“How do you know there’s an Irishman at a cock fight?” an old joke begins. “Someone enters a duck.”
We don’t have much cock fighting in these parts anymore, but we do have a Republican primary for president. Many conservatives and Republicans are rightly disgusted by President Trump’s embarrassing behavior, his toxic rhetoric, his flagrant disregard for facts, his dangerous embrace of strongmen and dictators, and his destructive bad policies. They would love to vote for someone else in a Republican primary. The probability of Trump losing in a primary is near zero, but there’s value in giving people a chance to cast a protest vote, whether to send Trump a message or just for catharsis.
Plenty of names have floated around as potential challengers, including Bill Weld (who wants to expand the freedom to abort the unborn and abridge the free exercise of religion), and Justin Amash (who is still running for Congress). The minority of Republicans and conservatives eager to vote against Trump is ideologically varied, and so you can’t expect unanimity on a candidate.
But, to echo the old joke, How do you know there’s a Trump Derangement Syndrome patient at a Republican Primary? He enters Joe Walsh.
Nearly everything wrong with Donald Trump is wrong with Joe Walsh. The one difference is that Walsh appears to possess self-awareness about this, and that almost makes it worse.
Walsh believes in nothing and represents everything wrong with American politics.
In the 1990s, Walsh was a pro-choice gun-grabber. When he challenged Democrat Sydney Yates for a Chicago-area U.S. House seat in 1996 — a year in which Bill Clinton would easily carry Illinois on his way to reelection — Walsh positioned himself as closely as possible to the geriatric incumbent, so as to make age the only distinction. “On issues such as gun control, affirmative action and abortion rights,” the Chicago Jewish Star wrote, “Mr. Walsh has matched his views to Sidney Yates’ (either intentionally or from conviction).” Walsh supported the “assault-weapon” ban back then.
But 2010 was a different sort of year. It was the Tea Party revolution, and Walsh became a Tea Partier for his successful congressional run. He was a fiscal hawk, a pro-lifer, and a fierce defender of gun rights. A good old conservative.
Then Walsh lost reelection in 2012, and once again sought a new market segment. The niche he eventually settled into was as a crank radio host. He pushed birtherism, the conspiracy theory that Obama had been secretly born in Kenya. He was always willing to share his belief that Obama is a Muslim — in fact, he was sharing that as recently as last year.
By 2016, Walsh was a full-fledged Trump fan, promising that “if Trump loses, I’m grabbing my musket.” Walsh never had to take the streets, rifle in hand, but he also didn’t feel the need to drop his racist crankery. In the early days of the Trump administration, Walsh tweeted “Islam has a problem. It’s our right & it’s our duty to profile Muslims.”
He’s promoted other conspiracy theories, and he became a big supporter of white nationalist congressional candidate Paul Nehlen, who ran in the Wisconsin district just north of the Illinois border.
Now we’re supposed to consider Walsh the sober alternative to Trump? That’s not going to happen. At best, this is just another costume change by a rootless play-actor.
It’s fairly typical for politicians to change their positions over time for expediency. Kirsten Gillibrand, for instance, has flip-flopped on gun rights. Ted Cruz has flip-flopped on Trump. They all do it. But even the most cynical politicians tend to have boundaries they won’t cross. Joe Walsh alone has gone from North Shore liberal to racist conspiracy theorist and back to Never-Trumper shocked at the behavior of our incontinent president.
Justin Amash should really run in the GOP primary. Or Jeb Hensarling should run. Heck, maybe we’ve got a sitting Republican lawmaker with the courage to run against Trump. Maybe all he or she would accomplish is standing on a national stage and articulate the conservative truths the Trump era threatens to bury.
But to support Joe Walsh would be to cede everything to Trump, and declare that we have no standards of decency.
I hope that Trump faces a fight for the nomination. But we shouldn’t enter a quack.
