Earlier this week, I was having a conversation with a former classmate who is very politically active and connected within the Republican party. Take it with a grain of salt, but until recent revelations that she wasted her own puppy dog in a rock quarry, it was widely understood in Trumpian circles that South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem's name was at the very top of the former president's vice presidential shortlist.
I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I would have never thought Trump would pick Mike Pence in 2016, so it stands to reason that he would be looking to pick someone I wouldn't have thought was the best idea this time around too.
Personally, if I put on my political scientist hat, shed my own preferences and convictions, and spoke strictly as a strategy adviser to the soon-to-be nominee, I'd tell him:
- Want to win? Tulsi Gabbard
- Want integrity and loyalty? Tim Scott
- Want competence? Tom Cotton
- Want to be upstaged? Vivek Ramaswamy
- Want chaos and outrage? Tucker Carlson
But Kristi Noem? I never understood precisely what she brought to the table. Until now, of course. Now she brings baggage. A lot of it. In the shape of a puppy carcass.
That's why my former classmate confirmed what most casual observers have assumed - there's been a sudden and deliberate ground shift against Noem in Trumpland. In fact, for all intents and purposes, she's done - off Trump's list entirely. And with her term-limited in South Dakota, her political career might be cooked as well.
It really is an astounding fall from prominence for Noem, who had so meticulously created a no-drama persona of competence over the years. But there's something else that's worth noting about all this.
In the course of our conversation, my classmate revealed that yes, Noem had been one of the frontrunners for VP prior to the dog issue, BUT, among Trump's inner circle, she had one major flaw working against her even then:
She supported her state's 9-week abortion ban.
Former President Trump reportedly finds that effort to save innocent life "excessive."
If you're looking for another commentary on where we are as a people, there it is. The one thing that was apparently holding Noem back from getting Trump's nod was that she was in favor of saving the lives of unborn children at the earliest stages of their human development. Now, combine that reality with what apparently cost her the nomination - that she killed a puppy - and follow the equation through to its depressing conclusion:
Our society, including those controlling both major political parties, are more disgusted by dead puppies than dead babies.
I remember watching the 2008 Republican presidential primary debates. Former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum was put on the spot about his opposition to exceptions in abortion law. He was called radical and unelectable because he did not believe in permitting innocent children who were conceived in rape to be legally dismembered in the womb.
Santorum‘s response was something I will never forget. It struck me then as one of the bravest and most alarmingly astute observations regarding our society that I have heard from the lips of a major party candidate. He pointed out that the Supreme Court has ruled against the death penalty for rapists, but it's open season on the innocent children conceived in rape.
It doesn't take a genius to figure out the moral incongruity there. We value the life of the man who rapes a woman more than the life of the innocent third-party - the baby that we permit to be subject to execution. "That is a country that has its morals backwards," Santorum indicted to audience applause.
I don't know where Rick is these days, but things certainly haven't improved since then.
To be clear, I am not about to justify, defend, or rationalize Noem pulling a premeditated Old Yeller on her pup.
