The latest Third-Way echo-chamber is back in the news thanks to some Presidential candidates who are playing along with their scheme.
No Labels, formed after the 2010 midterm elections, is asking candidates to embrace four broad goals related to job creation, the federal budget, energy independence and entitlements, promote them in the campaign and promise to work with a bipartisan group in Congress on at least one of them within 30 days of taking office.
No Labels was a progressive reaction to the TEA Party movement. The TEA Party message was Taxed Enough Already. Don’t take over health care. Stop the spending. And how about less government spending, and by extension less government interference. No Labels came to the defense of big government, soft-selling it under the cover of calming, can’t-we-all-just-get-along, Third Way language. And Republicans continue to give it legitimacy.
AP | On Monday, the group’s leaders are announcing the six who stepped up: Democrat Martin O’Malley, and Republicans Ben Carson, Chris Christie, John Kasich, Rand Paul and Donald Trump.
My initial reaction was, huh? What does Rand Paul gain by getting labeled by No Labels? Then I remembered, Rand Paul is the get-along smaller-government guy. He’ll make nice in exchange for access. He agreed to endorse Romney in exchange for insider-politcal capital. He makes nice with Mitch McConnell because it buys him the good graces of the political class. How far of a stretch is it to accept the brand of ‘Problem Solver’ from a Third Way institution like No Labels?
I’m sure his defenders will insist that he’s Dalton from Roadhouse. Be nice until it’s time not to be nice.
I’m sure they all say that at the beginning, and I’m not saying Dr. Paul’s credentials are forfeit, but No Labels is the currency of snake oil salesman and it is a label that does him no favors.
Not Left. Not Right. Forward
“Not Left. Not Right. Forward” was No Labels’ first tag line; classic socialist copy, painfully similar to a slogan used by the Marxists at MSNBC who were just putting a spin on an old communist narrative.
“Stop fighting Start fixing” is the new pealing bell from No Labels. It suggests that the disagreements are the problem, and (let’s be honest) that if the Right will stop clinging to the idea of a Constitutional Republic that limits what problems government should fix, government can and will solve every problem. You ask for a little help on one issue here or one issue there until this creates a new middle–moved further left–from which the next leftward call to moderation can then begin.
Not New. Not Moderate. Creeping Socialism.
There is no Libertarian message. There is no Conservative message. There is no defense of smaller government or local control. No Labels has little or no interest in individual liberty. The organization is a redoubt providing moderate cover for Marxists in pursuit of Republican validation.
I like Dr. Paul. I think he has a future outside the Senate and that could include a higher office. But he should let the nice folks at No Labels know that he’s fine without their label and move along. There are more than enough ‘get-along’ candidates in the current field. He’s not going to attract voters away from them by being labeled a problem solver, nor will this get him support back from defectors in his own base. It certainly won’t help his standing in Iowa or New Hampshire.
I think this hurts his campaign.