Paul Ryan, the last Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, gave a talk at the Reagan Library in violation of Ronald W. Reagan's Eleventh Commandment:  "Thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Republican."  Indeed, it was, as they say in basketball, a flagrant foul that Ryan committed.

At the beginning of his talk, Ryan said the following:

Even for our good showing in the House 2020 left Republicans powerless in Washington. Even worse, it was horrifying to… to see a presidency come to such a dishonorable and disgraceful end....

He went on to say that the conservative cause will be stymied if it "depends on the populist appeal of one personality or of second-rate imitations."  Apparently to make sure that his audience will not mistake the target of his sarcasm, Ryan then remarked that voters "will not be impressed by the sight of yes-men and flatterers flocking to Mar-a-Lago."

Thus, like any member in good standing of NeverTrump, Inc. Ryan excoriated a fellow Republican, but not a single Democrat.  And so, Paul Ryan thumbed his nose at the teaching of the man in whose library he stood, speaking very ill indeed of our last Republican president, while giving a pass to leftist demagoguery, mendacious propaganda, unfair and dishonest election strategems.  Sure, he said that leftists seek vast powers of government to remake society, but that is mere pabulum.  Ignored by Ryan were the totalitarian methods they employ to gain power, including, above all, demonizing Republicans, character assassination.

Did Ryan inform his audience that the totalitarian-minded Democrats take their guidance from Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals, which, I well recall, tells leftists to isolate their target and then demonize him.  Ryan did not even say that the Democrats are totalitarian-minded.  All he could muster was to say that Biden was more left than any previous Democrat president Ryan knew.

And, still, Ryan had the chutzpah to call Biden "a nice guy."  There is Paul Ryan in a nutshell, excoriating a fellow Republican and complimenting Biden.

In his May 27 remarks, Ryan quoted a comment President Reagan said about himself:  "I wasn't a great communicator, but I communicated great things and they came from the heart of a great nation...."   Had Ryan not transgressed the Eleventh Commandment, he would have said, and those words could apply even more strongly to Donald J. Trump who certainly did "communicate… great things" coming from the heart of a great people neglected by leftists. 

Ryan asserted that the great economic recovery -- not crediting President Trump -- came to an end with the "pandemic."   Ryan, like a loyal NeverTrump trooper, did not explain how Democrats and their media lackeys propagandized Covid-19 to defeat President Trump, who led a miraculous campaign to deal successfully with the Wuhan virus (unlike the charlatan Andrew Cuomo who, for a time, the media made into a  faux hero).

Ryan did not go so far as to disdain populism to elevate the need for conservative principles of governance.  He did point to the marriage of "the populism of President Trump...tethered to conservative principles" as leading to "powerful and inclusive economic growth."  Further, Ryan recognized that "Republican populism is just the natural response to progressive elitism...."

More importantly, he stated: "Take the populist energy of the recent years, combine it with the core principles of conservativism, and the result will be a coalition even broader and stronger than yesterday's Republican Party."

If Ryan is sincere, he seems to be advocating Trumpism, without Trump.  But in disparaging the man, if not his program, Ryan shows that he himself is prey to the vicious anti-Trump propaganda spewed by Trump-haters from the time he rode down the Trump Tower escalator to announce his presidential candidacy, June 2015.  The best inoculation to avoiding "Cheneyitis" is to honor President Reagan's Eleventh Commandment.

Ryan, of course, was a very reluctant Trump backer.  And with hindsight, one can appreciate Ryan's cool feelings toward Donald Trump from his time as House Speaker.   After all, the momentum for a special prosecutor was propelled while Ryan was in the Speaker's chair.  What did Ryan do as the most powerful figure in the House to put a stop to the innuendo that President Trump was a tool of the Russians?  Why didn't Ryan act to defend his Republican president?  Or did he think that the slurs against Mr. Trump were credible?  Paul Ryan should have tried to put a stop to Russia-gate.

What did Paul Ryan, as House Speaker, do to press Congress to look into the performance of the FBI under James Comey?

Or did Ryan, given his NeverTrump leanings, take Comey's anti-Trump insinuations as gospel?  

Paul Ryan has a lot to answer for, dereliction of duty-wise, with respect to his service as House Speaker with Donald J. Trump in the Oval Office.   Mr. Trump famously felt that he had been abandoned by Attorney General Jeff Sessions.  More significant was Paul Ryan's failure to have President Trump's back against the dishonest and unfair campaign by the Obama/Clinton-led "Resistance" to undermine his presidency.

Ryan announced his retirement in 2018.  At first, this writer thought of citing Theodore Roosevelt's 1910 address at the Sorbonne, familiarly known as "The Man in the Arena" speech, to criticize Ryan for leaving the arena, giving up the fighting against creeping leftism.  On second thought, it is best that someone ready to stab a fellow Republican in the back quits the arena, and so will not be in a position to cause further harm to Republicans. 

Mr. Ryan is terribly misguided if he thinks his remarks in the Ragan Library, May 27, 2021, will get him invited back into the arena, possibly as the Republican nominee for the presidency in 2024.   Those remarks are more likely to have him follow Rep. Liz Cheney into the political wilderness so richly deserved for traducing the spirit of a great Republican: Ronald W. Reagan -- and rushing to denigrate another great Republican:  Donald J. Trump.

Photo credit: YouTube screengrab

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