Experienced Writer

When the editors of National Review famously endorsed Mitt Romney a few weeks back, I was personally pleased, seeing as how part of my job involves the citation and mockery of demonstrably nonsensical statements, with these seeming to come with the territory when one is in the unenviable position of defending a guy like Romney.

Like many die-hard Romney backers, the editors are unhappy to see John McCain surging ahead at what appears to be their candidate's expense, and are doubly unhappy to see Romney getting widely bashed for running chiefly on issues on which he held contrary positions not too long ago. And so the magazine has instead taken to attacking McCain for his own flip-flops, which is a reasonable enough thing to do. But unable to support their candidate by refuting citations of his own unprecedented degree of flip-floppery, the editors have instead chosen to simply downplay the obvious in passing, because, really, what else can you do?

Here's what they have to say today:

Some of Romney's critics allow that all politicians change their positions over time, but say that Romney stands out for changing his very political identity. Supposedly he ran as a moderate technocrat in Massachusetts, but is running as a culture warrior in the Republican primaries. We think both halves of this characterization are overstated...

"Supposedly"? "Overstated?" Need it be pointed out for the millionth time that Romney famously told the people of Massachussets that he didn't "want to go back to Reagan-Bush. I was an independent during Reagan-Bush," and that he's now a happy participant in the 2008 ~~Reagan Rhetorical Fellatio Festivities~~ GOP primary? Need it be pointed out that Romney claimed that he would be a greater defender of gays and lesbians than Ted Kennedy, and that he's since gone on to serve as the keynote speaker at the Family Research Council's anti-gay Liberty Sunday event at which another speaker noted that homosexuals used to be executed and that this should be the case again? Need it be pointed out, then, that he didn't so much "supposedly" run as a "moderate technocrat" in Massachusetts as he did actually do so, and that he isn't so much "supposedly" "running as a culture warrior in the Republican primaries" as he is actually doing so, and that anyone who refers to such a demonstrably true characterization as "overstated" is either a fool or a liar?

Speaking of flip-flops, National Review is now apparently okay with them. "For us," they proclaim, "the most important question about a flip-flop is whether the movement is in the right direction." Would you be surprised to learn that this was not quite their position in 2004, when John Kerry was running for president? Back then, they knocked Kerry for having in 1997 praised Yassir Arafat's "transformation from outlaw to statesman" before knocking him in 2004 as "an outlaw." National Review, of course, believes that Arafat was indeed an outlaw, so surely such a flip-flop was "in the right direction." Which is to say that National Review's new position on flip-flops is itself a flip-flop - albeit "the movement is in the right direction" insomuch as their new take on such things is in service to their candidate of the hour.

Now, would you be similarly surprised to learn that one need not even go back to 2004 to find National Review attacking someone for flip-flopping in the "right direction" even though they supposedly now think such a thing is fine and dandy? Would you be surprised to learn that, in fact, one could simply go back a few paragraphs in this very same article to find such an example? Is that not incredible? Check it out:

Senator McCain, alas, was not silent: He voted against the tax cuts, as he had voted against the 2001 tax cuts. He flip-flopped on estate taxes, defending them after having voted to get rid of them. As he geared up to run for president this time around, however, McCain became a born-again supply-sider. Now he wants to keep the tax cuts he originally opposed.

But, wait - National Review is in favor of those tax cuts! Surely this is flip-flop "in the right direction," right? Oh, and then, towards the end of the piece, we find this:

We hope McCain comes around some more on immigration, and campaign-finance reform, and a lot of other issues and we will not attack him as a flip-flopper if he does.

Ha. Ha. Ha. National Review just attacked McCain as a "flip-flopper" for reversing his stance on taxation just two or three paragraphs before, and now they're claiming they won't "attack him as a flip-flopper" if he reverses his stance on other matters, including campaign-finance reform, which has long been one of his most defining issues. But, wait, it gets better! Check this out, if you'd be so kind as to do so:

And if flip-flopping on immigration is a crime, McCain can be charged with it, too. He himself says that he has changed his position on the issue. One of the principal points at issue in the debate over his bill was whether we should try "enforcement first." Since the bill's collapse, McCain has said that he now understands that we should. If that is not a flip-flop, it is only because his claims of a change of heart are insincere.

National Review had already attacked McCain as a "flip-flopper" for having changed his stance on immigration just a few paragraphs before claiming that they won't "attack him as a flip-flopper" for having changed his stance on immigration! Which is to say, National Review just did X because McCain did Y, and then claimed that they won't do X if McCain does Y. What a terrible, terrible magazine this is.