A high-profile Boston University professor is prominently mentioned in the latest look at the phenomenon of "Obamacons" -- well-known conservatives, many of them Republicans, who have publicly declared they will vote for Democrat Barack Obama.
The article in the current issue of The New Republic magazine says that Andrew J. Bacevich's pro-Obama piece, published in March in The American Conservative, is the "seminal Obamacon manifesto."
In that piece, Bacevich argues that conservative revival depends on a US withdrawal from Iraq, which Obama supports -- and Republican John McCain vehemently opposes.
"Barack Obama is no conservative," Bacevich starts his article. "Yet if he wins the Democratic nomination, come November principled conservatives may well find themselves voting for the senator from Illinois. Given the alternatives -- and the state of the conservative movement -- they could do worse.
"The essential point is this: conservatives intent on voting in November for a candidate who shares their views might as well plan on spending Election Day at home," Bacevich continues. "The Republican Party of Bush, Cheney, and McCain no longer accommodates such a candidate.
"So why consider Obama? For one reason only: because this liberal Democrat has promised to end the U.S. combat role in Iraq. Contained within that promise, if fulfilled, lies some modest prospect of a conservative revival.
"For conservatives, Obama represents a sliver of hope. McCain represents none at all. The choice turns out to be an easy one," Bacevich concludes [My emphasis].
What Bacevich is trying to say is that Barack Obama will end the U.S. war in Iraq. When you have two-thirds of the American public opposed to the U.S. war in Iraq, you have to seriously wonder just how many conservatives will either vote for Obama in protest against the U.S. war in Iraq, or will stay home. Here I am not talking about the neo-cons or the 25-29 percent of Americans that still support President Bush. If conservatives do cross over to vote for Obama, they are going to be the moderate conservatives who no longer approve of the direction President Bush has sent this country, and that a vote for Senator John McCain will be a third Bush term.
Then again, the conservatives may end up staying home on Election Day, or may not even bother to vote for the presidential election.
One more comment here. Republican National Committee spokeswoman Blair Latoff responded to the Bacevich article, saying that conservatives will not "embrace a candidate who has voted 94 times -- once every five days the Senate was in session -- for higher taxes."
"Republicans, independents, and even some Democrats understand that John McCain’s independent leadership is what the country needs to tackle today’s challenges," Latoff said in a statement.
So how does the GOP respond to Bacevich's article saying that conservatives will vote for Obama because Obama will end the war in Iraq? By saying that Obama will raise your taxes! And John McCain has the independent leadership needed to "tackle today's challenges." Latoff never responded to the argument about conservatives voting for an end to the U.S. war in Iraq, because she knows that the Republican Party will continue this disastrous war under a McCain administration. So Latoff trots out this stale GOP argument that Obama will raise taxes, while failing to mention that the Republicans under King George The Deciderer, and John McCain, were responsible for running up a national credit card debt of a half trillion dollars just for the war. Not really the kind of people I would want in the Oval Office to "tackle today's challenges."
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