Dan McLaughlin, a senior writer at National Review Online, recently saw himself pop up in The Bulwark. Now National Review isn’t exactly a MAGA bulletin, having devoted an entire issue to “The Case Against Trump.” But in Jim Swift’s view, McLaughlin is an anti-anti-Trump writer. The difference between him and The Bulwark’s crew? He’d never tell you to vote for the Democrat.
People who believe in nothing – such as @JimSwiftDC – live in a constant state of bafflement as to why people like me would not support a political party that aims at the destruction of everything I believe in – not just policy but the American system. https://t.co/E3XaAwpr5s pic.twitter.com/xsJdrkpgPo
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Swift takes exception to McLaughin writing of Liz Cheney, “She threw away her career in an act of noble self-sacrifice that descended into monomania and bad political judgment.” That excerpt reads:
The problem with Dan McLaughlin and many of the other anti-anti-Trump writers is any workable strategy seemingly never involves defeating Republicans by voting for Democrats. It’s only unworkable because guys like Dan want to keep their patina of good conservative intact and not tell people, hey, Maryland Republicans voted for a nutjob? You should vote for a Democrat, even if their policies are not your cup of tea.
That’s it. That’s the divide. Folks like Dan and his cohorts will never say: Vote for the Democrat. We will. I guess that makes us less conservative by comparison, but maybe you can write in people in D.C. or NYC just to prove to readers you’re a “true conservative.”
Yes, it does make you less conservative.
And for what? His example is Maryland. But *Democrats* don't believe that Dan Cox is a dangerous person who does things they would never do in the same shoes. If they believed that, they wouldn't have spent 50 times as much money on his ads as he did. https://t.co/jbENpbSZQz pic.twitter.com/TJcsWInUNI
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Lincoln didn't react to the Know-Nothings or his 1844 & 1854 losses by saying "vote for the pro-slavery Democrats." Reagan didn't react to Watergate by saying "vote for the Democrats who want to go soft on the Soviet Union." They worked within the only party their principles had.
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Democrats can't be trusted with any of our institutions. They constantly push changes to the fundamental rules to undermine our democratic system. They attack the legitimacy of our elections & system at the drop of a hat (links collected in this column).https://t.co/5qElQgHHnI
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
If people like me throw our support to the Democrats, they will respond with more, rather than less, of that sort of behavior. Which is fine if your only principle is "more votes for Democrats" or "more clicks."
I wasn't born yesterday. Go sell it to someone who was.
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Relatedly, in bad analogies: @BillKristol wrote this entire column without any acknowledgement that Lincoln's loss in 1858 was to a Democrat, not a fellow Republican. Lincoln rebounded precisely because of where he stood on what divided the two parties. https://t.co/Di5fYTNJbA
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Which is why I made the point about Lincoln in my Liz Cheney column https://t.co/lEaBgkKNlm pic.twitter.com/lOGgGTF8mG
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Sorry, I'm not gonna sign up with the people who argue that we need to get rid of the United States Constitution.https://t.co/9IA9lFnEy6 pic.twitter.com/WVekC5jOVR
— Dan McLaughlin (@baseballcrank) August 19, 2022
Wasn’t Youngkin also a “nut” I was supposed to spurn for Terry McAuliffe? The nut calibration is important and it’s off.
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) August 19, 2022
Yes exactly. For that crowd, every Republican is bad. Which is fine if you just want to be a Democrat, but don’t pretend you’re doing it as a principled stand against bad forces on the right. https://t.co/Uhol8oJKG1
— AG (@AGHamilton29) August 19, 2022
Opposition to Youngkin was a pretty good test as to whether someone actually just had a principled objection to Trump or is just rooting for Dems at this point. And it’s rather telling how many people from a certain crowd are now lying about their position in that race.
— AG (@AGHamilton29) August 20, 2022
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) August 19, 2022
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) August 19, 2022
Yeah, vote with these guys: “Liberal MSNBC guest calls Winsome Sears a ‘Black mouth’ for ‘White supremacist practices.'”
Alex Jones for college educated people
— Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) August 19, 2022
Has Jim Acosta given everyone around America an update on "Soviet-style" Virginia since Youngkin took office?
— Blame Big Government (@BlameBigGovt) August 19, 2022
Every current Republican is worse than Trump, who was literally Hitler.
Next one after next Republican will be worse than the last one.
And so on, and so on.
— Daigotsu Elenti (@ScarletElenti) August 19, 2022
We get it: You’re #NeverTrump, which means voting for Joe Biden and Democrats all the way down the ticket who support abortion through the third trimester, jails with revolving doors, higher taxes, open borders, etc. The only way to keep Trump from coming back is to vote Democrat — that “conserving conservatism.”
Related:
Bulwark columnist gives a heads up about a couple of people wearing ‘1776’ hats https://t.co/84QOe2RclE
— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) August 20, 2022
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