Letters | 23 April 2011

Rubio for President?


Sir: Richard Littlejohn’s idea of a President Rubio (‘Who will fight Obama?’, 16 April) is little more than wishful thinking. The Florida senator is at most a lukewarm conservative, which will become increasingly obvious over his six-year term. (Obama is only the second man in 50 years to go directly from Senate to White House — it’s a difficult path because legislative service forces a politician to commit his views to the record.) Littlejohn is impressed that Rubio could draw a crowd of 5,000 in his home state, yet there are a half-dozen other Republicans with at least as much pull — including figures such as Palin, Bachmann and Trump, whom Littlejohn rightly discounts.

Daniel McCarthy
Editor, The American Conservative


Washington, DC


Sarko could survive


Sir: John Laughland thinks that Nicolas Sarkozy’s presidency is finished and the French centre-right cannot hold (‘A right mess’, 16 April). But his judgment might be premature. In 2001, after all, it was commonplace to say that Jacques Chirac had no chance of re-election.