Blame Jack Ryan
Michael Cecire • November 7, 2008 • Uncategorized
In the wake of the unavoidable finger-pointing has arisen a disturbing claim by McCain insiders that Sarah Palin was, somehow, to blame. Of course, even assuming that were true (and the cited reasons are pretty lame), it would be quite a stretch to assume that Sarah Palin alone costed McCain his 5% deficit. What we know was true, however, was that Palin energized the base in ways McCain never did. So, in the struggle to find a scapegoat, (since we apparently can’t find it within ourselves to blame the GOP’s own nutty, self-destructive culture, it’s embrace of big government, and endemic corruption) I humbly suggest that we blame Jack Ryan.
No, not that Jack Ryan. Yes, we all have many things for which to blame Harrison Ford (like encouraging the insufferable George Lucas), but the seemingly inevitable statist creep from an Obama presidency isn’t one of them. At least as far as I am aware. Neither are, of course, either of the others who have played Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan – Alec Baldwin and Ben Affleck – although their hyper-leftist credentials are quite, quite well established. Oh, to clear up any confusion, Tom Clancy is also in the clear.
But no, I’m actually referring to a non-fictional Jack Ryan (who knew?). If you recall, Obama was firstvaulted to the national scene in 2004 with his election to the US Senate, handily defeating the overmatched and perennial GOP sacrificial lamb Alan Keyes. Alan Keyes, as some might remember, stepped in to fill a void that had been left after the GOP designee, Jack Ryan, had resigned after a strange and unflattering sex scandal.
I’m not going to go into the details – that’s what Wikipedia’s for – but in the end Jack Ryan resigned in utter shame and Obama went on to win his step-ladder Senate seat and, now, the Presidency.
The richest irony is that Obama’s seat was, at one point, considered quite competitive. And Jack Ryan, I recall hearing during an AIPAC briefing I received before the scandal broke out, was also considered something of a GOP rising star. Obama’s story was compelling, but so too was Ryan’s:
Obama’s Republican opponent for the November 2004 Senate race was Jack Ryan, who had rugged good looks, a glittering resumé and a well-funded campaign. Like Obama, he was a graduate of Harvard Law School, and also had an MBA from Harvard Business School. He was 44 and after making his fortune at Goldman Sachs left banking to teach for three years at an all-black inner-city Catholic boys’ high school in Chicago.
But Obama never got vetted properly in 2004. And instead of a rising star, from the Jack Ryan fallout the Illinois GOP collapsed like a dying star. While one could plausibly charge that Obama’s own political manuevering kept him from having a real opponent until Hillary Clinton, it doesn’t change the fact that Jack Ryan’s disclosure problem might have done great damage not only to his once-ascendant career, but to the Illinois GOP and, by extension, the country.
So if we’re going to irresponsibly point fingers, I say it should be directed at those whose blame goes beyond shocking charges of clothes shopping. And, in all earnest, maybe we should start thinking about things like, ya know, policy?
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Hi there. Your post Jack Ryan : Democracy Project is very interesting for me. My written English is not so good so I write in German: “Lieber den Spatz in der Hand, als die Taube auf dem Dach.” Yours sincerely Thursday Ryan