fbpx
Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

Country First, At Least Until the General Election

Erick Erickson objects strongly to Jon Huntsman’s preparations for his 2012 presidential campaign while he was still serving as ambassador in Beijing, saying that he will “never, ever support him” because of the disloyalty he has shown to the President and, as Erickson would have it, to the country as well. That puts things very […]

Erick Erickson objects strongly to Jon Huntsman’s preparations for his 2012 presidential campaign while he was still serving as ambassador in Beijing, saying that he will “never, ever support him” because of the disloyalty he has shown to the President and, as Erickson would have it, to the country as well. That puts things very bluntly, and I doubt that very many people objected to then-Ambassador Lodge’s 1964 presidential run in these terms, but Erickson has a fair point about Huntsman’s loyalty.

Administration officials have reportedly expressed feelings of betrayal, and Erickson insists that it is simply wrong for an ambassador appointed by a President to plan for a presidential run against him while serving abroad. It is, in his words, “unseemly and disgusting.” There is something to this, especially when Huntsman has been presenting himself as someone who puts service to the country ahead of political ambition. In fact, one could fairly say that he very consciously exploited the opportunity to serve in Beijing to advance his political ambition. By the standards of Washington politics, that might not be so remarkable, but for someone who claims to be representing something different from conventional politics and seems to be casting himself as a post-partisan public servant it is a very damaging charge.

Erickson raises some good questions that journalists should ask Huntsman during the nominating process. He asks, “[D]id you fully carry out your duties as Ambassador or let a few things slip along the way hoping to damage the President?” These questions can probably be answered pretty easily, as Huntsman has generally received rave reviews for his performance in Beijing from within and outside the State Department, but they are perfectly fair questions to ask.

Evidently, however, there are limits to Erickson’s patriotic outrage. By “never, ever,” Erickson means that he won’t support him unless he becomes the Republican nominee. “If he is the Republican nominee, I will vote for him,” Erickson writes. Since Huntsman is not at all likely to be the nominee, that is something that Erickson won’t have to worry about later on, but what sense does it make to damn Huntsman for his disloyalty during the nominating process and then say that he’ll support Huntsman in the general election against the President to whom he showed such disloyalty? Wouldn’t that be a case of directly rewarding Huntsman’s disloyalty to Obama by supporting his effort to unseat Obama?

Advertisement

Comments

The American Conservative Memberships
Become a Member today for a growing stake in the conservative movement.
Join here!
Join here