Steve Kornacki of the New York Observer was on Fox New York local TV with Jody Applegate and Ron Corning this morning and he was there to comment upon John McCain’s faltering campaign. Faltering here means lacking in dollars. Kornacki made me so mad that I anteed up another contribution to John McCain’s campaign at a time I can scarcely afford it.
I’d never heard of “political analyst” Steve Kornacki. He appeared to be a bubbling, gleeful, intelligent guy with a softened brillo haircut and an enormous amount of self-esteem drawn from a pampered or doting upbringing. His flight glide must have been a three step: prep school, college, journalism job. Maybe I’ve got that wrong and he was really a jet jock shot down over Iraq during the Gulf War, captured by Al Qaeda, tortured but refusing to give up any info except name, rank, serial number. But wouldn’t that have made him persona non grata among New York’s self-appointed cognoscenti?
The New York Observer is one of those insider political and style commentaries aimed at the moneyed liberal elite of New York City. A lot of the writing is about style and trend issues and that part of it is both funny and clever (with an effective humor range of about thirty Manhattan blocks). What’s not funny is that New York Observer writers are content to abstract real issues, believing that a clever phrase and a political approach are the cure for all the world’ problems. I was fascinated watching this guy reciting the conventional wisdoms as if he were a precocious child performing a recital for a gathering of close relatives.
It’s a tune you’ve heard before so I’ll abbreviate and employ semaphore. The recital went something like this: John McCain didn’t endear himself to conservative republicans because of his support of the failed Immigration Bill and his past forays into campaign finance legislation. Then he goes on to say that the one truly isolating issue that sealed the death warrant for McCain is that he hasn’t adjusted his stand on Iraq to reflect the popular media polls and the political winds.
Smile, wink, drool. The thought of McCain being punished for his support of the war is enough to make guys like Kornacki lick their lips and begin salivating. We’re in an Orwellian era of double-speak, double talk, and turning worms and they’re not all on the Democratic side of the aisle. My dream ticket is John McCain and Joe Lieberman-- I’d take either one for president.
I’m tired of turning worms like Hilary Clinton. I’m tired of b.s. armchair generals like Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. I’m tired of the two Chucks—Hagel and Schumer. I’m tired of so-called journalists regurgitating popular sentiments and pre-digested notions which receive the stamp of imprimatur from their spineless contemporaries who think that “roughing it” means eating at a roadside diner instead of Elaine’s. I’m tired of hearing from people who think that the only type of people who wish to become soldiers do so only because they are too dull to think of anything more fun to do.
I’m probably a lot like you. I’m a guy trying to learn as much as I can about all the candidates, all the domestic and international problems, and all the strategies for guiding America. At bottom though, after all the political bullcrap, manipulations, illusions and insincere words are spinning in the air like dead leaves, it comes down to who you’d follow when you’re in trouble. It’s probably not news to you, ladies and gentlemen; we live in times of trouble. A knee-jerk withdrawal from Iraq coupled with a nostalgic yearning for pre-9-11 euphoria won’t help us much when the “bright new day” of a Clinton presidency turns out to be wishful thinking just as a real, hard, darkness falls.
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