In 2000 I was one of those overseas Florida voters whose vote for once was not only counted but actually counted. Yes I did vote for George Bush, and yes I did intend to vote for him – there were no hanging “chads” on my ballot, and I was a registered Republican.
In 2008 I went to a fundraiser for Barack Obama, and voted for him. Did he do as well as we had hoped? No. Do I regret voting for him? Not at all. Any indecision I might have felt ended the moment Sarah Palin was added to the ballot. I give President Obama the same benefit of the doubt I gave President Bush, namely that they were both dealt bad hands and did their best.
2016 is fast approaching, and Democrats fundraisers seem to automatically assume I’ll jump on board with their candidates, that I’ll get out the vote and help fundraise the way I did in ‘08. This is becoming increasingly unlikely, and I do not see myself as a Democrat.
People outside the party – and those in the Democratic party – were puzzled by why my going to a fundraiser for Obama received any coverage, let alone articles and online discussion (led by Bruce Bartlett and Andrew Sullivan) about "Obamacons" or conservatives who had endorsed Obama. It’s simple – whilst never a “Neocon,” I had had long ties to the Republican party, worked on a number of Republican projects, for example setting several up for one of their big donors, working first for him in London, then in New York.
Obviously something went wrong along the way, as I had embraced the Obama campaign even before Palin’s nomination.
I had become severely disenchanted with the Republicans. The “Big Swing Dick” Manhattan Republican had literally put his dick inside my vagina against my will. I have been threatened if I call it rape, so I won’t. I’ll simply point out that I repeatedly said no, I shouldn’t have let him push his way in through the front door, and then in an attempt to stop him I through so much china in the kitchen that I took the surface off the wooden floor in the dining area. His “version” of events is that I was a gold-digging whore trying to steal him away from his wife. Mine is that after he had tried to first get me to work for him, then tried to woo me, and when that failed he took out his anger on me in a vile way. The act of coercion was nothing to do with sex, and everything to do with domination and a dislike of women.
I didn’t call the police. I holed up in the Four Seasons, and then later flew back to London. I have not been back to New York since 2006, as ... if Washington DC is meant to be “House of Cards” my experience of Manhattan was more “Game of Thrones”. There was blood, and I prefer fights to be cerebral.
I still go to DC, which I prefer as a city – it’s international, has more people with good brains, and fewer that think they can do whatever they like because they’re rich, then threaten things when they’re caught.
In March 2008 I went with Bruce Bartlett to the AEI Annual Dinner. "Big Swing Dick" was also there, having bought an expensive seat. Apparently I had "stalked" him there, and the fact that I felt deeply embarrassed and kept well away from him was "confirmation" of this. At the beginning of the evening I'd been asked to write an Op-Ed, by the end of the evening the editor had rescinded his offer based on "rumours" he'd heard, and that was to be a pattern for quite some time when it came to my work.
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The same week I went to the OEED for some 'face time' followed by 'face time' with the head of the GOP. I also went to a small dinner where this gentleman was the guest giving us a 'pep talk':
I suspect Chatham House Rules applied, so I can't say what others said there. I can say that I lost my cool on the GOP operator sitting next to me, and explained exactly what I thought of erh plans to ban oral contraception (the birth control pill, not the 'morning after' pill). I explained that anyone who thought that contraception was an 'abortifacient' because one could miscarry whilst on the pill was a complete idiot. Apparently big Republican donors were allowed to put their dicks into my body against my wishes, but I wasn't allowed to make choices about my own body?
I then made a plea to Karl Rove for the Republicans not to abandon moderates. I did it in a room full of mostly moderates. My concept was that the more right wing and Evangelical Republicans would never vote Democrat anyway, and that by abandoning those of us who are more libertarian and more in the centre politically, the party would throw any chance they had of winning at presidential elections. Centrists are more likely to vote Democrat in disgust - as I did - than Southern Republicans, so we should be the voters to aim for, as Republicans had done for decades. Even without giving away Mr Rove's answer, I'm sure people can guess what it was. I might as well have been tilting at windmills.
In 2008 I voted Democrat for the first time in my life.
2015 started with invitation after invitation to fundraisers for PACs supporting Hillary Clinton '16, whose supporters have been pulling in money like crazy in Europe.
Having just come back from Paris, the scene of some horrific terrorist massacres, information about her like this worried me:
Hilary Clinton also supported UN res 16/18 to restrict criticism of religion http://t.co/Kw8XKjWVs4 ht @DuseVanDuse
— Ed West (@edwest) January 11, 2015Freedom of religion is a fundamental American right - but so is the Freedom of Expression to criticise religions.
The emails from a personal account? Yes it can be 'spun' as a storm in a tea cup, were it not for others being fired by State for using personal email accounts. It also shows her contempt, and how the Clintons behave as if mere rules don't apply to them. That ridiculous press conference she did where she refused to answer any real questions? To me it just confirmed she was not presidential.
I watch Jon Stewart's The Daily Show, like a lot of friends who still consider themselves Republicans. I can laugh at the wilder ideas aired on Fox News, but I also cringe at the way Stewart pushes some agendas; his treatment of Bill O'Reilly, which came across as bullying, just made me feel sympathy for O'Reilly and not for Stewart. When it comes to Bill Maher I draw the line. Maher's horrific Islamophobia is worse than the Islamophobia the liberals criticise Fox News for, and I'm surprised that iTunes is allowed to sell it in Europe, as it likely qualifies as 'hate speech' in several countries here.
I'm not a Maher fan any more than I am a Hillary fan. I'd rather be an old-fashioned Republican of the sort the party seems to sideline these days in favour of brutish big donors (see: Manhattan, above) and increasingly extreme Tea Party supporters (see: contraception, above). Like most of my friends I'm socially liberal but fiscally conservative (aka do what you want, just don't touch my money too much). Years ago I argued that since the GOP was for stable relationships and lower taxes, they should support gay marriage, a position even Republican states are slowly coming around to. I've never had an abortion, but I support women's rights to chose for themselves, and believe in legalised abortion on the basis that no woman who does not want one will ever be forced to have one.
Did I allow some overly vocal Evangelical idiots to make me feel so unwelcome that I left the Republican party? Yes. But had it not been for the Manhattan experience, I probably wouldn't have done so. So in some way this is my me culpa, for allowing an idiot to threaten me to the point where I felt victimised. I'm older and wiser now, and I realise that the Republican party should no more be bullied into doing what men like him want than vocal Tea Partiers.
I can't change those Republicans, but I can stand up for my views, and the views of the old-style Republicans I know. The best way to do that is to re-register as a Republican and to vote in the Primary for a more moderate candidate whose views do not pander to the lobbies I dislike. So I'm back in the GOP whether they like it or not, and I hope all others who feel alienated by them recently try the same step - instead of complaining, sign back up again and use your ballot to express your views to try to take back the party. It might not work, but if we don't try then it definitely won't work!
The emails from a personal account? Yes it can be 'spun' as a storm in a tea cup, were it not for others being fired by State for using personal email accounts. It also shows her contempt, and how the Clintons behave as if mere rules don't apply to them. That ridiculous press conference she did where she refused to answer any real questions? To me it just confirmed she was not presidential.
I watch Jon Stewart's The Daily Show, like a lot of friends who still consider themselves Republicans. I can laugh at the wilder ideas aired on Fox News, but I also cringe at the way Stewart pushes some agendas; his treatment of Bill O'Reilly, which came across as bullying, just made me feel sympathy for O'Reilly and not for Stewart. When it comes to Bill Maher I draw the line. Maher's horrific Islamophobia is worse than the Islamophobia the liberals criticise Fox News for, and I'm surprised that iTunes is allowed to sell it in Europe, as it likely qualifies as 'hate speech' in several countries here.
I'm not a Maher fan any more than I am a Hillary fan. I'd rather be an old-fashioned Republican of the sort the party seems to sideline these days in favour of brutish big donors (see: Manhattan, above) and increasingly extreme Tea Party supporters (see: contraception, above). Like most of my friends I'm socially liberal but fiscally conservative (aka do what you want, just don't touch my money too much). Years ago I argued that since the GOP was for stable relationships and lower taxes, they should support gay marriage, a position even Republican states are slowly coming around to. I've never had an abortion, but I support women's rights to chose for themselves, and believe in legalised abortion on the basis that no woman who does not want one will ever be forced to have one.
Did I allow some overly vocal Evangelical idiots to make me feel so unwelcome that I left the Republican party? Yes. But had it not been for the Manhattan experience, I probably wouldn't have done so. So in some way this is my me culpa, for allowing an idiot to threaten me to the point where I felt victimised. I'm older and wiser now, and I realise that the Republican party should no more be bullied into doing what men like him want than vocal Tea Partiers.
I can't change those Republicans, but I can stand up for my views, and the views of the old-style Republicans I know. The best way to do that is to re-register as a Republican and to vote in the Primary for a more moderate candidate whose views do not pander to the lobbies I dislike. So I'm back in the GOP whether they like it or not, and I hope all others who feel alienated by them recently try the same step - instead of complaining, sign back up again and use your ballot to express your views to try to take back the party. It might not work, but if we don't try then it definitely won't work!