This summer, while 10 Republican candidates duked it out in debates, Fred Thompson sat at home. The media and much of the conservative community waited anxiously for Thompson to enter the race, dubbing him the savior of the Republican Party, and the only candidate who could bring the GOP back to the glory days of Ronald Reagan. Now his candidacy is official, but as it turns out, he is no savior.
Why conservatives looked up to Thompson this way is beyond me. Perhaps it's because he was an actor, just like Reagan, or maybe, as many have said, it was his grandfatherly appeal. There is a problem with grandfathers: Some are
senile, and Thompson is getting close.
Disclaimer: Yes, I work for Students for Obama, but I'm also a democrat, so I wouldn't support Thompson anyway.
Since he entered the race in September, Thompson has failed miserably to whip up the frenzy so many republicans expected of him. On the campaign trail, many find him lethargic and unspectacular. Add to that his penchant for making mistakes when talking to crowds and the media, and you've got yourself a disaster waiting to happen.
Over the course of a few weeks at the end of September and early October, Thompson proved why he should never be president of the United States. First, on Sept. 13, he was asked about the Terri Schiavo case. He responded by saying, That's going back in history. I don't remember the details of it.""
It was two years ago! Now I don't know about you, but I wouldn't call that ancient history. If he can't remember that far back, how can we expect him to conduct diplomacy or work with Congress?
On Sept. 18, when Thompson was in Florida, someone asked if he would support drilling for oil in the Everglades, a very contentious issue in the state and Thompson didn't even know there was oil there. A reporter asked Thompson on Sept. 22 what he thought of the Jena Six case and he replied, ""I don't know anything about it.""
On Sept. 28 he found out for the first time that lethal injection was unconstitutional in Tennessee - his own state! As the Associated Press reported, he campaigned heavily on the death penalty when he ran for the Senate in 1994; you'd think he would know about this.
On Oct. 1 his ineptitude turned to Iraq when he said: ""We can't forget the fact that although at a particular point in time we never found any WMD down there, he clearly had WMD. He clearly had the beginnings of a nuclear program.""
Of course, we now know that there were no WMDs in Iraq, and the thin evidence supporting that claim was largely debunked by the time President Bush announced it in his 2003 State of the Union Address.
Just two days later, Thompson messed up twice, first by incorrectly saying Democrats controlled Congress when Chief Justice John Roberts went through his confirmation hearings in 2005, then by referring to Russia as the Soviet Union, which hasn't existed since 1991.
Also last week, Thompson ended a 24-minute speech in Iowa and the audience did not clap, which forced him to say: ""Can I have a round of applause?""
The combination of mishaps and the lukewarm response he received in Iowa proves that Thompson is definitely not the savior conservatives had hoped for. Even James Dobson agrees, saying in an e-mail that Thompson ""can't speak his way out of a paper bag on the campaign trail,"" according to a New York Times report.
Dobson added: ""And yet he is apparently the Great Hope that burns in the breasts of many conservative Christians? Well, not for me, my brothers. Not for me!""
The days when the GOP coalesces around one candidate early in the primary season are over. It's too late in the game for one shining candidate to emerge from the pack, and Grandpa Fred seems to have failed. Maybe they should call up my grandpa: He's even from Iowa, so he would probably do well in the state. Of course, he's not an actor, and he's not senile, so there goes that suggestion.
Erik Opsal is a senior majoring in political science and journalism. Please send responses to opinion@dailycardinal.com
