republicans’ sudden love for the Clintons is a little less obvious than the reasons for the Clintons’ sudden love for them. On paper, there is no actual policy difference to speak of between Obama and Hillary Clinton. Their one main disagreement is on healthcare mandates – and on that question, Obama is, if anything, slightly to Clinton’s right.

What’s going on, I think, is a classic bluff – as well as a simple desire to keep the Democrats’ agony going. Yes, Obama does have obvious problems winning over older and whiter voters in places like Pennsylvania and Ohio. His recent sub-par performances have not helped. But in a hypothetical contest between McCain and Clinton, the very forces that help keep Clinton ahead among these voters in the primaries would aid McCain against Clinton in the general election. McCain’s a Scots-Irish Vietnam vet with an independent streak. He should beat her easily in this demographic. If, however, Clinton becomes the nominee by wrestling superdelegates away from Obama at the convention (which, barring a catastrophe, is the only way she can do it), McCain’s advantages grow even more.

The Democrats led by Clinton would haemorrhage desperately needed black votes and young votes. All the new money, new votes and new enthusiasm that Obama has brought into his party would not just disappear; the new voters would be actively enraged, sit out the election or even vote for McCain. For all these reasons, the Republicans know that Clinton is still one of their key assets. That’s why they have a sudden, new-found love for her. Obama scrambles politics in ways they do not fully understand yet, and profoundly fear. Endorsing Clinton’s attempt to redefine him as an elitist, leftist snob is win-win for them.

If Clinton prevails, they know how to beat her. If she loses, she will have legitimised a main Republican line of attack against Obama. It’s not that hard to understand. And it’s even more intelligible when you absorb a simple fact. Beneath the headlines about suicidal Democrats, there is a sobering reality for the Republicans in the current polling.

Even now – as the Democrats are tearing themselves apart – the polls are still showing that McCain and Obama are all but tied in the national vote. In a swing state such as Minnesota, Obama actually has a 14-point lead over McCain, as of last Thursday. The death match is now. And the Clintons and the Republicans need all the mutual support they can muster.

The Irony of a McCain Candidacy

As we’ve seen, the inevitable candidacy of John McCain has left the various elements of the Republican Party struggling to mend fences while trying to drown out the voices urging conservatives to sit this one out.

In the Wall Street Journal, Daniel Henninger, debates the proper course for Republicans: “McCain or Wilderness”?

Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham aren't the only conservatives in agony over John McCain. The base is bummed. There are murmurs of heading into the political wilderness. Sit this one out. Rather than sell the party's soul to John McCain, let Hillary have it, or Barack. Go into opposition for four years while the party gets its head together and comes up with an authentic conservative candidate. If this sourness takes hold at the margin, say among GOP anti-immigrant voters, it might happen.

The wilderness is a good place to find yourself, if you're a prophet. There are reasons, though, why a principled political retreat won't make conservative prospects better. The point of a principled retreat would be to rediscover coherence amid doctrinal confusion. The exact opposite is likely to happen.

Most of the distrust of the McCain candidacy is rooted in personal ill will. He's a hard case, and activists are often brittle. The fear is that one of the strongest impulses in a McCain presidency will be payback, and that he might sell out conservatives on taxes and the judiciary. That is possible, though by now it would require an act of deep duplicity by Mr. McCain. Here again, the conservatives should show more self-confidence.

This isn't an apologia for the senator. Unlike Reagan, he is too self-preoccupied. There is a danger his presidency would be mainly about legacy, and therefore disorganized. This is a call to play the cards on the table. Conservatives are not in the wilderness. They should get back in the game.

Former Bush speechwriter, Michael Gerson, speaks to why some conservatives have found relief, not contempt, in a McCain candidacy.

The attacks of movement conservatives - particularly the talk radio and blogging crowd - on John McCain have reached a shrill, off-key crescendo. McCain is not only "dangerous" and "stupid," he has "contempt for his fellow humans." His opponents will refuse to vote in the general election, or even will campaign for Hillary Clinton. With McCain now almost the last man standing, it will be interesting to see how, or if, these pledges are fulfilled.

For some conservatives, the frustrations run deeper than resentment for a single, outsized, prickly, infuriating man. Early in this cycle, many elements of the Republican coalition rooted for - and fully expected - a decisive, ideological break from the compromised Bush years on issues such as immigration and foreign policy. Those hopes have been disappointed.

The lessons of the McCain resurrection run deeper than the limits of talk radio: Candidates of unity are more appealing and electable. American ideals are indispensable in the conduct of American foreign policy. Some conservatives have reacted with anger. For others of us, there is only relief.

Gerson is not alone. As Politico points out, “Conservatives have already found something to like about John McCain: They think he can win in November.” Former Oklahoma Gov. Frank Keating elaborates: “The public who wants change is comfortable with John McCain, whom they view as someone who is not a wholly owned subsidiary of the Bush administration." Keating believes the very issues that have estranged McCain from much of the conservative base “have actually strengthened him with moderates.”

That may be. But as McCain treads his political tight rope toward the general election, his balancing act of appeasing conservatives without alienating moderates will continue. With Mike Huckabee and the base tugging from the right and President Bush beginning to embrace his candidacy, McCain could topple. The ultimate irony could become reality - the more popular McCain becomes with conservatives, the more likely he loses that trait that they find most appealing - his electability.

Election Forecast

The Prince of Darkness offers his political forecast following Super Tuesday.

1. Sen. John McCain's (R-Ariz.) late-night Super Tuesday victories in Missouri and then California give him half the convention delegates needed and all but clinch the nomination for him. Once again, Romney's tactics such as pouring $10 million into California worked in theory but not in practice.

2. The anti-McCain barrage from conservative talk show hosts led by Rush Limbaugh did not work. The old GOP tendency to get behind the presumptive leader trumped irritation with McCain. Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour went on TV last night to say it was time for McCain's opponents to get out and make him the nominee.

3. There is now no clear path for Gov. Mitt Romney to the nomination. The former Massachusetts liberal never was able to sell himself as a conservative, finishing third behind former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and McCain in Southern states.

4. McCain is still a heartily disliked figure in the Senate, but usually soft-spoken Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), uncharacteristically, was the only anti-McCainiac to speak out. The reason may be that Cochran is the Senate's king of pork while McCain is a leading anti-porker.

5. A test for McCain comes Thursday at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), an event he stiffed last year. He has to repeat what he has been saying lately: First, he will veto any tax increase passed by the Democratic Congress. Second, he will name Supreme Court justices in the mold of Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justice Samuel Alito. More than that, he has to say he is one of them.

6. McCain's asset is that there is no genuine conservative left against him. Huckabee is an evangelical, not a conservative (which is one reason he is unlikely to be picked as McCain's running mate). In next week's "Potomac primary" (Virginia, Maryland, and D.C.), it looks like McCain will be the winner, with Huckabee a strong second in Virginia.

7. Thanks to proportional representation, the Democratic fight will stretch out into April. It would have been a very big night for Sen. Hillary Clinton (N.Y.) had Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) not squeezed out a win in Missouri. The next really big tests come March 4 in Texas and Ohio.

8. The overriding story is that twice as many Democrats as Republicans voted on Super Tuesday, and the gap in enthusiasm was even larger. McCain as nominee faces a massive task ahead.

The McCain Tight-Rope

As we saw in 2000, the political fortunes of John McCain are balanced on a precarious tight rope. The more he falls to one side, the more he endears himself to right-wing conservatives and establishment Republicans. The more he falls to the other, the more his appeal broadens to independents and moderates from both parties - demographics that are unreachable for nearly every other Republican candidate. As his popularity rises with one, it falls with the other. In this balancing act, McCain has struggled to find a safe middle-ground and we’ve seen him evolve from a straight-talking maverick to a Bush loyalist to somewhere in between. In the Fall, these struggles put him and his campaign on the ropes. Today, he has staked his claim in a political no man's land somewhere above the fray - getting just enough support from both sides to win New Hampshire and South Carolina. It’s unclear how long he can safely occupy this ground but, if he is going to survive the Republican nominating process against opponents perceived as more "traditionally conservative", it surely won't last long.

E.J. Dionne: John McCain is feared by Democrats and liked by independents. That, paradoxically, is why he may yet be rejected by Republicans, even though he has bent over backward to satisfy conservative demands. McCain's politics-be-damned image has proved remarkably durable, even though he more recently cozied up to his right-wing critics in the anti-tax movement and the older parts of the religious right. Where he once bravely opposed Bush's tax cuts, McCain now spouts orthodoxy in declaring they should be made permanent. He speaks of himself as the true Reaganite because of his opposition to federal spending. In South Carolina it was enough - but only because moderates, liberals and independents identified McCain as the best available alternative.

And that’s the thing about McCain… While perceived as “the brave independent willing to confront a Republican political machine that punishes free thinking," his voting record is far from independent. He votes with his party and the president nearly 90% of the time and his departures from the Republican Party on major votes come with much less frequency than his moderate and independent admirers or conservative detractors let on. His leadership on climate change, immigration and judicial nominations is worthy of praise. There's no doubt about that. But the stands he has taken on these issues (often with a number of conservative senators standing behind him) are far from liberal. They may appear liberal when contrasted with the stances of unrealistic Republican ideologues, but, in actuality, they are generally smack-dab in the middle of mainstream public opinion. His opinions and actions may enrage the Rush Limbaughs and Ann Coulters of the world but does that make him a maverick? Not necessarily. After all, if McCain’s Republicanism was truly in doubt, why would he have endorsements by conservative establishment figures such as Trent Lott, Sam Brownback, Phil Gramm, and Jon Kyl?

Nevertheless, the question of McCain’s true “conservative credentials” continues to be debated and as assaults from the right-wing attack machine continue, independents and moderates have rushed to his defense. It has to be an alarming trend for McCain who is approaching a slate of conservative states. As his popularity rises with one group, it falls with the other - that preacrious political tight-rope.

Ann Coulter, who has repeatedly attacked McCain’s integrity over the years, is always quick to point out that McCain’s appeal with non-right-wingers is proof of his evil ways. In fact, she recently blamed McCain’s loss in Michigan on Democrats...and snow storms. “Unluckily for McCain, snowstorms in Michigan suppressed the turnout among Democratic "Independents" who planned to screw up the Republican primary by voting for our worst candidate. Democrats are notoriously unreliable voters in bad weather. Instead of putting on galoshes and going to the polls, they sit on their porches waiting for FEMA to rescue them.” So yes, Democrats are all lazy dependents of the federal government with a fear of bad weather, and John McCain is the GOP's worst candidate. Well, who is the best candidate, Ann? It’s Mitt Romney…and “by a landslide.” Why? Because “the candidate Republicans should be clamoring for is the one liberals are feverishly denouncing.” As per usual, the logic of Ann Coulter is infallible.

Rush Limbaugh, who shamelessly attacks McCain every chance he gets, went even further, claiming that nominating McCain (or Huckabee) would "destroy the Republican Party . . . change it forever, be the end of it.” Other ideologues like Rick Santorum and Tom DeLay claim that they’d vote for Hillary Clinton before they’d vote for John McCain. Really? What is it that scares them so much?

Is it because, despite his conservative voting record, McCain truly does “confront a Republican political machine that punishes free thinking”? Maybe it’s because of his approach to issues. He may end up in the conservative camp at the end of the day, but he actually seeks solutions to our nation’s problems and doesn’t hate his political opponents. Maybe those who denounce him so vehemently fear they will become increasingly irrelevant during a McCain Presidency that would move beyond the divisive politics of hate. After all, if there was no boogeyman to demagogue, the Coulters and Limbaughs might actually have to defend the merits of their “ideas”.

The question remains, but some answers may be right around the corner.

Dionne: This is also what makes the next stage of the Republican contest so perilous for McCain. In many of the states that vote next - notably Florida, which casts ballots next Tuesday - independents will not be able to come to McCain's aid. In such closed primaries, he will have to emphasize his fealty to traditional conservatism and use his strong support for the Iraq war as a Republican credential.

The balancing act will continue because “the more McCain tries to look like a typical Republican, the more he threatens his standing with middle-of-the-road voters."

McCain thus confronts the most difficult challenge he has faced so far. He made his name as a straight-talker who does not shade his positions to satisfy potential critics. But to win the rest of the way, McCain may have to offer himself as a split personality. He will argue to those on the party's right who mistrust him that they should support him as the one candidate who can appeal beyond the Republican base. But he will also try to ease conservative worries by presenting the most conformist version of himself, thereby giving independents food for second thoughts. At one and the same time, he will have to be the true conservative and the maverick, the loyal font of traditional Republican nostrums and the independent thinker, the candidate of both Fox News and CNN.

Candidates must always walk a fine line in presidential politics and McCain’s tightrope routine will undoubtedly test the best of his abilities. As discussed in the Wall Street Journal – “Ultimately, Mr. McCain doesn't have to make conservatives adore him. But he'll never be president unless he persuades them he's the most conservative candidate available with a credible chance of winning the White House. That shouldn't be too hard a sell."

Perspective

On ABC’s This Week, Michael J. Fox discussed the effects of his Parkinson’s, advocated for embryonic stem cell research, and addressed criticisms from Rush Limbaugh and other partisan hacks. Despite the tremors which dramatically affect his physical behavior and the ability for him to communicate as effectively as he’d like, it’s a powerful interview that puts the entire issue into perspective.

E.J. Dionne, who followed Fox on the show’s next segment, summarized it well: "If you put Michael J. Fox up against Rush Limbaugh in a public debate, which is in effect what you did today, what's happening all over the country, we know that except for Rush Limbaugh's conservative base, the vast majority will shift to the Michael J. Fox side. And I think that what Fox did is made the most compelling case for embryonic stem cell research, which is if you're against it, you also have to be against in vitro fertilization. And no one who is against it really wants to say that, because you're going to create these embryos that will be destroyed."

A few excerpts:

Stephanopoulos: Rush apologized — I guess he apologized for saying you were acting. He didn't call you, did he?

Fox: He would've had more qualifications at an AA meeting. No, you know, that's beside the point. It really isn't germane to the issue. It's funny because, what I'm talking about is about hope. It's about promise. It's about moving forward. It's a forward-looking attitude about what this country is capable of and what we can accomplish for our citizens.

And so if we get sidetracked into a dialogue about whether sick people have a right to display their symptoms in public, you know, that reaction. I think it was more disappointing, from the point of view of— The campaigns, like the [Republican Senate candidate Michael] Steele campaign, their spokesman said, "It was in poor taste," which really— I mean, I'm out here and I expect that. Being in the lead, I'll take some hits. And that's fine. I'm a big boy. Well, not height-wise.

I'm experienced enough and mature enough to take my licks. But I know the community was really hurt by it. And it really brings up the specter of, "Go away. Shut the windows. Shut the doors. Close the curtains, and suffer, and don't let us know," because it's a fearful response.

And what the irony is, is that those people that are being pitied or being asked to suffer in silence don't want to suffer, don't see themselves as pitiable, don't see themselves as victims — see themselves as citizens, participants in the process, and people with aspirations and hopes and dreams for the future. They are way more positive as a whole than what I've seen from the community that opposes them.

[Later]

Stephanopoulos: You mentioned the Steele campaign. Both the Steele campaign and the Talent campaign have said you're not being fair to them, because they want to expand stem cell research, too, they say, but it's adult stem cell research.

Fox: Right, and I agree with them on adult stem cell research. I mean, let's talk about what we agree on. I agree that stem cell research is fantastic; we should pursue it. I agree that we should have no human cloning. We're against that. We're against egg farming, that notion. We agree on all of that.

The only thing is, we would like to include embryonic stem cell research, which our scientists say has the best hope for cures and breakthroughs. See, we're in agreement. I think that when they say talk about not being fair, there has been, again, not as much focus on the content of the ad. It's really the appearance of the ad. But really, because all the statements are verifiable and to direct comparison, it is, in effect, an ad for their position. If you see the ad and you agree with their position, and there are people that do, then it should incentive you to vote for them.

[Later]

Stephanopoulos: Do you think there's any way to finally find common ground with people who do believe in the end that this is tampering with tiny lives?

Fox: Well, again, the point has been made that these lives are going to be thrown away, anyway. They are marked for destruction — thousands of frozen embryos that are a byproduct of in vitro fertilization. We have routinely, before this conversation started on stem-cell research, we have for years thrown them away.
And that's the other thing, you know, this idea of snowflake babies: We're in favor of that. The truth of the matter is that it is only going to account for a tiny fraction—

Stephanopoulos: Those are the embryos that are adopted and then brought—

Fox: Absolutely. Who would have a problem with that? That's fantastic. But it will, in the end, account for only a tiny fraction of those eggs. And so our point is that the pro-life position is to use that — what up to this point is waste, of literal waste that is going to be thrown away — use it to save lives and to ensure lives for the future. I
mean, they talk about unborn. Unborn kids are going to be born with diabetes.

People are going to be dealing with a genetic predisposition to Alzheimer's or to Parkinson's or kids that are going to be injured, have spinal cord injury. That those kids may be born into a world that has the answers for that. That's our position.

[Later]

Stephanopoulos: One of the things he says is that when you're talking about all these cures, you're giving people false hope and that it's cruel.

Fox: It's so funny. What is crueler, to not have hope or to have hope? And it's not false hope. It's a very informed hope. I mean, it's hope that's informed by the opinion of our leading scientists, almost to the point of unanimity that embryonic stem cells, because they're pluripotent, because they have the capacity to be anything, and, are truly— Will [it] be a straight path to victory? Probably not. Probably you'll have stutter steps along the way.

In fact, they just did some work where they found that it actually relieved the symptoms of Parkinson's in one test, but there some residue, some tissue residue that built up, which is not ideal. But two steps forward, one step forward, one step back, you know, it's a process, it's how this country was built. It's what we do, you know. It seems to me that in the last few years, eight, 10 years, we've just stopped, we've become incurious and un-ambitious.

And hope, I mean, hope is— I don't want to get too corny about it, but isn't that what the person in the harbor with the thing—? It's about hope. And so to characterize hope as some sort of malady or some kind of flaw of character or national weakness is, to me, really counter to what this country is about.

Stephanopoulos: You're supporting it through your foundation. A lot of states are supporting it. What do you say to those who say, "You know, we don't need the federal government to get in the middle of this right now, and it's too divisive an issue?"

Fox: Well, the federal government has to be involved, because on one level, you talk about limitations; it's not just a matter of the stem cells being limited, but the restriction on federal funding. If you have an institution, a facility that can do this kind of work and it receives any federal funding at all, you lose that if you do, if you take a cell out of a Petri dish on government property. So you have to have duplication of facilities.

So now our resources are going into scientists having to duplicate federal facilities at enormous expense in order to do the most rudimentary work with stem cells, with embryonic stem cells. You have researchers that can't get funding. And so you have young researchers that are not going into the field. It's the iterations of limitation are endless. So you say: Why can't the private sector get involved? Because they have to duplicate the entire resources of the federal government in order to do it. It's just not practical.

[Later]

Fox: ...You know, that's the other notion that was put out there, was that I somehow was recruited by the Democratic Party.

Stephanopoulos: Democratic shill, I think was the word.

Fox: Democratic shill, yes. I have to look up shill in the dictionary. I think it has something to do with supporting someone whose beliefs you don't believe in for ulterior reason or something.

But, yeah, no, I'm not a shill for the Democratic Party. I approached them. I sat down to find out what candidates are pro-stem cell in races where they're opposed by anti-stem cell candidates. And I had no predisposition toward Democrats or Republicans. It'd be fine with me either way.

In fact, a Republican candidate who's pro-stem cell would be someone I'd really like to talk to. And in fact in the past I've supported, I've done commercials for Arlen Specter, who is a very aggressive pro-stem cell champion. And I know that there are others, you know. There are people like Orrin Hatch and Danforth and others who've thought about it, weighed it really carefully and found that its pro-life possibilities aren't counter to their previous positions. This is a pro-life position, and this is the responsibility of our leadership to take it down this path. It will help Americans.

Rush to Judgment

In today's Washington Post, Slate's William Saletan writes an entertaining and sobering indictment of Rush Limbaugh, whose recent accusations of Michael J. Fox served as yet another reminder to us of how deeply disturbed this guy is. Here's an exerpt:

In Limbaugh's world, "there never was a surplus" under President Bill Clinton. AIDS "hasn't made that jump to the heterosexual community," and cutting food stamps is fine because recipients "aren't using them." Two years ago, he said the minimum wage was $6 or $7 an hour. Last year, he said gas was $1.29 a gallon.

Limbaugh has particular trouble distinguishing reality from entertainment. The abuse at Abu Ghraib "looks just like anything you'd see Madonna or Britney Spears do on stage," he told his listeners. Last month, he defended ABC's Sept. 11 movie against the document on which it purportedly relied: "The 9/11 commission report, for example, says, well, some of these things didn't happen the way they were portrayed in the movie. How do they know that?"

Last year, Limbaugh, who used a tailbone defect to get out of the Vietnam War draft, accused a Democratic candidate of having served in Iraq "to pad the resume." He charged veterans -- including former senator Max Cleland (D-Ga.), who lost his legs and an arm in Vietnam -- with trying "to hide their liberalism behind a military uniform . . . pretending to be something that they are not." When war is just a television show, a uniform is just a costume. Liberalism is real; losing your limbs is a pretense.

Which brings us back to stem cells. Limbaugh says Fox's ads dangle a prospect of imminent cures "that is not reality." He's right. But the ads convey another reality: a man dying of a disease that might be cured more quickly if the government dropped its restrictions on research funding. Limbaugh dismisses this as a "script" being followed by Fox's "PR people" and "the entertainment media." Script? Entertainment? This is life and death.

If he didn't average 13.5 million listeners every week, he would be a joke. The fact that he does makes him dangerous in that he'll simply continue his campaign of character assassination and misinformation. By continuing to demonize those he disagrees with, he'll further divide his listeners from people of tolerance, and further drive them from reality. By continuing to spout unsubstantiated and often completely fabricated information as justification for his politics, he'll just add further to the growing number of duped Americans who would rather turn to others for direction rather than conduct their own independent thinking.