An epic overthink

Atlantic's Conor Friedersdorf executes a colossal overthink of Rush Limbaugh's "the neocons are paranoid" rant last Friday:

I don't want to exaggerate the size of the Rush Limbaugh right.... What I do want to make is the modest claim that Limbaugh giving this treatment to the "Paul vs. McCain" divide ... shows that the whole GOP is already in a very different place than it was prior to Election 2012.

Good grief. Saying the GOP is now removed to "a very different place" from pre-Election 2012 is an exaggeration.

There's been no strategic shift here. None whatsoever. Limbaugh's love of Rand Paul's loathing is merely tactical--the enemy of my enemy sort of thing. That's all there is to it. Were a Republican to re-ascend to the highest office of foreign policy possibilities, his party would return soon enough to squandering what's left of the public treasury on massive losses of American lives in yet more frightfully godforsaken wastelands.  

Limbaugh was only reflecting the GOP's deepest principle: froth at anything Obama does.

Comments

[Robert Lipscomb]

It seems different to me.

I claim credit for predicting the Club For Growth Republicans would push the Culture Warriors under the bus. I never imagined the apparently sincere willingness to make substantial cuts in military spending - even if cuts to "entitlements" are the reward.

Imagine Cheney and the neocons getting on board with that.

I always assume pervasive cynicism among politicians - GOP and Dem - but these guys seem to have worked themselves into a real cut-government-spending froth, regardless of who gets cut.

[AnneJ]

Classic overthink indeed. I doubt that the phoney libertarian would have treated the country to his 13 hour theatrical display if Mitt Romney had won the election. And it's not as though Mitt Romney would have ended the drone program. Rand Paul is only a libertarian in the economic sense. He believes in leaving the average person at the mercy of large corporations who have all the money and no laws to obey, giving them free reign to rip off consumers, exploit workers, and foul the environment. He is certainly no libertarian in the social sense. He is anti marriage equality, anti-choice, and against drug legalization. He's a hypocrite getting undue praise from both sides of the aisle at the moment.

[Jaylemeux]

Like button.