A Bill Buckley contemporary, Iowa’s Governor Branstad, Donald Trump and Mark Levin challenge the theoretical and practical implications of Rove’s “Conservative Victory Project.”
The Discounting of Rove Runs Apace. Photo credit: Tony Narlock / Foter.com / CC BY-NC
As previously referred to in these pages, the Karl Rove connected political action committee Conservative Victory Project purports to be organized in pursuit of what it fashions or formulates as The Buckley Rule, support for “the most conservative candidate who can win.” According to a contemporary of Bill Buckley the definition is a corruption and not one of mere nuance.
Now we have held forth previously that the definition of “support” in Rove’s parlance essentially translates to “destroy the disfavored one” regardless of that politician’s adherence to the Republican platform and conservative principles. Rather than help conservative candidates in general, rather than help voters to relate to conservative principles, Rove sets out to enhance candidates who may have a marginal adherence at best to those principles by denigrating the more conservative candidate and by implication conservatism in general. * Rove justifies his tactic by glomming onto what we now see from an authoritative source is a corrupted definition of the Buckley Rule
Neal Freeman is a former editor of National Review, William F. Buckley’s creation. The publication in its print and online formats has for sixty plus years been the most influential magazine of conservative thought. That is a continuation now several years after Buckley’s passing. There is an engrossing article by Freeman in the online version published February 13th titled: Buckley Rule — According to Bill, not Karl What supporting “the rightwardmost viable candidate” meant in WFB’s lexicon. Freeman, who was a participant observer during the formulation of the “rule” (perhaps the last remaining person) makes it very clear that the rule has been both “misquoted and misapplied.”
We have criticized the “rule” as stated and practiced by Rove without checking on the accuracy of the quote he attributes to Buckley. Freeman provides the actual words along with an originalist, and therefore correct, exegesis of the meaning. According to Freeman the actual words from Buckley’s mouth were that “National Review will support the rightwardmost viable candidate.”
As Freeman points out “Bill Buckley was careful with words. He did not opt for the words “rightwardmost electable candidate,” The word of choice was viable — and that referred to a person moving the conservative message forward through the capable presentation of it, win lose or draw. A “viable” candidate in that respect could be a third party candidate. That should be obvious from Buckley’s personal application of the “rule “as set forth by Freeman.
He reaffirmed his position by running in New York City as a third-party conservative against a highly electable Republican. I can tell you as the manager of that campaign that there was never a single day, from our first planning meeting in February until the polls closed in November, that Bill considered himself even remotely electable. But viable? Absolutely. He was the best candidate in the country to carry the conservative message into the heart of American liberalism. And for those who needed further reinforcement of the point, five years later Bill’s brother, James, ran for the U.S. Senate as a third-party candidate against a mainstream-Republican incumbent.
While the corruption of Bill Buckley’s rule is not unique to Rove his threats and practices while invoking it are out of bounds and, accordingly, are receiving censure from diverse elements of the Republican Party.
Iowas Terry Branstad, the nations most senior Republican governor, establishment Conservative Republican, the very type that Rove’s group purports to want to protect, is quoted in the Omaha World Harold:
“I basically told Karl Rove that what he was doing is counterproductive and he needs to stay out of it,” said Branstad, recounting a phone call to Rove, the leader of the new Conservative Victory Project super PAC.
Donald Trump who has vigorously championed the Tea Party but is otherwise hard to define other than to say he is after all “The Donald,” on a recent Mark Levin radio program excoriated Rove saying “Karl Rove gave us Obama” (a thesis we have sympathies for) and in no uncertain terms that Rove’s current project was “bad news for Republicans.” Levin to his credit has been constant in his criticism of Rove’s direction.
As this article is put to bed our senior editor sends us this item from Brietbart News:
Breitbart News editor-at-large Ben Shapiro will give a keynote address at the California Republican Party convention this March, taking the spot previously scheduled for Karl Rove.
According to the Sacramento Bee, “Rove’s talk has been moved to the Saturday luncheon because of a scheduling conflict,” and the CA Republican Party “had been seeking to book a speaker who would appeal to conservatives in light of a rift caused by Rove’s newly announced Conservative Victory Project.”
Still more reading on Breitbart regarding the controversy is available here.
* In order to illustrate the poison these types of “consultants” are capable of, a future supplement to Veritaspac.com will include material from our expose (prior to the establishment of our website) of the grotesque slash and burn primary campaign conducted by Roby Smith and Rove wannabe Steve Grubbs in their 2010 State Senate primary campaign against David Hartsuch. The aura surrounding Smiths campaign was stained by some of the worst of Republican politics now practically called for by Rove’s endorsed Conservative Victory Project. Depending on the audience . . . save the Party from the Tea Party people or vote for me the conservative ” . . . wild claims that so-and-so will lose the seat . . .. the bad mouthing . . . the subterfuge . . . the rent seekers giving the nod to the more reasonable compliant candidate . . . RINO vendettas . . . principle and honor sacrificed to ambition and king making . . . disregard for the platform . . . hand wringing or complicit leadership and more. R Mall
