Tom DeLay bites back
A thoughtful man at the eye of the storm
Plain speaking from the former US Republican majority leader
And who’s next? DeLay is under no illusions about the importance of Iraq. ‘It is a battle in Iraq, a battle that is part of the War on Terror.’ Yet despite the success of the surge, DeLay knows that Iraq is popularly seen as a disaster. Is there any hope then that the American and other publics could ever be galvanised to support an attack on, say, Iran’s nuclear facilities? On this DeLay is more positive.
‘Ahbinajerk [Ahmadinejad] is making a case for it all the time. I mean you can put him on television and he is very good at helping us make our case. Saddam Hussein kind of went underground and it was his actions that you’d point to. But you put Ahbinajerk up on the television and get his clips out. That helps our case.’
The fight suddenly seems to be back in Tom DeLay. The eyes light up and the hand gestures and air-quotes lose their flippancy and become authoritative.
For a man who confesses in his autobiography, ‘I do not have many gifts,’ one of the gifts DeLay does possess is plain speaking. Although his talk-radio buddies would prefer him to pitch it higher, the truth is that DeLay’s voice is most effective when he says things plainly, as he sees them. This is clearest when he suddenly mentions, without demonising, the simple attraction of the Left’s siren-calls.
‘It is easy to gravitate towards what the Left is putting out. That is how we would all prefer it to be because the reality is just too horrible. The fact that for generations we are going to be fighting this war and losing the best of a generation, all these young people dying, maimed and there is not an end in sight and there won’t be an end in sight for a long, long time.’
The enemy may not change. But Washington, he knows, will have to. ‘The media right now is on this kick for the last few days — the media in the United States — that the people want change. Of course they don’t articulate what kind of change or change to what. They just want change.’ ‘As I travel around, the conservatives I meet — the Republicans — want leadership.’
Douglas Murray is the director of the Centre for Social Cohesion.
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Hal from NY
November 10th, 2007 3:11amTom Delay's nickname in Washington was "the Hammer." He saw the GOP as the true American party and his opponents and unpatriotic and disloyal. His medium-sized intellect seems to have no room for the idea of a loyal opposition, or of disagreement in good faith. And he was corrupt in office. He was a blight on the U.S. Congress, and not even particularly liked by his fellow conservatives. He is not missed in the slightest, as far as I can tell.