Conservative reaction to the president’s announcement of the killing of Osama bin Laden has been relatively, perhaps even surprisingly, positive, given the standard view of Obama on the Right as an irresolute multilateralist afraid to use military force and always ready to apologize for American power.
Naturally, GOP congressional leaders and would-be presidents have been careful in their reactions. All gave credit to military and intelligence personnel with the event, but most (with the exception so far of Mitch McConnell, Rick Santorum, Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann) also gave at least a small shout-out to the Obama administration, typically along with his predecessor.
Even some of the major right-wing opinionaters have been giving Obama grudging praise. RedState co-founder Ben Domenech made this rather strong statement at RealClearWorld:
Whatever you may think of Obama’s domestic policies or diplomatic decisions, his approach to national security has been largely wise and overwhelmingly vindicated thus far.
But there’s a very big undertow of conservative criticism of Obama for hypocrisy on grounds that the tactics that led to the discovery of Osama’s hiding-place were allegedly those that the president and other Democrats have deplored in the past. In fact, it’s being accepted at break-neck speed in the right-wing blogosphere that interrogations at Gitmo and/or the waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed produced the critical intel. In other words, if Bush and Cheney can’t get the bulk of the credit for a big achievement that eluded them, the interrogation methods they defiantly championed were the real heroes.
There seems to be more than a little lefty-baiting going on in this line of conservative “reasoning,” in hopes of pouring gasoline on anti-war sentiment. Indeed, you can expect conservatives, initially at least, to leap to Obama’s defense if he visibly rejects the much-anticipated post-Osama advice to accelerate troop withdrawals in Afghanistan or announce an end to the Global War On Terror.
Before leaving this subject, I’d like to give a special acknowledgement to Michele Bachmann for her reaction to the death of Osama, which is a minor masterpiece in message discipline:
Tonight’s news does not bring back the lives of the thousands of innocent people who were killed that day by Osama bin Laden’s horrific plan, and it does not end the threat posed by terrorists, but it is my hope that this is the beginning of the end of Sharia-compliant terrorism.
“Sharia-compliant terrorism?” Sounds an awful lot like those “Sharia-compliant mortgages” Tim Pawlenty’s been accused of promoting as governor of Bachmann’s home state.
OBL’s death has temporarily interrupted the build-up of conservative wrath over the debt limit and GOP spending cut demands, but only temporarily. This week’s meetings in Washington involving representatives of the White House and congressional Republicans, and separately, the Senate’s Gang of Six deliberations, will produce a quickly intensifying backlash if there is any sign whatsoever of agreement. The latest “idea” that you’ll hear more about is that of a series of short-term (say, two-month) debt limit increases, providing multiple bites at the ideological apple, or, depending on which metaphor you prefer, a planned series of hostage crises. This is supposedly Grover Norquist’s pet proposal, and it could become very popular, even though some Tea Folk will point out this tactic didn’t work as brilliantly as was advertised on the FY 2011 appropriations front.
On the presidential campaign front, the news from Pakistan may have partially obscured Mitch Daniels’ decision to sign legislation making Indiana the first state to formally ban public funding for Planned Parenthood, and the third to impose a constitutionally-suspect ban on abortions more than 20 weeks after conception. This step is being widely interpreted as a signal that Daniels is back-tracking from his famous proposal for a “truce” on divisive cultural issues like abortion until such time as the country’s fiscal crisis is resolved, and/or that he has decided to run for president.
I dunno about that. Clearly, if Daniels had vetoed this legislation, the outcry from social conservatives would have made any presidential run in the immediate future a highly dubious proposition. But it’s not as though he actively promoted the bill before it landed on his desk, so further demonstrations of fealty to the anti-abortion cause will probably be necessary, and in any event, no one seems to know if he actually wants to run.
Pressure is also building on Mike Huckabee to make a move towards a candidacy a bit earlier than his own summer timetable. His friends in South Carolina recently had to bat down rumors he’d put out the word that he was giving the contest a pass.