You have to hand it to Paul Stam, the fellow is blunt. And for once, he’s even right. In endorsing Tillis, he said “those who attack him for lack of conservative credentials are disconnected from reality.” Indeed they are.
Stam should know. This man has long been known as “the prince of pelvic politics.” Once he even said gay parents are more harmful to children than second-hand smoke. So when he credits Tillis as the “chief architect” of the Great Counterrevolution, he knows of which he speaks.
The list has been repeated so many times, we’ve almost gone numb to it. Perhaps superlatives can re-sensitize. Since 2011, the House has passed the nation’s MOST INTRUSIVE ultrasound law; the MOST STRINGENT anti-gay marriage amendment in America; the LARGEST higher education cuts in state history; the HARSHEST Unemployment cuts of any state; the MOST SWEEPING voter-suppression law in decades, and so on and so forth. Tillis had the power to block any of these measures, but he didn’t. If that’s not a conservative credential, I’m not sure what “conservative” means.
Why, then, does the Speaker’s “moderate” reputation persist? Partly it’s aesthetics. Like Pat McCrory, Tillis quite literally plays a moderate on TV. The sheer extent of GOP extremism also plays a role. As Jonathan Chait quipped, “the main divide in the Republican party is between those who merely have a paranoid worldview and those who are literally, clinically paranoid.” When you’re running against a water-fluoridation alarmist like Brannon, it’s impossible not to look moderate.
But make no mistake, Democrats, Tillis is anything but. By conflating sanity with centrism, we play right into his hands. 2014 is the one time in history to listen to Paul Stam.
Alexander Jones is an original contributor to PoliticsNC.
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