Tuesday, January 05, 2016

Some Strange Moves by Pro-Bush PAC and Rubio

Governor Jeb Bush
Interesting that the pro-Jeb Bush Right to Rise PAC accuses Donald Trump of trying to insult his way to the presidency, but shows Bush on his way to the presidency insulting Trump.
"And he gets his foreign policy experience from 'the shows'. . . . I don't know if that's Saturday morning or Sunday morning. Donald, you're not going to be insult your way to the presidency."
Then Marco Rubio says in attacking Ted Cruz that if ISIS had lobbyists they would have spent millions to pass the "anti-intelligence law" which Cruz voted for.
Senator Marco Rubio
"If ISIS had lobbyists in Washington, they would have spent millions to support the anti-intelligence law that was just passed with the help of some Republicans now running for president," Rubio said in foreign policy speech delivered Monday in Hooksett, New Hampshire.
The "anti-intelligence law" to which Rubio referred is the USA Freedom Act, passed in June 2015. It restricts the National Security Agency's collection of so-called metadata from Americans' phone records, a controversial part of the nation's post-9/11 anti-terrorist strategy. Rubio has said the Freedom Act "weakens U.S. national security by outlawing the very programs our intelligence community and the FBI have used to protect us time and time again."
Rubio's presidential site touting Trey Gowdy
But, as Byron York notes, lots of Republicans voted for that bill including Rep. Trey Gowdy who just endorsed Rubio and who Rubio is having speak at his campaign events. Are they all unwitting ISIS supporters?
Beyond going wildly over the top, has Rubio looked at who else voted for the USA Freedom Act? There are a lot of Republicans — conservatives whose support Rubio will need in this campaign — who acted, in Rubio's telling, in concert with those imaginary ISIS lobbyists. 
The bill passed by a vote of 67 to 32 in the Senate and 338 to 88 in the House.
 Sometimes political shots are not well aimed--even aimed at the candidate's own foot.

6 comments:

MAX Redline said...

Yes, it's certainly a lot of oddness going on. But neither Jeb! nor Rubio can gain any traction, so they're adopting some desperate tactics - a couple of days ago, Jeb! even floated the idea of bringing Dubya on the campaign trail because he's really well-liked. Amazing.

T. D. said...

George W. is well liked because he has done no campaigning or political criticism since he left office (except for the snide remark saying he just didn't like Ted Cruz). Avoiding anything negative even about Obama when Obama was blaming GWB right and left. If GWB starts campaigning, that popularity will rapidly fade and his failures (especially the economic disaster he left) will come front and center. In fact, whenever Jeb talks about a coalition of overwhelming force to defeat ISIS it reminds me of the mess GWB left in the Middle East. Iraq is a mess not only because of Obama's incompetence. It was a lost cause from the beginning. And Jeb can't very well disavow GWB's policies.

MAX Redline said...

Exactly, TD: given the constant barrage of blame from obama over the years, Dubya has shown remarkable restraint. That doesn't mean that he's well-liked; he'd become red meat for the rabid Left immediately upon entering the campaign.

Following 9/11, I supported going after the training camps in Afghanistan, but completely opposed returning to Iraq - even though Pantsuit and Lurch were for it before they were against it.

T. D. said...

Yep. You were right all along. I followed the wrong logic about the likelihood of democratizing Iraq.

MAX Redline said...

Some places aren't ready for democracy - or a representative republic. And third-century mindsets definitely aren't. Take out the training camps, I'm good with that. Back to Iraq, not so much.

T. D. said...

You were way ahead of me on this, Max. Seeing most of the Middle East blow up under Obama and Egypt almost going under and Turkey wavering underlines that.