Robert Francis O’Rourke is a straight, white guy with well-connected parents and a wife whose daddy is a billionaire. He’s also an (almost former) three-term congressman with a DWI and failed music career under his belt. He somehow kindles fantasies in the minds of middle-aged liberals despite having the charisma of an airplane safety video, and the Democratic establishment wants you to believe that he’s the next Barack Obama.
Yes, a privileged white kid named Robert with a forgettable congressional record is supposed to take the place of the two-time Ivy League grad, self-made, first black president — who actually was able to win his Senate race.
Progressives are already angry with the memory of the Democratic Party actively shivving the inspiring and socialist Bernie Sanders in order to clear the field for the least trustworthy presidential candidate in history, only to lose to Donald Trump. Although they’re still looking for a real champion — the progressives with great press aren’t necessarily presidential material at this point — progressives know that bitter Hillary Clinton alums and their media lackeys will eagerly try to pull a fast one with an establishment changeling as 2020 rolls around.
Beto O’Rourke lost to a very disliked Republican incumbent in an election characterized by Democratic turnout despite burning through tens of millions of dollars on campaigning and receiving media coverage so glowing the rest of us wanted to ask them to get a room. He lost. He lost in an election cycle where dozens of other Democrats with none of the other advantages flipped seats and conquered. O’Rourke lost, and it’s time for him to join a think tank or a university, and he can moonlight as a campaigner.
Beto for Texas signs haven’t even come down in some parts of Austin, and the media is already writing pieces like “Obama aides say Beto O’Rourke reminds them of the ex-president. Obama agrees.” (Obama’s actual quote, responding to a question specifically asking about O’Rourke and answering with a few generic compliments about him, reads, “The reason I was able to make a connection with a sizeable portion of the country was because people had a sense that I said what I meant. And that’s a quality that, as I look at what I’m sure will be a strong field of candidates in 2020, many of whom are friends of mine and whom I deeply respect — what I oftentimes am looking for first and foremost is, do you seem to mean it?” In other words, Obama was, as usual, just talking about himself.)
So naturally, progressives have pushed back. The Washington Post’s typically cogent Elizabeth Bruenig pointed out that from a policy perspective, not only are his progressive credentials thin at best, but he’s also “plainly uninspiring” when it comes to national politics. Zaid Jilani at Current Affairs did a deep dive into O’Rourke’s legislative record and emerged displeased at the man he speculates “rarely, if ever, challenged the powerful.” Jilani found that “[i]n his six years in Congress, O’Rourke passed three bills. Two were related to veterans issues, the third renamed a federal building and courthouse.”
Sounds like Hope and Change to me.
The Democratic establishment is not having dissenters.
“It’s almost like there’s a concerted effort to kill an O’Rourke candidacy because attacks are focused solely on him,” wrote Center for American Progress’ Topher Spiro. “I don’t know who our nominee should be but it’s interesting that Beto is being attacked before he even announces.”
Spiro’s boss Neera Tanden echoed the sentiment, calling O’Rourke pieces falling out of the adulating line “orchestrated.”
Former Hillary Clinton campaign staffer Zac Petkanas called David Sirota’s critiques of O’Rourke a “sick obsession with attacking Democrats.”
Suffice it to say, the Beto Bros will not let you commit thought-crime. Criticize the boring white guy at your peril, progressives.
