{"id":6722,"date":"2010-08-23T19:21:54","date_gmt":"2010-08-23T23:21:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/?p=6722"},"modified":"2010-08-23T19:21:54","modified_gmt":"2010-08-23T23:21:54","slug":"republican-chuck-hagel-backs-democrat-joe-sestak%e2%80%99s-senate-bid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/6722\/republican-chuck-hagel-backs-democrat-joe-sestak%e2%80%99s-senate-bid\/","title":{"rendered":"Republican Chuck Hagel Backs Democrat Joe Sestak\u2019s Senate Bid"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Finally, some above-the-fray bipartisanship!\u00a0 Tomorrow former Senator <a href=\"http:\/\/politicalwire.com\/archives\/2010\/08\/23\/hagel_backs_sestak_in_pennsylvania.html\" target=\"_blank\">Chuck Hagel (R-NE) will support Congressman Joe Sestak\u2019s (D-PA) bid<\/a> to enter the body Hagel once inhabited.\u00a0 On the surface, the endorsement can be rationalized.\u00a0 Both men served in the military (Hagel in the Army, Sestak in the Navy), and neither could be confused with a strong ideological commitment to forceful shows of American power.<\/p>\n<p>However, there\u2019s probably something more to Hagel\u2019s otherwise ineffectual endorsement.\u00a0 (He is virtually unknown to Pennsylvania voters, and his refusal to back Republican Pat Toomey won\u2019t come as a surprise to anyone familiar with Hagel\u2019s moderate record.)\u00a0 With Obama Defense Secretary Robert Gates (another middle-of-the-road-Republican) retiring at the end of next year, look for Hagel to get extra attention to replace him.<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s the take from <a href=\"http:\/\/voices.washingtonpost.com\/thefix\/fix-endorsement-hierarchy\/chuck-hagel-and-the-me-for-me.html \" target=\"_blank\">Chris Cizilla of the <em>Washington Post<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>On the other hand, there could be genuine benefit for Hagel &#8212; albeit symbolic. Hagel is rightly understood as trying out for a Cabinet job and the more he can show a willingness to put party aside to do what he believes is the right thing, the more attractive he will be to President Obama and his inner circle.<\/p>\n<p>It will be interesting to see if &#8212; and where &#8212; Hagel chooses to insert himself between now and Nov. 2 and what benefit, if any, he accrues in the eyes of the White House for those endorsements.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Funny how the \u201cright thing\u201d in this scenario is calculated to boost Hagel\u2019s chances at landing one of the most important jobs in the United States government.\u00a0 Hey, we can\u2019t all be political martyrs \u2013 right, Pat Toomey?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Finally, some above-the-fray bipartisanship!\u00a0 Tomorrow former Senator Chuck Hagel (R-NE) will support Congressman Joe Sestak\u2019s (D-PA) bid to enter the body Hagel once inhabited.\u00a0 On the surface, the endorsement can be rationalized.\u00a0 Both men served in the military (Hagel in the Army, Sestak in the Navy), and neither could be confused with a strong ideological [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1760,1696,1308,31,1085,190],"class_list":["post-6722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-posts","tag-chuck-hagel","tag-department-of-defense","tag-joe-sestak","tag-pat-toomey","tag-pennsylvania","tag-robert-gates"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6722"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6722\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6724,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6722\/revisions\/6724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cfif.org\/v\/freedom_line_blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}