Two articles making the case for Hagel

There are two articles out today making the case that Chuck Hagel is the right choice for the Republicans. They both note (as I have heard many times) that Republicans are not excited about the 2008 field.

The first is "Long-Shot Hagel May Be Republican's Best Bet" by Margaret Carlson. Here are some excerpts.

With no Secretariat in the stable, there's room for a dark horse. Galloping in is Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel.
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If party activists could see past his sharp criticism of Bush's foreign policy, they would like his life story. Hagel's father died when he was a teenager, and young Chuck helped look after the other children and worked as a carhop at a hamburger joint. He and his younger brother joined the infantry and nearly died in Vietnam. He worked several jobs before starting a hugely successful cell-phone company. It made him a millionaire.
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Although he's often referred to as McCain without the attitude, Hagel is hardly an economic populist. He is an ardent tax cutter and fiscal conservative who votes with Bush, as he reminds me, more than 90 percent of the time.

He's not an evangelical (he's Episcopalian), but they could hardly fault his voting record, which garners a pro-family score of 100 from the Christian Coalition.
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He's not the only Republican to turn against Bush on the war, just the one who most annoys the White House.
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It's hard to make smears like ``you're emboldening the enemy'' and ``sending the wrong message to the troops'' stick to Hagel, who still carries shrapnel and burn scars from pulling his brother to safety in Vietnam.

The second piece is "Hagel's the only real right stuff" by Brett Arends.

Conservatives should stop complaining about their choices for president. They already have a serious candidate who is to the right of Ronald Reagan - and who could actually win a general election.
Despite his current liberal vogue over the Iraq war, Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) has a 100 percent lifetime rating from the Christian Coalition. One hundred percent. He has a 0 percent rating from pro-choice pressure groups. He has a right-wing record right down the line, from gun rights to gay marriage to ANWAR petroleum drilling to tax cuts. He even opposed the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law, which President Bush signed.

He’s also an expert on foreign relations and intelligence. Oh yes, and he’s a decorated veteran who served his country in Vietnam.
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The irony is that Hagel is the sort of conservative candidate who could win over a lot of independents in a general election, even if they may not agree with him on some issues.

Why?
The man has moxie - enough to stand up to the Bush administration in 2005, when even many Democrats were still hiding in their bunker. He has been proven correct on the handling of postwar Iraq. He has the foreign policy experience, through his work on non-governmental organizations and on the Senate Foreign Relations and Intelligence committees. And finally, Hagel’s conservative principles even extend to a burning issue for independents: the Constitution.
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Grassroots conservatives have to ask themselves a simple question: Are they really conservatives or just loyalists to the party leadership?