Fred Thompson

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Fred Thompson appears to be authoritative, forceful, knowledgable and entirely in control of any conceivable situation in his role as District Attorney in "Law and Order" re-runs. That is the whole of his appeal as a Presidential candidate. He would unquestionably make a fine President if all events, and his responses to them, were scripted by the show's writers. In real life, someone would probably change the channel.

In the real life Thompson lived as an actual US Senator, prior to his ersatz TV life as a scripted District Attorney, he was apparently best known not for his legislative skills, but rather for his culinary avidity at various DC steak houses. Like Reagan before him, he is a construct of writers, substituting delivery of lines for the reality of policy.

 

Well, the exact same thing has happened before - Ronald Reagan was an actor! Or, if you prefer a more recent example, the governor of the most populous US State - California - yup another actor.

 

I hate to steal ideas from Ragusa, but I think what you're talking about, Chandos, is the concept of the sound bite. Many people are angry about the present situation of immigration. But hearing a detailed plan about how to solve it puts them to sleep. With some in power floating the idea of "amnesty", all an opponent of that general idea has to do is say "I WON'T grant amnesty" and then do some flag waving. That sort of talk certainly gets people riled up and might get votes, but I don't think it indicates a lack of a plan -- just a lack of a plan that he's sending out over the airwaves. This sort of demagogery is not new and certainly not the sole province of either party.

 

That's a ploy to pander to the minority vote. Again, I dislike sounding reactionary, yet it appears that the whole amnesty ploy, besides a vote-getting scheme, is not a solution, but capitulation. Conservatives would use the term "appeasement" within another context.

Edit - I'm sure we must have a thread on the Immigration problem somewhere on these boards. I will post more on the topic there, rather than turn this thread off its intended topic. I only wanted to illustrate that an issue can be approached on a solution solving manner, rather than the old "Republican vs Democrat" mantra used by pundits in the media. who are really nothing more than political operatives.

[ September 14, 2007, 03:10: Message edited by: Chandos the Red ]

 

Cernak, please don't insult the greatest President of the 20th century. Here was a man who had great ideas and implemented them. And guess what, they worked. Remember our economy was in shambles, interest rates were in the 20%s, Iran had bitch slapped us around, and the Soviets were a superpower. How'd that turn out.

Wow, a candidate for office who has a real job that pays money from someone who is not the public coffers. Some of you should try that.

Thompson brings REAL conservatism to the race, something Guliani and Romney don't. Remember this is the Republican primary, so liberal opinions don't count yet.

Chandos, you of all people can't say anything. If it isn't on MSNBC you don't believe it.

Hmmm, Sen. Craig gets caught looking for gay sex and the party tells him to resign, Congressman Jefferson get caught with $90K in his freezer and he gets re-elected. Yeah, you're right.

 

General,

Of the 13 scandals currently rumbling through congress, Jefferson's is the only case involving a Democrat. The rest are all Republicans. One Dem scandal doesn't cancel out the other 12. I'd also like to point out that it was the Democrats who initiated the corruption investigation against Jefferson.

Exaggerate much?

 

Yes, a being a movie star is a real job, but he did work for the Actor's Union. As far as being an actor, I would have commented that he was not really very good. But that some believe that he was the greatest prez of the last century does say something about his acting ability. Of course, his job as governor of Cali and as president was paid for by the public coffers....

Yeah, a news source like say, AM radio?

And let's not forget Tom Delay and Bob Ney and Mark Foley and Randy "Duke" Cunningham - Republicans all. If Thompson wants to talk about "corruption" he is certainly in the right party.

What's that, GG, being a movie star? Or running for prez?

 

Acting is a credible job, if one with an overinflated pay scale. I'm reminded of what Doc says in "Back to the Future": No wonder the President is an actor -- he has to look good on TV!

As for "trying real jobs" -- unless I'm way off the mark pretty well all of us here on the site are gainfully employed or in training to become so. By the same token, I don't know that calling someone's opinion of who the greatest President is an "exaggeration" is fair -- it's an opinion, after all, and trying to come up with objective criteria for such a claim would be well-nigh impossible.

Thompson's rhetoric agrees with me. However, most rhetoric is designed to go down smooth. Were I an American I'd look really closely at his voting record during his time as a Senator. The fact that the other fellow currently under discussion in the Alley (Paul) consistently references his voting record makes me like what he says a little more.

 

Except that he stated it as a fact, not an opinion, which is the exaggeration I was commenting on. Reagan was arguably the most successful Republican President of the last century, certainly - but any claim beyond that is silly partisan puffery. My grandpa has a t-shirt that says "Best Grandpa Ever!" and that doesn't mean anything, either.

 

I wouldn't even go that far DR. I'd say he was the most popular Republican president of the 20th century. I'd think that the most successful title would have to go to either Eisenhower or Teddy Roosevelt. (Although I do admit that throwing TR up there is a bit ticky tack - technically he was a president in the 20th century (he took office 1901), but things were much different then. Then again, you could argue that it was TR that brought us into the modern era with the US as a world power - so maybe not so ticky tack.)

 

Started a new thread on something similar, so hopefully this one can stay on Fred Thompson.

http://www.sorcerers.net/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?/topic/34/549.html

 

I wanted to kick this thread back to the top to see if anyone's impressions of Fred Thompson have changed since his "coming out party" in recent debates. Particularly those who support him.

I for one have been pretty underwhelmed so far.

 

Chalk me up in the "strongly underwhelmed" category as well. Thompson is not the knight riding in on a white horse to save the Republican Party in 2008.

 

LOL, it is great to hear two Democrat supporters comment on how underwhelmed they are by a Republican.

I'm still strongly in Fred's camp

He speaks the truth.

Probably one of my favorite things I have read about him recently is

That sums it up pretty neatly for me.

[ October 17, 2007, 01:20: Message edited by: The Great Snook ]

 

Well, if they were actually overwhelmed, they could vote for him. I doubt that most people here are so dogmatic that they would never, ever vote for a candidate other than their party's. Sure, it may take several earthquakes and a voice speaking from the heavens, but it's a possibility . I myself could be impressed if a candidate, while not having exactly the platform that I would vote for, has a strong enough background and a platform that would, if executed, bring at least some positives. I doubt I'm such a political curiosity.

P.S.: I just checked http://www.factcheck.org/mitt_and_rudys_cherry_orchard.html and it was hilarious. It sounds as if the two (Romney and Giuliani) are adolescents bragging about bicep or penis sizes.

[ October 17, 2007, 12:01: Message edited by: The Shaman ]

 

@Shaman,

No, I would say it would be impossible as the earthquake was caused by global warming and therefore a Republican's fault and everyone knows that only the Christian right can hear God.



You also need to edit your link as it isn't working

 

Last I checked, global warming was humanity's fault. Not just the republicans.

One may also feel inclined to point out that more and more Republicans now accept that we need to do something about global warming. Not every republican is a mindless partisan hack, you know. Most republicans, like most democrats, are actually quite reasonable.

 

Oops, my bad. Damn you, English courses! Damn you and your "punctuation marks are placed immediately after the last word" rule! After all those years of Internet use, I still can't get rid of you for good!

Ahem. I take it there's no identified Christian left, then? Interesting. Anyway, back to the topic: just how is Mr. Thompson several steps to the political "right" of the current president? It could just be my perspective, but I wouldn't say that George Bush is a centrist (or left) in his policies, so being more conservative than him would seem rather difficult. I somehow believe no US president in the foreseeable future will form a brown shirt brigade, for starters, so that part is out. On the other hand, the current US policies seem rather business-oriented (apart from the cooperation with the state on matters of national security, but I doubt he'd be against that), so I'm at a bit of a loss about what he'd do. He could reduce taxes, I suppose, but I would question the desirability of such a measure when the state is in a period of increased expenses, such as the Iraq "war" or the Afghanistan operations. Most of the other things I can imagine would depend on the Supreme Court, and I think the Bush nominees were all fairly conservative anyway. To boot, what he proposes has to be approved by Congress, and unless there is a landslide Republican win in the next election, he won't have the necessary majority to pass any groundbreaking proposals.

[ October 17, 2007, 12:27: Message edited by: The Shaman ]

 

Bush has been a disappointment to many conservatives as he has done nothing to reign in spending.

 

Well, it would appear that the Republicans are quite underwhelmed by him as well. When Thomposon first entered the race about a month ago, he quickly shot up the polls and was breifly in a statistical tie with Giuliani for the front-runner position. Then he actually started talking, and support fell for him pretty fast. As of this moment, Giuliani is still up on him by a considerable margin.

Actually, I HAVE voted for Republicans in the past. That's another thing that makes me chuckle when I read TGS's posts. He assumes that DR and I are dyed in the wool, bleeding heart, pinko, commie liberals when nothing could be further from the truth. I'm quite the centrist and have voted for Republicans in the past, and DR used to be a card-carrying member of the Republican party. Other Republicans realize that Thompson is not riding in to save the day for the Republican party. It's not just the Democrat opinion. If he was as popular as TGS claims, he'd be doing better in the polls.