Reflections on Fred
Lee on Jan 23 2008 at 11:02 pm | Filed under: Domestic Politics, Election 2008
This was a post better suited for yesterday and Fred’s withdrawal, but I suppose I let myself get distracted without posting it. It should go without saying that while I was unsurprised by the event, it was nevertheless disappointing. But not so much because we are now bereft of any reasonable alternative in the Republican field, but because it seems to confirm that registered Republicans by a large margin, are using unwelcome criteria to evaluate candidates. In fairness, that impression has been with me throughout Fred’s campaign, since I’d found myself to be fond of Thompson because of the reasons he failed to appeal to almost everyone else.
Thompson didn’t really seem to want the job, which always speaks in a candidate’s favor for me. He was reflective, contemplative, introspective. He gave sober, rational, non-emotive speeches with almost no prefabricated applause lines. He didn’t pause for applause, he didn’t solicit the audience’s baser instincts and he avoided political clichés as if they were plagued. He was often pessimistic (even gloomy) about serious issues and he often failed to see any virtue in mindless optimism about problems which are unlikely to be easily resolved (social security, theocratic despotism in Iran, etc).
He was well-read in uncommon but enormously important areas affecting current affairs and public policy. He lost many an audience’s interest by dealing with issues of importance, rather than issues of popular concern. He could speak in extemporaneous length about about entire subjects Mike Huckabee or Mitt Romney are probably unaware exist. The fact that he was so rarely invited to discuss interesting subjects, seemed only to only heighten his dissatisfaction with the process. That too is a sympathetic attribute.
Indeed, he often seemed bored by the banality of questions he was asked, and tired by the meaningless rituals of the campaign he was required to perform. He didn’t care if you liked him, and he didn’t in fact debate anything. He gave his view and you could take it or leave it by voluntary choice as far as he was concerned. He didn’t rely on the whims of the media or the prejudices of the electorate to define his views. Or even more strikingly, he didn’t allow them to define his interests. He was his own politics.
People commonly like to say they hate the permanently smiling, unprincipled and shamelessly manipulative caricature of the politician. For the Republicans at least, Fred probably proved most of them to be dishonest about their own claimed virtues in a leader. Fred personified the ultimate rejection of that type of career candidate, and was in turn rejected by the voters himself. Thus henceforth, whenever a Republican starts to complain to you about the undesirable characteristics of the political class –its vacuous sentimentality, its banal dishonesty– ask them who they supported in 2008. If the answer comes back as anyone other than Fred Thompson, enjoy a chuckle at their expense.
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