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Schmidt Versus Gabriel; Who Do You Got?
Never Trump likes to think of themselves as the thoughtful, reasoned, and above all principled(TM) alternative to MAGA. They are the wise, diplomatic Picards to MAGA’s boorish James T. Kirks. Which makes watching Lincoln Project founder Steve Schmidt’s descent into madness so compelling. And the most recent target of his outrage is our own fearless leader, Jon Gabriel. Who, according to Mr. Schmidt, is “a Christian Nationalist … an extremist and a fascist.”
The backstory is here. The TL;DR version is that Mr. Schmidt gets very, very testy when people point out that one of his Lincoln Project co-founders, John Weaver, had an unsavory interest in teenage boys and that this troubled the rest of his Lincoln Project cohorts about as much as teaching five-year-olds about gender ideology bothers Disney executives. After this and another recent Schmidt Twitter tirade against Sarah Palin (whom Schmidt called a “nut ball”) and Meghan McCain whom he called insane; Mr. Gabriel gently recommended Mr. Schmidt should perhaps seek help. And it was this that prompted Schmidt’s “Christian Nationalist, extremist, and fascist” riposte. Mr. Gabriel handled the insult with the class and aplomb we have come to expect.
Seriously, though, it does kinda look like the shingles are coming off Mr. Schmidt’s roof and maybe someone ought to look into that.
Really wanted to work in a reference to the crack pipes that the corporate media claimed no way would there be crack pipes in the taxpayer-funded safe smoking kits the Biden administration was distributing, but yeah, there totally are crack pipes in those kits, but… maybe I’m feeling too nice today to suggest a metaphorical connection between Mr. Schmidt’s tirades and the contents of the Biden Administration’s safe-smoking kits.
By the way, the “principled conservatives” at the NAMBLincoln Project have laid out their “2022 Roadmap for Republican Defeat.”
“The Lincoln Project’s mission heading into 2022 is simple and direct: Defeat the Republican Party and their candidates in key states and Congressional districts.”
Certainly sounds like something a group led by principled conservatives who aren’t at all a grift operation fronting for the Democratic Left would say.
Speaking of things angry people say on Twitter, Texas Republican Dan Crenshaw says if you don’t support sending billions of dollars to Ukraine with no financial oversight, you’re probably a Russian stooge.
Published in General
That guy is a real disappointment.
The best part about the LP guy calling Jon a “a Christian Nationalist ” is that he infers this from an icon Jon has in his Twitter bio:
Jon has this in his bio:
Which one should recognize as the Orthodox Cross. How he made the leap from an Orthodox Cross to “Christian Nationalist” I leave to clinical psychiatrists.
Wait, are we talking the Shatner Kirk or the Pine Kirk? Just curious.
As for @exjon, counting Schmidt as an enemy is a huge notch in the belt. Congratulations.
There’s no such thing as bad publicity.
Especially from Steve Schmidt.
pretty certain this was their goal before Trump, too.
The interesting twist in the Steve Schmidt Goes Crazy saga is that this week he ran to a fellow “political consultant” based in DC, who interviewed him for the “Kyiv Post” for a long, rambling piece in which he repeatedly warned of all the Russian Stooges in American politics going back to his time working for John McCain.
Yeah, it’s quite obviously Ukrainian Propaganda. Just wondering why he went to a Kyiv media outlet to try to rehabilitate his image. But I suppose inserting yourself in a global conflict draws attention — one might hope. If that sounds calculated, it is. The guy who interviewed him is all about rehabilitating political figures. Coincidentally, this political consultant also worked for John McCain. In fact, McCain is the only political figure he mentions by name in his long list of politicians (here and abroad) who he allegedly worked for.
Otherwise his resume from his site reads like this.
It goes on and on like that for multiple entries.
So who is “a major European presidential candidate”? Who is the “post-Soviet candidate”? Who is the “European politician”? Our consultant won’t say. Which leads me to suggest the whole list is bogus. (It does read like it was written by a corporate BS generator.) Either that or none of these people benefited in any way from having Jason Jay Smart as a consultant. He only helped them lose. You know, like Schmidt does with his clients.)
So, to sum up, Schmidt called on a fellow political mercenary from the McCain years to help him rehabilitate his image by jumping on board the latest global conflict to declare all his enemies to be Russian Stooges. And it was published in . . . the Kyiv Post.
It’s all pretty weird, but it does support my view that political consultants are malignant.
Leave our Jon alone!!
What a maroon.
Well played.
That’s it? That’s the emblem of Christian Nationalism?
Stevie needs to get out of his basement more often.
I wonder if it gives any of these Trump skeptics (as opposed to Never Trumpers – they are irredeemable) the tiniest pause that a guy like Steve Schmidt was running the GOP nominees Presidential campaign as recently as 2008. And let’s take a moment to remember that John McCain was the Republican nominee. That’s the guy who singlehandedly voted down the repeal of ACA. Also the guy who claimed to want to “build the damn fence” and his glaring inaction and intransigence on that very issue.
Then the nominee of 2012 Mitt Romney was fully supported by the likes of Jen Rubin Bill Kristol and Max Bootlicker (and others) who are still fighting the Trumpian elements in the GOP with a zeal that borders on fanaticism.
It was never Trumps personality. That was cover. They have a fundamental problem with democratic populism and anyone not willing to offer their firstborn sons to perpetual war in some foreign [REDACTED]. They have zero principles. They are actually worse than most Democrats in that category.
Yup. Based it off an Orthodox Cross. Stevie needs a psychiatric hold.
I fully supported Romney in 2012. Full disclosure.
And here I thought that I was going to get a tip on how a Christian Nationalist was supposed to accessorize.
The Ruthless Podcast is hosted by Comfortably Smug and former Mitch McConnell Chief of Staff, Josh Holmes. One of the games they play is called King of the Hill, which is on every Thursday episode. In it, each host picks a former conservative star who is prolific on Twitter. Then in a best of three competition each host selects a tweet to read and the third member of show is the judge and jury. Two weeks ago Josh picked Schmidt and won. Last week they didn’t have the game, Schmidt might have already started his descent into slander, but I think they ran out of time. Anyway, Josh was one of his targets. This week, on the advise of lawyers, they didn’t play the game. I think Josh is going to sue and it would probably be bad if he used evidence in a game show on his podcast.
I did too! So much has changed before our eyes.
Wait … they read his tweets out loud? The words he actually wrote?
The dastards!
My support was tepid at best. I wanted Newt.
Newt was also my favorite. And in retrospect wasn’t it interesting how Newt was marginalized by the media and what we know now to be Conservative Inc.
For me, no second term for BO was the whole point. I thought Romney had a shot, as opposed to Newt or Santorum. Still, if you look at all we’ve learned from the Trump years and into today, the Obama win was probably for the best.
I wouldn’t trust Schmidt any further than I can throw him.
There are so many disappointments Mitt, McCain even GWB now Crenshaw, it’s like invasion of the body snatchers. I can never forgive Schmidt and Nicole Wallace undermining their own VP candidate. No one hates Lord Cornwallis, Benedict Arnold is reviled forever.
PS. I just read on Breitbart that Schmidt now admits he didn’t vote for McCain
When does “admits” become “proudly states?”
Not me. Steve Schmidt struck me as a jackass from when I first became aware of him. I’ve never been a John McCain fan or a Romney booster. I’ve never liked Biden, Obama, or either Clinton. That doesn’t mean because I don’t want any of them in power that I have to like Trump. I assert my right to hold every one of the aforementioned in disdain.
Wait a minute. I thought the only reason that anyone criticized Trump was for the mean tweets. It’s a good thing we Trump skeptics have people like you to tell us what we think.
‘Christian nationalists’ are a strange bugaboo of the left. Pretty sure Jon isn’t one, but then I don’t know that anyone at all actually is one. Or even what one is supposed to be.
Well, I’m a Christian, and if nationalist is the opposite of communist, I’m one of those too. Which one is supposed to be so scary?
I think it’s to do with ‘dominionism’.
Part 1
I agree with the overall post here but I feel the shot at Crenshaw at the end was unnecessary, and also obviously wrong.
I think I know why you don’t like Crenshaw- he’s hawkish on foreign policy. Given his military background, that shouldn’t be unexpected, and we could use a lot more veterans in congress.
I’ve listened to Crenshaw speak on multiple occasions- seen him on Joe Rogan’s pod among others. He’s articulate and intelligent. He’s got a good (and correct) view of American military strength and how to responsibly use it. He’s also realistic about America’s role in the world and what our America-First priorities actually are- which means not leaving a power vacuum in places where people hate us, and also standing up to foreign adversaries.
The tweet you referenced is from a Yahoo article (yikes- may as well be linking Mother Jones). You’re taking the bait in that Yahoo article because they enjoy framing things to get Republicans to fight amongst themselves. You’ve picked a side just as Yahoo wants.
Part 2
The actual tweet controversy started when Crenshaw criticized the Biden admin for the open border allowing drugs to pour in. He’s right! Good for Crenshaw.
Some random person tweeted at him about his vote for the 40 billion to Ukraine (correct again Crenshaw). The reason for the criticism is because it’s a vote to spend money which can be spent in the US; again that isolationist-Tucker crowd with bad priorities. If that crowd really cared about government spending they would be going after Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, as those programs are the drivers of our deficit. The aid for Ukraine is a drop in the bucket for federal spending, and it’s money well spent as it is foreign aid which is appropriate as it deters Russia without getting the US directly involved with killing Russians.
So Crenshaw defends the vote correctly and without anger as you assert (probably to stir a controversy): Yeah, because investing in the destruction of our adversary’s military, without losing a single American troop, strikes me as a good idea. You should feel the same.
The yahoo article links Greene’s tweet to Crenshaw: So you think we are funding a proxy war with Russia? You speak as if Ukrainian lives should be thrown away, as if they have no value. Just used and thrown away. For your proxy war? How does that help Americans? How does any of this help?
The tweet she sent asserts a lot about Crenshaws position- calling his vote a vote for proxy war and that it doesn’t help Americans. Somehow Greene missed the part where Russia losing helps America. Crenshaw has the America-first position and the isolationist-Tucker crowd are wrong here.
He hits her with: Still going after that slot on Russia Today huh?
Probably because she has a voting record against sanctions on Russia and has been speaking out against opposing Russia. This brand of isolationism- where you surrender the world to murderers and tyrants- is not conservative, it’s un-American, it’s unethical and immoral, and it’s something I don’t want any part of.
What’s so funny here is that Crenshaw was attacking the Biden admin, but it got turned into an intraparty argument. Again, leave it to yahoo to get people to take the bait.
The real disappointment is that you either didn’t read the link or worse did and still don’t think Greene is playing the part of fool here. Biased Yahoo article that tries to stir up controversy within Republican ranks is a better description of the article. In it Greene dramatically points out that Crenshaw is spending money to stop Russia, and Crenshaw uses Greene’s voting record against her:
To wit-
Greene voted Nay
H.R. 6891: Isolate Russian Government Officials Act of 2022Passed 416/2 on May 11, 2022.
Greene voted Nay
H.R. 7066: Russia and Belarus Financial Sanctions Act of 2022Passed 418/2 on May 11, 2022.
Greene isn’t a villain, but she’s wrong on the Russian invasion, and Crenshaw is right to point out her record. Finally, I find it amusing that he gets attacked after he takes the effort to go after the Biden admin on open borders and illegal drugs. Who’re the ones doing Biden’s bidding in this situation? Who gains by making this about Greene V Crenshaw? Oh right, the Biden admin. As the boys on The Ruthless podcast are fond of saying- “Don’t take the bait!”
I am unhappy with most NT. My take on the Trump era was we won, now take the opportunity to move the conservative agenda forward as far as possible, where the NT took the opportunity of (R) victory to poop on it …. I still don’t get it.
But the Lincoln Project are in their own special category of WTF are these ahrse clowns all about, who do they purport to appeal to, even more importantly why are they still here? …. again …. I don’t get it.
In a just world we simply allow all the Steve Schmidt level NT to keep talking their way into extinction …. but if the Left keeps giving them money ……