Those of us who follow the political scene and remember who said what about whom, recall how Peggy Noonan shook up the right with her “endorsement” of Barack Obama in 2008.
Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan’s advice to Mitt Romney is dissected by kramerontheright. (lonely conservative.com
“He has within him the possibility to change the direction and tone of American foreign policy; his victory would provide a fresh start in a nation in which a fresh start would come as a national relief,” she wrote about Obama in her Wall Street Journal column. She went on to comment that he was steady, calm, and showed good judgment.
Noonan was taken in like many other members of the media. New York Times columnist, David Brooks, wrote that he could tell by Obama’s perfectly creased pant leg that he was going to be president and a very good one at that; and MSNBC’s Chris Mathews remarked how he felt a tingle up his leg when he heard Obama speak.
Since 2008, however, Noonan has seen the light, writing a number of critical pieces on Obama, his policies and programs. “Mr. Obama seemed brilliant,” she wrote in 2011, recalling his longing for unity; that we weren’t divided into red and blue states; we can solve our problems together.
To conservatives, Noonan became someone we loved to hate. As a writer, I never stopped reading her columns, and often found myself agreeing with her in later years.
President Reagan delivered Peggy Noonan’s Pointe du Hoc speech in usual fashion at the 40th anniversary of the Normandy invasion. (blog.heartleand.org)
You may not be aware that Noonan was a speechwriter in the Reagan White House. She wrote the famous speech Ronald Reagan gave at the 40th Anniversary of the Invasion of Normandy, June 6, 1984. I’ll never forget the memorable line as he spoke of the daggers thrust into the top of the cliffs, “And before me are the men who put them there. These are the boys of Pointe du Hoc. These are the men who took the cliffs.” While you will find the complete speech on the Internet, click here to hear that stirring line.
As I remind you of her talent as a writer, I must criticize her latest column, Don’t Do It, Mr. Romney. While it is generally believed that a governor is better equipped to be president than a senator, surprisingly, Noonan comes down on the other side. Noonan acknowledged that much of what a governor does prepares him or her well, but “they know nothing about the world … they haven’t been filling their brain-space with foreign policy and foreign affairs …”
When a governor becomes president, she writes, they hand the foreign-policy portfolio over to someone respectable who’s called a thinker. Senators, on the other hand, serve on foreign relations or armed services committees, and deal with serious international issues.
Has she forgotten how we got into the mess we are in with Obama? The choice of Joe Biden, with his years on the Senate foreign relations committee, as Obama’s running mate was supposedly made to strengthen the Obama administration internationally. However, Obama, the amateur, set off on his apology tour and “leading from behind” became the Obama foreign policy. He gets most of his advice from national security deputy Ben Rhodes, a former speechwriter with foreign policy experience limited to his time with Obama.
Mitt Romney at the Republican Party winter meeting. (sandy huffaker/getty images,north America)
Noonan also wrote that Romney doesn’t possess the superior political gifts required, saying, “He’s politically clunky.” Again, we have seen what the masterful political animal, always campaigning Obama has done to our country.
“He (Romney) is a smart, nice and accomplished man who thinks himself clever and politically insightful. He is not and will not become so,” wrote Noonan, who confusingly noted that “He’d have been a better president than Obama, but that’s not nearly enough.”
A few years ago, a blogger wrote, “Shut the hell up and go away, Peggy Noonan!” I just wish you would stop and think before writing.
Noonan isn’t the only pundit sounding off against another run by Mitt. I prefer to let the voters decide. Do they want another Bush? Could Bush win? Who among the 15 or 20 others thinking about a run can win? Could Mitt win?
If I were able to advise Mitt Romney, I would simply remind him that he didn’t go in for the kill after having Obama on the ropes following the first debate in 2012, proving that nice guys do finish last.
