These are strange times when far-right blogs like Michelle Malkin's Hot Air make the case against one of their own as standing for nothing now but her own personal ambition (see also Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, etc). Allahpundit writes sarcastically after Haley's stupefying Fox News appearance, "Another spectacular victory by Trump and MAGA. I’m genuinely impressed."
Indeed.
My own minor quibble though would be that these servile toadies for Trump have never stood for anything but their personal ambitions, and based their fortunes on wherever the political winds blow them. The rest is bang on though.
Source: Allahpundit/Hot Air
Which brings us to this creature, the nominal establishment favorite for the GOP nomination in 2024. If anyone should be expected to take a firm moral stance against a two-month coup attempt punctuated by an attack on Congress, you’d expect the great centrist hope to do it. All she has to say for herself here, though, is that Trump’s behavior was “not great” and that we should “give the man a break” regardless, which has to be the single lamest soundbite about uttered by any politician since January 6. At least Senate Republicans have farted out some BS jurisdictional excuse to justify voting against conviction. Haley’s actually going so far as to make Trump the victim in all this.
She wants to be president someday and now here she is surrendering unconditionally to MAGA, making clear that she’ll say anything to improve her chances. Her capitulation looks all the more servile considering that she criticized Trump more pointedly on January 7:
“President Trump has not always chosen the right words,” Haley said during an appearance at the RNC’s winter meeting on Amelia Island, Fla., according to a person familiar with her remarks. “He was wrong with his words in Charlottesville, and I told him so at the time. He was badly wrong with his words yesterday. And it wasn’t just his words. His actions since Election Day will be judged harshly by history.”
Maybe she’s saying one thing to party apparatchiks like RNC attendees and another to Fox-watching Republican voters. Or, more likely, she misjudged how much of a backlash there’d be to Trump’s behavior on the right in the immediate aftermath of the Capitol attack. On January 7 it looked like there might be some momentum for convicting him. By January 25, that momentum had all but totally dissipated. Haley reworked her message accordingly.
She stands for nothing except her own ambition and now everyone knows it, in case there was any doubt. Another spectacular victory by Trump and MAGA. I’m genuinely impressed.
Nikki Haley: I don’t even think there’s a basis for impeachment... Now they’re going to turn around and bring about impeachment yet they say they’re for unity... I mean at some point I mean give the man a break. I mean move on... pic.twitter.com/IqnZrIDIY0
— Acyn Torabi (@Acyn) January 26, 2021