Do you know why Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey would make a great conservative alternative to Trump?
Well, George Will told us why in his recent column by that title.
While Will lauded Ducey’s conservative accomplishments as governor, he based his alternative-to-Trump recommendation on Ducey’s attitude.
He cited a September speech Ducey gave at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in California. “A vocal corner of conservative politics is defined more by attitude – and anger – than commitment to a specific set of ideals,” Ducey said. “And yes, a good many small-government conservatives have morphed into bullies – people who are very comfortable using government power to tell companies and people how to lead their lives.” He added that such conservatives “are just as happy bossing us around and telling us – and businesses – how to lead our lives as the progressive left is”.
“I’m a conservative, I’m just not angry about it.”
Will said that attitude separates Ducey from other Trump alternatives like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, whom he called “a brawler against woke corporations.” He described Ducey as “a cheerful malcontent.”
“A plurality of Americans call themselves a conservatives, and probably a majority of this plurality are not angry but are embarrassed by today’s politics,” Will said.
Later in his article Will praised the “strong Republican bench” of potential presidential candidates. “Surely one of them will prevent Donald Trump from being, through a third election cycle, the florid face of one of the two parties that since 1856 have framed American politics.”
Will named the bench. Besides Ducey, he included DeSantis, Tennessee’s Bill Lee, New Hampshire’s Chris Sununu, Massachusetts’ Charlie Baker, Maryland’s Larry Hogan, Ohio’s Mike DeWine, Texas’ Greg Abbott, Iowa’s Kim Reynolds, Arkansas’ Asa Hutchinson, Nebraska’s Pete Ricketts, and Virginia’s Glenn Youngkin.
Most Mississippi conservatives have probably never heard of Ducey. But they have heard of DeSantis and several of the others. And they must be muttering about Will’s glaring omission, at least from their point of view.
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves was not listed.
Hmmm.
It wasn’t that long ago that state GOP leader Frank Bordeaux distributed a newspaper column proclaiming, “Nation should follow Mississippi's conservative example” and extoling the performance of Gov. Reeves and other GOP leaders. “Conservative-led states – including Mississippi – are rising to the occasion and producing real results for their citizens,” said Bordeaux.
Darn. Will obviously got the scoop on those other governors, but missed Mississippi’s. Not making Will’s long list of talented conservative governors must be ego-busting for the guv.
That will pass. Campaign season begins in January. Soon the governor et al will be all over the state letting us know why he should have been at the top of the list.
“If I bear witness of myself, my witness is not true” – John 5:31.
Crawford is a syndicated columnist from Jackson.
29 comments:
George Will is only slightly more influential in GOP circles as is Bill Crawford.
You figure out the rest.
The party of division and make people hate and “mad enough to vote,” lectures the right on “anger?”
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Bill, I'm surprised you are surprised.
Tate Reeves lacks charisma. Neither a camera or microphone is good to him.
He lacks polish in presentation and in the social graces. I'm not even sure the best Hollywood trainer or make-over expert could help him.
On a national level, he has zero chance to get the urban or suburban vote especially that of women.
Indeed, on the abortion issue alone he would be poison to 70+% of women.
Independents would not be interested.
And, as far as economics are concerned, a rich legislative bank account hasn't brought Mississippi off the bottom.
Our State loses our young educated children for good reasons. His stances and "style" of politics will not get the young voters. The young who support him here, have benefitted from the " as is" social hierarchy though unlikely acknowledge their rationalization.
Then, there's the problem most States wouldn't and don't understand...letting our Capitol City deteriorate for political gain in rural areas. Most States see their Capitol as symbols of pride and even if the mayors are lousy, at they, least, try to keep up appearances...if for no other reason than their historical buildings should be protected as they cannot be dismantled and moved.
Generally, good Governors have experience that can be useful in the Oval Office...one could argue they are better suited than Senators and certainly more than Congressmen.
But, this one has zero chance of success on a national level.
Wicker or Guest wouldn't be a humiliation but Reeves...even Trump supporters in other States thought Trump shouldn't have bothered to make the unnecessary gubernatorial endorsement.
Every trucker on I-55 and I-20 knows our State government doesn't look after the entire State. Why would any of our politicians look after the entire Nation?
The only thing stranger than Crawford's long-winded garbage is the post at 10:26 which tells us nothing. And speaking of malcontents....Back to the post at 10:26.
Again, Mississippi conservatives need to recruit better candidates. Our state will elect a really weak conservative instead of a solid democrat until....one day it will not. Then, the conservatives will wonder how it happened.
Weak candidates are the Achilles heel of the MS GOP.
RMQ
@10:26
You are clearly delusional if you think the MSGOP “let” the capital city decay, instead of the elected leaders of the Capital city.
Giving more money to that minstrel show is no different than flushing it down the toilet!
Ducey probably is just another RINO. I didn’t read anything about him after the Arizona governor’s race steal by its sitting Democrat Secretary of State, who is also the governor-elect.
Tate Reeves is an obvious water boy. He can be part of the team but he's just not a player. Mississippi's governors just haven't had that kind of charismatic presence and Tater falls right in.
George Will hasn’t been relevant in at least ten years
No fan of Tate running for Prez here. But some of 10:26’s reasons are beyond hilarious.
10:26 may be correct re abortion. Both parties have extremes.
10:26’s reason for Mississippi’s loss of educated children is funny stuff. Except for family, why would any of the “educated children” stick around a Capital City so violent and destroyed by Democrats? Many of the transplants moving to MS claiming to be Democrats hypocritically live in Republican cities outside of Jackson, many in “gated upper end neighborhoods.”
And only in the land of indoctrinated can blame for the deterioration of MS’s Capital City, Jackson, controlled by Democrats for decades, be blamed on Republicans. Wow!
Why does Crawford never provide a link to the columns he refers to? You should insist he do so Kingfish going forward if he wants JJ pub.
Crawford doesn't provide links because he too often wants to keep information away from the (dwindling) few in Mississippi he thinks he can persuade. (He's been caught pulling this crap in the past.)
Here is the George Will piece on Ducey.
Will's column from the go features this passage that you know damn well Bill Crawford doesn't want you to read:
Hence Gov. Doug Ducey’s Empowerment Scholarship Account program, which was enacted this year to provide universal school choice in grades K-12. Every Arizona family is eligible to receive about $7,000 per student per year to pay for private school tuition, home schooling, tutoring, textbooks, online courses, programs for special-needs pupils and more. Money “follows the child,” Ducey says, because “Arizona funds students, not systems.”
Although the legislature simultaneously increased public school funding by $1 billion, ESA was ferociously opposed by the teachers’ unions, whose confidence in the quality of their schools can be gauged by their fear of competition. A union attempt to repeal ESA by referendum failed to get enough signatures to qualify for the ballot, partly because of a group (Decline to Sign) in which, Ducey said here last week, Black leaders were disproportionately active.
Get that? Give black Americans school choice and they'll fight if you try to take it away.
Bill Crawford the Fraud doesn't want you to know the whole story about Doug Ducey because Ducey is a national leader when it comes to school choice.
Crawford's column was more about satisfying his prurient need to bash Reeves than it was about promoting Ducey.
Both Trump and Reeves are traitors who participated in the tyrannical Plandemic response.
Neither are worthy of high office every again.
You do know that with a stroke of Biden’s pen via presidential order, every illegal alien (theoretically over 17) who has illegally crossed the border will be able to vote. Which party do you think they will vote for? Of course, it would be a violation of the illegal’s rights to require identification.
Reeves doesn't make dead baby jokes and laugh about it with PPHood like Obama did, so Bill Crawford pans him.
Remember when George Will and Krauthammer had dinner with Obama? Took 5 weeks to figure out who he really was they said, even though there was plenty on the record about him. Will isn’t a good judge of horse flesh.
11:17am Newsflash—private schools don’t want school choice. I’ll let you do the algebra on why.
10:56 - Speaking of weak candidates, while your guidance for republicans is appreciated, I laugh out loud every time I think about the dump-truck driver you clowns ran for governor a few years back. The struggle is real - Ain't it?
1:46 - Newsflash: School choice has nothing to do with private schools.
3:17, you assume incorrectly. I became a republican before it was cool to do so. My party has become like the Dems in the 60’s in that weak candidates can be the opponent. That’s unacceptable to me and should be to other conservatives.
I’m calling out my friends and colleagues. The party needs to recruit better.
Reeves has done a good job at every step of the way. But no way I would want him on the national stage. He is a little too Trumpy for me. I think his Trump fetish will cost him long term.
Anyone who would vote for Tate for President is outside of their mind.
3:41PM, Democrats will eventually take over and ruin Mississippi like they did Colorado and like they are doing in Georgia.
Republican voters are holier than thou cut off their noses to spite their faces just plain dumb. Herschel Walker was allegedly involved in a first trimester abortion so Georgia sends the party that believes in late term abortions to the Senate instead. Hard to fix that kind of stupid.
Teddy Kennedy killed a woman, obstructed justice, etc. in 1969 (the Kennedy evil list would be far too long to list here) and Democrats sent him to the Senate until he died 40 years later.
Holier than thou cut off their noses to spite their faces dumb Republicans, verses couldn’t care less evil Democrats; hard to compete with that.
Is this y’all’s way to admit that NO ONE can beat Tate for Governor next year?
So y’all are trying to beat him for President??
An office that to my knowledge he has never once said he is interested in running for….
Some of those Republicans mentioned by Will are to the left of Hitler. Surprised he didn’t mention Mitt Romney.
DeSantis is the man.
Good administrator. Sticks to his guns. Don't put him in front of a camera without cue cards that say Trump, Trump, Trump.
3:24 I grow weary of educating mouth breathers. The article which you clearly did not read and which this blog post is about states “Every Arizona family is eligible to receive about $7,000 per student per year to pay for private school tuition, home schooling, tutoring, textbooks, online courses, programs for special-needs pupils and more”.
School choice includes vouchers for private schools. Now back to the books!
11:23 - You might not find it in the article, but private schools do not have to accept vouchers. We're not quite there yet, but the gubment can't force private schools to enroll students. Even mouth breathers know that.
10:56, disagree.
Conservatives WILL cross over and vote D if the R candidate is garbage.
Dems have astonishing blind loyalty, to a fault.
See also: Fetterman
6:16 loses all validity with his omission to also admit that he could remove every reference to Republicans in his comment and replace with the word "Democrat" and be just as accurate in his vitriol.
But by all means, keep carrying water for your master.
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