DARK-HORSE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE
Watch for a dark-horse candidate in the 2008 presidential race on the Republican side, a man most people have not heard of who was a commanding general of the Army for many years in highly important positions throughout the world as a top adviser to the South Koreans and South Vietnamese as infantry commander and helicopter pilot under General Dwight David Eisenhower and his successors, and as senior Pentagon spokesman for Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger during the Reagan administration.
He is General Jerry Ralph Curry of Virginia.
Nationally syndicated columnist Linda Chavez, who was President Reagan’s staff director for the U.S. Civil Rights Commission –- the first Hispanic woman to hold such a high government position –- wrote in a Washington Times column on August 21, 2007, “There is no clearly annointed candidate in the field. The one who looked like he might best fill the role, Sen. John McCain, has been too much of a party dissident on bedrock Republican issues like tax cuts to easily become the party favorite. Though he still might pull off a victory in the early primaries, it's far from certain at this point.”
“And the other major candidates are even less in the mold of a natural successor. Former Sen. Fred Thompson has little claim to the mantle. An eight-year senator and former Republican congressional staffer, he did little in office, and even less since leaving Washington, to earn the right to be the party's standard-bearer. But he's also a movie star with folksy appeal, whose on-camera persona exudes conservatism.
“Mitt Romney, winner of the first Republican straw poll in Iowa this week, captured the governorship of Massachusetts, the most liberal state in the union, largely by running away from traditional Republican issues. His recent conversion to social conservative may be genuine, but many Republicans would like to see Mr. Romney's conservative credentials seasoned a bit more. Still, he's articulate and good-looking, with plenty of money — his own and what he's been able to raise — to run a tough race.
“Then there's Rudy Giuliani, in some ways the most enigmatic of the major Republican candidates. On the one hand, he has been fighting for some traditional Republican values for a long time. As a U.S. attorney appointed by President Ronald Reagan, he established his tough law-and-order image early in his career by taking on organized crime and political corruption, and then burnished his crime-fighting aura as mayor of New York, driving down the crime rate in the city by an astonishing 56 percent and homicides by 66 percent.
“But he also snubbed fellow Republicans. In 1994, Mr. Giuliani endorsed Democrat Mario Cuomo for re-election as New York governor over Republican State Sen. George Pataki, who won the close election.
“Mr. Giuliani also spans the ideological spectrum on other issues. He is a hawk on defense and foreign policy; moreover, one with chutzpah. He once had Palestine Liberation Organization Chairman Yasser Arafat ejected from a Lincoln Center gathering to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the United Nations, which earned him a reprimand from the Clinton administration but plaudits from Republicans who considered Arafat a terrorist and corrupt thug. But on social issues, Mr. Giuliani is clearly the most liberal of the Republican pack.
“The lack of a natural successor among the candidates will challenge Republican primary voters' traditional fallback position when they go to the polls next year. They won't necessarily pick the candidate they are most familiar with or the one who seems to have paid the most dues. Republicans may be forced to choose the candidate they think would be most likely to win against the Democrat nominee, which looks increasingly likely to be Hillary Clinton.”
Linda Chavez’s column can be found at
http://www.washingtontimes.com/article/20070821/COMMENTARY/108210005/1012/commentary
General Curry, the dark-horse candidate, has not yet announced as a Republican presidential hopeful, but I believe he will. He is a retired U.S.Army major general of Native American and African-American ancestry who rose from private to major general and is a proven leader in charge –- just what American voters may be looking for as an alternative in a murky field of political wannabees and career politicians who are weak and cannot get their act together.
Curry is a man of faith, an unabashed conservative, who openly states his Reaganite positions with eloquence and force. He has a proven track record of military leadership over the past half-century that matches the career of General Dwight David Eisenhower, who came out of the blue in 1952 to defeat Harry S. Truman for the presidency.
Watch and see. Curry has been encouraged by many on the Republican side to enter the presidential race, and I believe he will. He has commanded military bases throughout the world and is a proven leader. Both he and his wife, Charlene, have written eloquent books that spell out their claim to the mantles of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan.
Jerry Ralph Curry is the dark-horse Republican presidential candidate to watch as the 2008 race emerges, and I predict he will be the one candidate who could most effectively take on Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
