Quote of the Day

Lee Habeeb on Hugh Hewitt, December 1, 2011:

I don’t buy the idea that Newt’s not conservative because he sat on the couch with Nancy Pelosi.  He sat on the couch with Nancy Pelosi at the moment because he wanted to say at the moment, hey, I am not a Republican, I am not a conservative, I am an American, and yeah, let’s talk about global warming … what can we do to reduce our carbon footprint anyway, aside from Kyoto and aside from these other things?  I don’t want to ever be a conservative who says we can’t be better stewards. 

Tim Kowal

Tim Kowal is a husband, father, and attorney in Orange County, California, Vice President of the Orange County Federalist Society, commissioner on the OC Human Relations Commission, and Treasurer of Huntington Beach Tomorrow. The views expressed on this blog are his own. You can follow this blog via RSS, Facebook, or Twitter. Email is welcome at timkowal at gmail.com.

9 Comments

  1. That’s a great sentiment. Unfortunately, it doesn’t appear to be a mainstream sentiment of the Republican party these days.

  2. True story- I saw one of these ginormous pickup trucks down the street that had a Confederate flag, a NOBAMA sticker a sticker that said he is a member of PETA (People Eating Tasty Animals), and a personalized plate that read “I[heart] 8 MPG”

    The guy had as a point of pride, that he gets low gas mileage.

    Is it illogical of me to believe that this guy is probably not the sort of conservative who says stuff about being stewards of the earth?

    Would it be fair of me to say his attitude is more aligned with the conservative base than Mr. Habeeb’s?

    • “I saw an individual acting poorly in a way that catered to my preconceptions about a group. I then when on to make a sweeping generalization about an entire group based on this one negative example. I now expect you to come to a conclusion about the group instead of coming to a conclusion about me.”

      Does that sum it up?

      • bubububu if im not allowed to make sweeping generalizations about groups based on a single negative example how will i possibly justify the othering that is necessary to justify my selfish insistence on treating my personal preferences as objective determinations of truth?

    • It’s tribal signaling and eye-poking, and should not be taken as literal policy advocacy. He’s trying to get a rise out of people. You, specifically.

      • The guy in the pickup is not nutpicking on my part;

        No Republican at any level can be elected in 2012 expressing Mr. Habeeb’s views, but lots will get elected expressing Mr. Pickup’s views.

  3. As for the quote: The problem is that for a lot of people, it seems like the point is not to be stewards of the environment, but to be visibly beggaring oneself for it, even if that’s not doing anything good (and might in fact even be doing things that are bad.)

  4. Not even irrational partisanship suggests that anyone of a particular political stripe should either ignore a policy issue that the other side raises in good faith, nor refuse to acknowledge that members of the other team also have power and influence over the issue and therefore must be dealt with in some mature fashion.

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