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Falling for FredWhat his swooners overlook.

By John Dickerson
Posted Friday, April 20, 2007, at 6:53 PM ET
Fred Thompson. Click image to expand.

It's understandable that Fred Thompson fever is increasing around the time of the White House Correspondents' Dinner. In spring, Washington's political class falls in love with B-list celebrities. But the Thompson love fest is no mere fling. It will endure as long as only 65 percent of Republicans say they are happy with the current field of presidential candidates and as long as the actor and semiretired politician continues to flirt. Last Wednesday, Thompson met with 50 or so House Republicans and left most of them with the impression that he was running for president.

After the meeting, his audience was ready to gobble him up. "He has charisma dripping off him," says Tennessee Congressman Zach Wamp, who is leading the draft-Thompson movement. "I don't want you to take this the wrong way, but when you play a president in a movie and you fit the part, people believe you can carry it out in real life. That's one thing that Fred believes that no one in either party can bring."

I have been fascinated and a little puzzled by the mooning over a Thompson candidacy. The swooners are legion, and their love blinds them to problems that would count as black marks against any of the other Republicans currently running. Here are a few blemishes that Republicans overlook in their infatuation with this smoldering president-type:

His past McCain habit: Before the Thompson boomlet, the fastest way to excite a room full of conservatives was to mention John McCain's name. They just don't like him. They may have qualms about Romney and Giuliani, but they regard McCain as a political traitor. Thompson co-chaired McCain's 2000 presidential campaign and was his ally when the two served in the Senate.

He supported campaign-finance reform: When conservatives list their grievances against John McCain, the first is usually the McCain-Feingold legislation that restricted unlimited donations to political parties. They see it as an unconscionable attack on free speech. Thompson co-sponsored that legislation!

He was soft on Clinton: News flash: A lot of movement conservatives really, really dislike Bill Clinton. During Clinton's impeachment trial, Thompson was one of only five Republicans who voted not to convict him for perjury. It wasn't the sex; it was the "rule of law" at stake. No other Republican would live that vote down so easily. Just a few weeks ago, fellow conservative Newt Gingrich explained that the Clinton perjury charge was so deadly serious that it inspired him to ignore the hypocrisy of his own ongoing extramarital relationship at the time.

He's a consistent federalist: Believing in states' rights is a central tenet of conservative thinking, but so is opposition to homosexuality and support for sweeping tort reform. Thompson opposes gay marriage but believes states should be allowed to sanction civil unions, as the governor of the early-primary state New Hampshire has just said he'll do. While in the Senate, Thompson, a former trial lawyer, also resisted one of the tenets of the Contract With America that called for limitations on malpractice awards—an issue he thinks should be left to the states.

He's a former trial lawyer: See above. If you're John Edwards, this is pronounced with the same intonation as "convicted child molester" or "treatment-resistant fungus." If you're a jowly character actor from Law & Order, no problemo.

Don't get me wrong—Thompson is a conservative. He supports gun rights and lower taxes, opposes abortion, and doesn't like Iran one bit. But he's not the conservative gold standard that some of his supporters claim. Won't that set them up for disappointment as the campaign wears on and he starts to look like all the other guys? "Please don't compare him to Ronald Reagan," says Wamp, repeating for me the pitch he gives fellow conservatives in the hopes of trying to manage their expectations. "Compare him to the other candidates. He's not a hardcore conservative, but when you grew up in Lawrenceburg, Tenn. and you grew up in his skin, you are a conservative at your core." In the end, it is a message appropriate to a thespian candidate: Please suspend your disbelief.

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John Dickerson is Slate's chief political correspondent and author of On Her Trail. He can be reached at .
Photograph of Fred Thompson by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.
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Remarks from the Fray:

True we like him because he's conservative, and really there isn't much to get excited about in the current field. But, he also can win. The formula of a down to earth southerner has done pretty well in the last 4 presidential elections. Americans in the center just seem to like it, identify with it and feel comfortable.

Also, and maybe more important, Thompson was in the senate long enough to establish his conservative bona-fides, but not too long to become a cliche, a national polarizing personality (like a McCain, Kerry or Biden). People really know him more as the laid back, bromide spinning DA on Law and Order, with the bonus of "experience" in government. You start with that, and add a basically clean slate record on a conservative candidate, and naturally people will start to project all of their wishes and hopes on him as the perfect candidate.

I really don't think it's a stretch to say he's the Republican Obama. Barack also is a pleasant, intelligent, attractive guy in a field of polarizing Dems with a lot of baggage. So it's easy to say "we love him" and project a lot of hopes that he'll be the next JFK or Bill Clinton of the party, without yet having proven himself. If you haven't been around long enough, and haven't yet gotten the polarizing reputation, it's easy to be loved.

--poncethelion

(To reply, click here.)

Republicans like Fred for the following reasons:

1. He communicates well and as we've seen with GWB communications failure has big pricetags associated with it. Fred is like Reagan, big, open, accessible, and media-friendly with fast quips but a "non-mean" manner and high likeability scores.

2. He's good on issues that Republican Primary voters really care about: gun rights, less immigration, war on terror, fiscal discipline, and fighting back politically against Democrats. Bush just lays there and takes it for months on end.

3. Fred matches up well with either Obama or Hillary, in that Rep primary voters pencil in his performances on TV against what they see as an empty suit or the "Glacier" i.e. Hillary's lack of warmth.

4. Thompson has the voice, presence, drawl, and experience on TV to present himself as the superior personal choice—absent political identification—over either Obama or Hillary.

5. He is to the right of both McCain and Rudy on guns and abortion, while still being eminently electable.

6. The Media doesn't like Fred and for Republicans, who rightly view the Media as profoundly Democratic and hostile to their party, this is a plus.

No one cares about his divorce, Reagan was divorced. McCain's heroic military service is cancelled out by his courting the Media which Republican Primary voters despise. Both Rudy and McCain are open borders proponents and Fred has at least echoed Conservative Republican calls for border enforcement and told Mexico's President to shut up about US borders and get his own house in order.

--fwallace

(To reply, click here.)

Republicans are destined to be disappointed at some level with their candidate as long as their party contains the dissonant voices of old-line states' rights conservatism and theoconservative social interventionism. Those two groups are always going to be in direct opposition on certain issues, and the more salient those issues become, the more that difference will be evident. It's part of the reason I can't quite understand why Republicans decided to make such an issue of gay marriage - they've pulled the pin on the grenade, but I'm not sure they can throw it far enough so that they are not in the blast zone.

--Sawbones

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(4/23)

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