‘The Pence Mirage: Why the Right Isn’t Leaving Trump;
‘The Heritage Foundation “mutiny” isn’t a conservative realignment so much as the latest anti-Trump mirage, with Mike Pence cast as a moral standard-bearer no one is following’

Admittedly as one of those “Neocons” that Kimball attacks I find it half-true, even if touching on a key point. I used to like Pence. Used to. But his cowardice and dishonesty in 2020-1 regarding the fraud and suspicious maneuvers regarding voter legitimacy that he either KNEW OR SHOULD HAVE KNOWN about but was complicit in legitimizing is bad enough, but even worse was the highhandedness and indifference to the political prosecutions and suffering of the January 6 Prisoners. That is utterly disqualifying for me, and I note the abject chutzpah in his “Advancing American Freedom” naming for his little think tank. I agree on him with some things such as Roberts’s disgrace to Heritage, Carlson’s odiousness, and sending more tanks to Ukraine, but not enough to make me forgive his nonsense.

I imagine I am far from alone in believing that, and as far as that goes I agree with Kimball.

But I think this little mutiny is less the genuine threat and more a canary in the coal mine. AT PRESENT there is no great alternative to Heritage, because Pence’s shindig sure isn’t it. For now there have been little to no attempts to change this in spite of the numerous people disassociating themselves over Roberts and co, and indeed the stigma of Pence might be helping that given the impression that trying to create or establish an alternative might be seen as going over to the other side of Kristol style useful idiots and collaborators who speak about advancing American freedom but care little about advancing the freedom of those persecuted by the left. But that will change if this problem is allowed to fester.

In this I think Kimball is part of the problem. Conflating the attacks on Heritage as one on MAGA is a self-own and exactly what the left would want us to do because it allows them to downplay Trump’s extensive anti-racist record and embrace of Jews and Israel by pointing to Carlson, his Veep, and Heritage. His “No enemies to the right” as “practical” is stupid precisely because in this case it’s dealing with people who very blatantly do not reciprocate; Tucker has made it abundantly clear he views people like me as the enemy and personally hates Trump, and went as far as to memory hole the memory of Steven Sotloff, the contractor who worked for him and who he certainly knew that was kidnapped and murdered by ISIS. Fuentes is outright not on “The Right” and wants to destroy it.

You cannot co-exist with these kinds of people any more than you can work out a modus vivendi with gangrene on your body. Either you get rid of it or it will get rid of you. And every time I start to think this focus on Carlson and Vance is a bit excessive or undone, Carlson and co do something that reminds me of the stakes.

Mike Pence is fundamentally unfit to be the standard bearer for American conservativism. But the struggles with Heritage are about whether Heritage and Vance are worthy of that title going forward after Trump, and if not who should replace them.

I don’t see how Trump would be involved in any of this, nor why anyone would leave him because of it. Trump’s views on Israel are well known; he doesn’t have to declare much of anything at this point, nor is he running again. It’s about Vance and others whose views are far less known and who presumably want to run for president in 2028, and I suppose it might be about the midterms as well, in some cases anyway.

‘The Pence Mirage: Why the Right Isn’t Leaving Trump;
‘The Heritage Foundation “mutiny” isn’t a conservative realignment so much as the latest anti-Trump mirage, with Mike Pence cast as a moral standard-bearer no one is following’—
https://instapundit.com/765220/

I guess the challenge is how to see through all the smoke (IOW cut through all the BS).

Your last 4 paragraphs are accurate, vis a vis the MSM. The MSM has been steadily losing influence in the national conversation and independent media, like this blog, has been growing, but giving the MSM any ammunition is still risky for Republican politicians.

The 2016 election. What is that wisdom about Generals always wanting to fight the last (previous) war? They loose the war they are in.

And I assert that your problems with young men go away.

One particular grating thing about the complaints about this for “gatekeeping” or “endless self-purity tests” is that Owens, Carlson, and co are demanding endless self-purity tests of their own, and of a far more odious and far reaching nature.

Now there’s a good observation from @turtler. And thinking about what I’ve observed of the Left’s actions, may be the better solution – let them purity test themselves out of the coalition and/or burn themselves out in the process. I’ll have to ponder that more.

Nate Winchester:

Yes , i think it will “end there” because the offenses of Owens, Carlson, Fuentes et al are especially egregious and vile. If he can’t be critical of them he is morally bankrupt., These are not small nitpicky issues, to be safely ignored, as other such calls to denounce someone else might be. Perhaps you haven’t listened to them; i have. They are poison, and it’s not “just” about Jews and Israel, either.

It is possible – and necessary – to pick and choose whom to denounce.

I believe you have misunderstood me, @neo. I’m not saying they are small things or nitpicky or anything of the sort. You say it will “end there” – how?

Not even rhetorical or leading, I really do mean, “how will it end there?” Because I remember the 2016 election. You could make a drinking game of how often Trump would get asked in interviews about white nationalists and like. Each and every time he expressed strong condemnation and denouncement. And then they would ask it again. Even in Trump’s Charlottesville speech he outright said “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and the white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally” and yet what was the meme created by the media? I remember that time because on other blogs I pointed out to Leftists that line, a line of condemnation in a speech by Trump before that day, and a line of condemnation in a speech that followed that one (establishing that in 3 speeches in a row he condemned white nationalists) and it still wasn’t enough for the other side (some of whom even outright denied it).

So yes, part of me just does not believe that it will “end there” because experience has shown me that it won’t. It may “end there” for you and a few other people, but unfortunately those are not the only votes that count in a nation-wide run or voice in public spaces. (This is what I was writing about a year and a half ago.) Heck everyone loves to bring up Buchanan and Buckley and that whole history with the right. Regardless of what people’s actual views were or what the right and proper play was, how has that shaken out over the decades? My impression looking back is that when the Right said, “Ok, we’re also not ok with racism and will kick out people who have those views” the Left very quickly figured out they could use “racism” to snipe out of the way any Right-leaning figure that was a bit too troublesome for them.

I’m not even saying you’re wrong or Carlson et al aren’t dangerous or anything like that. I’m trying to think what are the long term plays. JD kicks them out of the party and establishes for the Press that a specific charge can cut someone out of the coalition. Then they start badgering JD about the next person/group they want to get cut off. Then the next after that. And another after that. In this age of A.I. do you think the accuracy of the charge matters? As I and Feral Historian here like to point out, numerous people believe Sarah Palin said “you can see Russia from my house” and that was an information operation done just with Saturday Night Live. With modern day deepfakes…. So if JD (or anyone) exposes that flank of their line with this move, there needs to be a compelling sign that the cause will actually advance.

Unless we just want to resign ourselves to Evan McMullin, Mitt Romney, and David French as our republican candidates for the rest of the nation’s life. (Hey we probably won’t ever win a political contest again, but there will be lots of moral victories.)

I guess that if Jesus can be hijacked by some of the more intensely earnest, there’s no reason why Abraham can’t be….

The question, I suppose, is WHO will have the last laugh….?

(I’d put my money on God, actually…)