Ron Paul's electability
By Ilana Mercer
October 12, 2007
About one thing Mike Huckabee is right (OK, maybe two): The presidential hopeful told Chris Matthews that if Republicans want to win the 2008 election, they must nominate a candidate who'll appeal to as many independents and Democrats as possible. Dark horse Huckabee expressed the hope that he was the man.
Wishful thinking aside, when it comes to Iraq, Huckabee and the rest of the Republican candidates for president, bar Ron Paul, are at odds with the American people. According to every conceivable poll – Gallup, Rasmussen, ABC News/Washington Post – most Americans now oppose the war in Iraq, deem it a mistake and "support the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq within the next year."
Like it or not, these are the facts. Iraq, polls predict, will dominate the 2008 elections. Yet nine of the Republican candidates are still flogging that fiasco with brio. On this salient issue, they've adopted a position in opposition to popular wisdom; on Iraq, the Republican candidates are mimicking a man whose approval rating is in the low 30s.
Rabbiting on about how Iraq is part of a grander ideological war against terror won't wash any longer; Americans are hip to that hoax. The idea that we can rehabilitate what we ruined in Iraq is delusional – a function of a collective mindset that rejects reality and its lessons. We can't fix Iraq because of what we wrought – because of the original sin of invasion. The sinner cannot turn savior.
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