That’s right, kids, Alan Keyes has his own personal link to Jesus telling him exactly who he’d vote for. I think that’s neat!
God almighty. I can’t wait for November 2, when I can vote for Obama. Hopefully Keyes’ crushing defeat will convince him to go back to Maryland. We don’t want you here, Alan! We have enough raving loons in Illinois without your crazy ass.
Jesus isn’t a U.S. citizen, so no, He can’t vote in our election. He’s welcome to participate in The Guardian’s Clark County project, though.
And Alan Keyes is nuttier than a Planter’s factory.
Jesus looks after fools, doesn’t he? That’s rather nice of Jesus, I think.
All of you who think the conservative movement is one big monolith should check out the National Review website.
Consensus opinion of the authors there is that Keyes has gone quite nuts.
Both parties have to contend with embarassing elements from time to time. The Democrats have, for instance, Lyndon LaRouche. We have Alan Keyes.
I honestly don’t know who got the worse end of that arrangement.
LaRouche isn’t a Democrat, he’s got his own crazy party. I got attacked (not physically!) by a LaRouchie on the train a while ago. That was fun.
I don’t think ANYONE thinks that conservatives as a whole agree with Alan Keyes. I may not agree with conservative viewpoints, but I don’t think they’re insane.
Not exactly a fair comparison–unless I missed when the Democratic party put LaRouche forward for a national political position recently.
So let’s play: who’s the nuttiest Democrat nominated for a Senate seat in the last decade?
Daniel
I don’t think that conservatives as a whole agree with Keyes, but I don’t think the Republican Party is reflective of conservative ideas any more. I think it’s been stolen by the fundamentalist ultra-right-wing religious viewpoint.
I think that most conservatives are loathe to recognize this, but I look around me and I see the Republican Party more and more pushed in that direction. That includes notions that Constitutional guarantees don’t apply to Muslim terrorists, that “rights” can be discarded in favor of the Greater Good, that opposing gay-marriage is one the key issues of the day, and so forth. And let’s not mention complete disregard for fiscal responsibility (once a rallying point for conservatives against liberals.)
Keyes is premature, in speaking the thoughts that the Republican Party has been steadily moving towards. Conservatives: stop them! Now! Don’t let them steal the Party any further than they have!!
The man calls himself a Democrat, therefore he is one.
Mind, I hardly think he’s representative of Democrats, the same way Keyes is not representative of Republicans.
{raises hand a la Arnold Horshak)Ooh! Ooh! Mr. Kot-TER! Would that be Carol Mosely-Braun?
Am I missing something? I truly thought that the Republican party had asked Keyes to be the Republican candidate once the last guy melted down. Now, if Keyes went uninvited, then I can agree with you. But if the Republicans sent him out there to highlight their differences, then Keyes does represent the Republican viewpoint. To my knowledge the Democrats have never asked LaRouche to participate in an important race, or any political contest for that matter.
Perhaps. But let’s be fair here. Keyes didn’t break out his most outrageous stuff until he was running in this race.
Had the party known he was going to say these things, do you think he would have been nominated by anybody?
A better example of a nutty Democrat might be Al Sharpton. I kind of like the guy, though.
I honestly did not know that. Yikes.
I don’t really consider myself a Democrat. We don’t register with parties in Illinois, but the last time I was registered, in California, it was as a Green - although I certainly don’t toe the line with them either.
The final choice came down to him or someone actually from Illinois, who a few years back was formally disciplined at her (government?) job for making sexually inappropriate and demeaning comments to a subordinate at an office party. Everyone else who was asked said “thanks but no thanks.” That’s not so much asking as scraping the bottom of the barrel for someone they can throw to the wolves with a clear conscience.
Hell, the head of the IL GOP (and the state treasurer), Judy Baar Topinka, would not comment on whether she was voting for him, and Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert said this week that the Republicans would be losing this particular Senate seat.
Interestingly, this race is to replace a Republican, Peter Fitzgerald, who was sick of feeling sold out by his party and being treated poorly because he voted in ways that didn’t necessarily correspond with what they wanted. Looks like they risked the same problem with this candidate too, assuming they don’t actually agree with him.
Ah, but the question was “who is the nuttiest Democrat nominated to a Senate seat in the last decade,” and Sharpton does not qualify, nutty as he may be (which is exceedingly nutty, indeed).
I think when it’s clear you’re going to lose and the choice is to run an outsider or a loser then the wise choice is to let the opposition run opposed and use your resources elsewhere. Not all races are (or need to be) contested.
Alan Keyes was hand-picked by the Illinois State Republican Central Committee to be the Republican candidate for the Senate.
The Committee knew exactly what they were getting when they put an out-of-state, right-wing nutjob on the ballot. The ‘moderate’ Illinois Republican leaders especially wanted to give the ‘conservative’ Illinois Republicans enough rope to hang themselves.
I started a thread a while back to watch how this race was going. I’m pleased to see that I apparently called it correctly (not that it was very difficult.)
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=271108&highlight=Obama
Ah, but they thought Keyes could make enough bluster to make the DNC spend some of its war chest in Illinois.
They knew they were going to lose the seat, so they put a troublemaker there to make the Democrats work for it.
Keyes does not represent mainstream conservatives’ views, though, and it’s unfair to pretend he does.
Actually, I don’t think W. represents mainstream conservatives’ views either.
Whatever. The pubbies make fun of the dems for having rockstars, divas and movie stars trying to influence peoples’ opinions. The pubbies actually run actors, talk show hosts and (if they could’ve) NFL coaches.
Okay, we have a contender! Now, put forward her nuttiest of nutty statements, so that we can compare them to Keyes.
Daniel