FNS: William "The Bloody" Says The Surge Has Worked--to Benefit McCain.
It's Sunday, so it's time for William "The Bloody" Kristol to pull more factoids out of the orifice of his choice to further his (and only his) agenda
It's Sunday, so it's time for William "The Bloody" Kristol to pull more factoids out of the orifice of his choice to further his (and only his) agenda.
In the discussion of John McCain's "surprise" win in New Hampshire (don't let that polling that showed him ahead all the way up to the primary sway you) to rise from the dead of pundit-declared lost candidacies, Bill Kristol has just one factor that won it all for McCain: The surge.
KRISTOL: McCain advocated the surge, defended the surge. It was unpopular; people thought...two-thirds of his own campaign wanted him to abandon his position on Iraq. He stuck with it. He showed guts, he showed intelligence. The surge is now working, very, very well. And McCain, Republicans, like it.
LIASSON: And he held two town meetings. He worked his butt off.
KRISTOL: He worked his butt off too, but I don't think...that wouldn't have mattered, he could have had town meeting after town meeting. And if many voters had thought that perhaps it was a mistake to go into Iraq, we didn't change strategy effectively, it would have been disastrous for McCain. So he was identified with the surge, he is the most credible Commander-in-Chief. That's what worked for him in New Hampshire.
Leave aside the new and improved definition of what it means that the surge "has worked," does it surprise any of you to know that Kristol is completely and utterly wrong, again?
New Hampshire Republicans said the economy was the nation's most pressing issue, with the war in Iraq barely edging illegal immigration for second place. McCain, 71, fared well among those preoccupied by the economy and the war.
Four in five New Hampshire Republicans are worried about the economy, and they preferred McCain over Romney (with Huckabee and Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, tied for a distant third).
Nearly two-thirds of the Granite State's GOP voters approve of the war in Iraq, and that group gave slightly more votes to Romney than to McCain. But McCain more than made up the deficit by winning big margins from the one-third of GOP voters who disapprove of the war.
So, in a classic case of voting against your interests (or, in other words, the platform upon which all of the Republican party rests), NH Republicans who are against the war voted overwhelmingly for the biggest war cheerleader in Congress today (outside of Joe Lieberman). Way to go, smart guys.