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Prediction Most Likely To Be Proven False

An experienced politician operating at this level is simply not allowed to make gaffes like this. Yes, some of the commentary might be unfair; yes, the media coverage might be over-blown, etc., etc. But this is a blatant unforced error, and to make a mistake with the slightest tinge of race about it is doubly […]

An experienced politician operating at this level is simply not allowed to make gaffes like this. Yes, some of the commentary might be unfair; yes, the media coverage might be over-blown, etc., etc. But this is a blatant unforced error, and to make a mistake with the slightest tinge of race about it is doubly damaging for Allen.  This will be in the backs of the minds of Republican primary voters for a long time to come. ~Rich Lowry

It’s easy to pick on predictions, but this one seems to be begging for a little ridicule.  Except for the 1-2% of the country that actively worries about presidential primaries two years before they happen, not only will no one will remember Allen’s odd, apparently ill-chosen “macaca/macaque” reference during this campaign come ’08, but I doubt strongly that Virginia Senate voters will remember it in three months’ time.  The Plank is getting excited at the thought of Allen jeopardising his re-election with this.  Give me a break.  I like Jim Webb and I think he’s excellent on the war, but right now it’s going to take a lot more than an obscure French racial slur to bring George Allen’s campaign down.  Who now remembers the Confederate battle flag hooplah that was supposed to doom Allen’s political future?  If anything, that might have helped keep parts of the Southside of Virginia in his corner. 

The most offensive thing about the speech to my ears was not his use of the slur, but the implication that he, preppie Californian transplant and Beltway insider George Allen, was some sort of down-home boy who was in touch with the real people, while the veteran Jim Webb, proud son of Scots-Irish stock, is supposed to be a wine-and-cheeser off partying with Hollywood types.  I would really like to see Webb win this one, but I have no illusions: his fundraising is simply dreadful, and he needs a lot more exposure if he is going to knock off someone like Allen. 

This is one of those episodes that the other side’s partisans will remember for eternity; they will make references to it at social mixers in 2014 during (I hope not) President Allen’s second term (thick in the middle of the war to save Guyana from IslamoMaoism) to show that they always knew that George Allen was a bad guy, because he once said something about some Indian kid during the ’06 campaign that…well, what exactly did he say?  Well, almost no one is exactly sure, but it was racist.  (In fact, there does seem to be something to the claim that he was using a derogatory term for North Africans, but again all of 1-5% of people in the country would know this.)  If Allen does lose the Senate race this year, it will be because of the anti-incumbency surge nationwide and opposition to the war.  If he doesn’t lose, hardly anyone will bother to bring this up in two years’ time.  When they do, it will not faze GOP primary voters, most of whom won’t even know what the commotion is about.

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