GOP Advantage

When it comes to the military, the GOP can get away with murder.

What I meant is put better in this letter I sent (February 15, 2008 1:11 PM) to the Reality-Based Community's Mark Kleiman, about how McCain gets a free-ride on his non-opposition to torture:

This issue reminds me of the paradigm-based immunities that separate the supporters of each party.

The Dems and GOP have a set narrative, a paradigm of rectitude, a set of orthodoxies, in the public eye. When a person in the party, or the party leadership, goes against that orthodoxy, the press and by extension the people, give the party the benefit of the doubt. The 'sin' is either ignored or pardoned.

My examples are 'national defense' for GOP and 'civil rights' for Democrats. A Democrat can get away with doing bad things to minorities. The same things, if done by Republican, would be considered abuse, are ignored if done by a Democrat. The examples for this are rife from the Clinton era, but a more recent example is Senator Biden's remarks a few months about Obama (calling him well-spoken, etc) Yeah, it's not 'macaca' but it'd be called racist if coming from Romney. The Clintons were allowed to slash welfare, enact NAFTA, and Don't Ask Don't Tell and are still given credit for being "liberal." While die-hard partisans on those issues will still blame the Clintons for abandoning core principles, that's not the press narrative.

Andrew Sullivan makes a big deal about DODT -- it's the main reason he gives for distrusting the Clintons and attacking the Human Rights Commission -- that the Clintons have a bad civil rights record for gays and yet the HRC supports Hillary.

Note, when the Clintons recently were staked out as being in the opposition to a civil rights icon (Obama - who will be in history books for the next century whether he wins the nomination or not), they lost their paradigm immunity. Minor comments were considered race-bating not only because they were but because it was assumed that they were. I.e. Hillary & Bill were being treated under the Republican 'civil rights' rules.

The Republicans have the same immunity when it comes to national security and the military. Even though any right thinking person recognizes that the GOP (president & congress) has left the country vulnerable to terrorist attack, electively stirred up a massive world-wide terrorist movement, and have nearly crippled the military - they are given a pass for all of that. Surely, if a Democratic congress/president did any of this they would be pilloried. But it's just assumed that the GOP is loyal to the military and will be tough on security. Even when they're not.

A proof for this is John Kerry's 'botched joke' back in '06. He was making a comment about Bush, but through bad delivery, it came out as a swipe against the military. And that's the interpretation the press swallowed (probably til this day). But I thought Kerry was a dedicated war hero who volunteered to go into Vietnam? No dice. He's a Democrat, he's against the military.

This goes with your comments about the public perception of a "liberal." That Obama is not considered a liberal by many Americans because Obama talks about religion (and patriotism) as if they were good things. Same paradigm issues.

This is why McCain gets a pass by the press for betraying the military and the constitution vis-a-vis Iraq and torture. Because McCain *can't* betray about torture. That's his paradigm. And, if Kuhn was right, it will take massive amounts of evidence to argue the contrary.

Backpost started 4/16/07 with just the bolded line and finished 4/11/08.