William Kristol (shown) accused Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.) of “running to the left of the Obama administration” during an appearance this weekend on Fox News Sunday.
Kristol’s latest lashing out is likely in response to Senator Paul’s victory in the CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) 2013 straw poll. By a narrow margin, Paul bested fellow Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) in that contest.
According to reports from the CPAC convention, there were “many attendees” donning “I Stand with Rand” t-shirts, a slogan made popular on Twitter during Paul’s 13-hour filibuster earlier this month.
More specifically, Kristol probably saw himself reflected in Paul’s CPAC comment, “The GOP of old has grown stale and moss-covered. I don’t think we need to name any names here, do we?” “The new GOP — the GOP that will win again — will need to embrace liberty in both the economic and personal sphere,” he added.
Kristol heard the bell tolling for him and his ilk and decided to strike a vengeful note in response.
The Fox News Sunday commentary isn’t the first time Kristol has bad-mouthed Paul in the press.
In an op-ed published in the Weekly Standard (an establishment Republican magazine he co-founded), Kristol called the libertarian-leaning senator the “spokesman for the Code Pink faction of the Republican Party.” Kristol was referring to the liberal group of women focused primarily on anti-war issues.
It should come as no surprise to readers that Kristol feels threatened by the ascendancy of liberty-minded, small government, constitutionally consistent lawmakers. After all, Kristol brags about his support for “the Bush administration after 9/11, and fighting our enemies.”
Unfortunately, several critical elements of our constitutionally protected freedoms have become casualities in the War on Terror that is so important to Kristol and his cronies. Due process and habeas corpus both lie dead among the rubble of markets and villages obliterated by Hellfire missiles fired from U.S. drones.
Of Senator Paul’s effort to demand the White House answer the question of whether or not the president assumes the authority to target U.S. citizens inside the United States in the execution of its death-by-drone program, Kristol calls that “semihysterical.”
And of those senators who chose to “stand with Rand” rather than “sit with Obama,” Kristol saved some derision for them, as well. He writes in his Weekly Standard piece:
And as for the other Republican senators who rushed to the floor to cheer Paul on, won’t they soon be entertaining second thoughts? Is patting Rand Paul on the back for his fearmongering a plausible path to the presidency for Marco Rubio or Ted Cruz? Is embracing kookiness a winning strategy for the Republican party? We doubt it.
The old guard of the Republican Party now considers the defense of the Constitution “kookiness” and labels all those who demand due process be followed before the life, liberty, or property of any American citizen is deprived by this government “semihysterical.”
Kristol questions the “staying power” of any Republican who refuses to budge on the most critical constitutional questions of the day. He believes that the popularity of Rand Paul or any other elected official who zealously guards the few constitutional liberties we have remaining will be “very much of the short-term variety.”
If Kristol’s prediction is accurate, then when viewed through the long lens of history, the liberty of the United States and the existence of the Constitution that protected it might be just as fleeting.
For now, there is yet time for Americans to flex their electoral muscle and throw their collective weight behind candidates for office — local, state, and federal — who demonstrate rock-ribbed adherence to the principle of freedom upon which our nation was founded and who can be counted on to faithfully abide by the oaths of office they take to “preserve, protect, and defend” the Constitution of the United States.
If Americans fail to rise up and “stand with Rand” or any other lawmaker who vigorously challenges the unconstitutional usurpation of authority by this or any other president, Kristol may prove prophetic sooner than we’d like to imagine.
Readers are encouraged to find and elect men and women who will resist the consolidation of all power into Washington and who will stand up for the right of states to nullify every act of the federal government that exceeds the boundaries of its power given to it by the states in the Constitution.
Joe A. Wolverton, II, J.D. is a correspondent for The New American and travels frequently nationwide speaking on topics of nullification, the NDAA, and the surveillance state. He can be reached at [email protected].
