Is there a way to turn the Paladino disaster into a conservative victory?

On October 14, in an entry called “Paladino apologizes—for everything,” I wrote about Carl Paladino’s abject surrender on the homosexuality issue. In response, Kilroy M. writes:

OK, so what is to be done now? Do we punish him for backing down, and thus establish that the only conservative candidate worthy of grassroots conservative support is one who will stick to his guns, or do we support him anyway because the alternative is a pervert who takes his daughters to a freak show? Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t Paladino one of the Republicans that upset the establicon endorsed candidate in his primary? If so, it shows how pathetic the Tea Party movement is. Nothing changes. The only way that this can be turned into a victory (of sorts) for conservatives, in the event the grass roots decide to withdraw their support for Paladino, is if it is made abundantly clear that the withdrawal was due to his surrender to liberalism.

Well, that’s a pretty thought—that Paladino’s coming crushing defeat be seen as a result of his total surrender to the left on the most controversial issue of the campaign, rather than as a result of his being either too conservative or simply not qualified. But I would say that there is zero chance of that happening. Even if it were the case that many voters turned away from Paladino over his collapse on the homosexuality issue, and I’m not aware of any data on that, there’s no way that that would be registered by the media. This is because the overwhelming media story is not, “Paladino is an inadequate conservative.” The overwhelming media story is, “Paladino is something of a clown and unfit to be governor.”

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James P. writes:

Kilroy asks,

“Do we punish him for backing down, and thus establish that the only conservative candidate worthy of grassroots conservative support is one who will stick to his guns, or do we support him anyway because the alternative is a pervert who takes his daughters to a freak show?”

There is little to choose between the alternatives. What is the difference between a man who would go into a gay bar and a man who would march in a gay pride parade with his daughters? Nothing! They are both willing to put themselves in close proximity to degenerates and to witness abominations that normal people would run away from as fast as they could.

If the guy can be rolled this easily by the liberals during the campaign, it bodes ill for what he would do as governor.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at October 20, 2010 08:50 AM | Send