'Trees for the forest': Journalist lays out 10 reasons Herschel Walker is 'so appealing' to Republicans

29 November 2022

If incumbent Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock defeats Republican challenger Herschel Walker in a U.S. Senate runoff election in Georgia in December, Democrats will expand their U.S. Senate majority from 50 to 51. Democrats will still have a majority even if Walker wins, but having 51 votes instead of 50 would give Democrats more wiggle room when it comes to nominations from President Joe Biden for federal judges or members of his administration. And Republicans have been campaigning aggressively for Walker in the hope of flipping a Democrat-held seat.

Madison, Wisconsin-based journalist Bill Lueders, in a listicle published by the conservative website The Bulwark on November 29, lays out ten reasons why Republicans “find” Walker “so appealing.” On the surface, it seems that Lueders is listing positive attributes. But Lueders’ piece is humorous, and anyone who picks up on his sarcasm will see that he is actually listing ten reasons why Walker shouldn’t be elected to the U.S. Senate.

The attributes that Lueders lists are: (1) “His reach exceeds his grasp, thus confirming the need for heaven,” (2) “He’s not afraid to be politically incorrect,” (3) “He’s not afraid to be just plain incorrect,” (4) “He knows how to put the best face on a situation,” (5) “He can take a complicated issue and sort it all out,” (6) “He doesn’t miss the trees for the forest,” (7) “He’s dealt with some big personal problems,” (8) “He’s flexible in his thinking,” (9) “He’s all about family,” and (10) “He makes people of color want to be Republicans.”

Much of the anti-Walker commentary published by the Never Trump conservatives at The Bulwark has been blunt and forceful. Lueders, however, gets his points across with subtle sarcasm.

With #5, for example, Lueders hails Walker’s “uncanny grasp of the science of climate change,” then goes on to quote Walker as saying, “Since we don’t control the air, our good air decides to float over to China’s bad air. So, when China gets our good air, their bad air got to move. So, it moves over to our good air space. Then, now, we got to clean that back up.”

Lueders isn’t really praising Walker’s “grasp” of climate change, but rather, is mocking his comments on the subject. Similarly, Lueders mocks Walker’s “flexibility” on the abortion issue with #8.

“Ralph Waldo Emerson once mused that ‘a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,’” Lueders writes. “Walker is nothing if not inconsistent. He has called for a ban on all abortions, with ‘no exceptions.’ Yet he seems to have made exceptions for the two women who have come forward, with substantiating evidence, to say that Walker, after getting them pregnant, pressured them into getting abortions and paid for the procedures. Walker has denied both allegations, adding, ‘And I also want to let you know I didn’t kill JFK, either.’ Such nimbleness would surely serve him well in the U.S. Senate.”

With #9, Lueders’ point is that Walker preaches family values but doesn’t practice what he preaches.

“Walker has identified fatherless Black families as a ‘major, major problem’ and importuned dads to not drop out of their children’s lives, saying: ‘If you have a child with a woman, even if you have to leave that woman …. you don’t leave that child,’” Lueders explains. “Yet he’s left at least three children to grow up, for the most part, without him.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, campaigning for Walker, recently commented that Democrats are “scared to death of Herschel Walker” because if he wins, “every other young child in America of color might want to be a Republican.”

With #10, Lueders sarcastically writes, in response to Graham, “Yes, that must be exactly what they’re thinking. In sum, it’s little wonder that leading Republicans are thrilled by the prospect of having Herschel Walker join the world’s greatest deliberative body, representing the party of Lincoln with the thoughts that he’ll be thinking. The people of Georgia have the chance to make this happen. Will they seize this opportunity, with all of its power and promise, or fumble it away?”

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