The political journalist and commentator Robert George of the New York Post has written a thoughtful piece in The New Republic on “Why I Can’t Vote for Bush.” It’s worth a careful read. Robert makes a good case, but I wonder how many conservative-minded Americans will heed it; most Bush-backers seem quite resolute in their support for their man. (And there remains the fear, even among those who think that the Bush administration has done an awful job, that although they’d like to fire Bush, they’re not ready to hire Kerry.)
Robert and I both attended St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland, where we met during his freshman year, which was my senior year. I saw Robert on Tuesday in New York at the International Policy Network 2004 Bastiat Prize for Journalism awards dinner, where he mentioned that I should watch for his essay in TNR. I’m glad I did.
Thanks for the recommendation, Tom, it was a good
piece. Usually I can’t stand TNR but I’m glad you alerted us to this piece.
To my astonishment one of the best things I’ve
heard on why we should vote for Kerry is a 19 minute audio clip from a Leonard Peikoff speech
on August 1. Peikoff discussed at length the threat from the religious right and the alleged
60 million fundi fanatics in the US (if the US
News & World Report figure here is correct).
They want to set up a religious state and W is
their boy. People should just go to Leonard Peikoff.com, click on What’s New and then listen.
I have strong differences with the Ayn Rand Institute people on foreign policy but I think
they are on the money here. Peikoff believes
that the welfare state idea as an ideology is
kaput but the theocrats are enjoying a real
rebirth. He said he’d vote for Hillary over Bush
at this stage. I agree. But listen and see what
you think.