Sinking Conservative Flagship

National Review continues to show that it is no longer a serious publication. In the past several years it has taken to publishing fawning articles about the he-men in the Bush administration. A low point occurred in the December 31, 2001 issue which featured a cover caricture of Don Rumsfeld in a Betty Grable, come-hither pose, had an article in the inside by Jay Nordlinger that gushed about what a sexy hunk Rumsfeld is.
The October 25 issue of the magazine has an article by British historian Paul Johnson that rehearses the usual points about thee President's heroism. Johnson lauds Bush's "stoicism" and compares his plight to "the dark winter Washington jaced in 1777-78." Yeah. It's exactly like that.
The Bush-gushing is just an appetizer. The meat and potatoes consist of a series of peculiar attacks on John Kerry. One denounces the senator for falsely portraying himself of Irish origin. Minimal research casts doubt on this factoid, however. A quick Google search reveals that Kerry's grandfather changed his name to Kerry in 1902, and that the Senator told this to a reporter years ago.
From there on out, Johnson is like a drunk shooting arrows at hummingbirds while riding a merry-go-round: Kerry has married rich women. . . They Kerrys have many homes. . . Kerry is supported by George Soros. . . He is supported by "intellectuals--many of them with . . . records of supporting lost left-wing causes, from the Soviet empire . . . Mengistu in Ethiopia, Qaddafi in Lybia, Pol Pot in Cambodia . . ." No need, of course, to name anyone who replaced his Pol Pot button with a Kerry-Edwards. Johnson refers to "one left-wing columnist in Britain [who] . . . offered a large sum of money to anyone who would assasinate the president." Again, no need to name the columnist or the publication.
He closed by suggesting that radical Muslim extremists are "clamoring and praying for a Kerry victory." As I pointed out in a previous post there is evidence to the contrary. I think many terrorists and insurgents would cheer Bush's defeat in the same sense that the Iranian hostage takers enjoyed helping to defeat and humiliate Carter. There interests lie with the candidate most likely to continue to pour fuel on the fire in the Islamic world.