Ace from Ace of Spades HQ's take on "Glenn Beck: I'm Done With the GOP"

Ace of Spades HQ ^ | March 18, 2015 | Ace

[Yashcheritsiy]

Allah keeps chortling, saying, "No you guys will be back," but I don't think he understands.

Something has changed.

No, we won't be back. Not in the way he means it. If AllahPundit means that I, for example, will still prefer a more conservative president over a less conservative one, sure, of course, but then, Communists preferred the more liberal Bill Clinton over the less liberal George Bush, without actually supporting the Democratic Party with anything stronger than a velleity.

In 2014, the Establishment went all out to defeat its foes not just on the electoral battlefield, but in the battlefield of the mind as well. They wanted to teach the upstarts a lesson: You have not only lost, but you will always lose; you will not be permitted to win, ever. The entire Party will rise up to crush you should you signal any intention of bucking our Rule.

I warned them about something then: A hopeless soldier is a soldier who will desert the field.

Yes, Establishment GOP, you can teach us that you will always lie to us, stab us in the back, humiliate us and crush us; but if you teach us that, be aware we are learning another lesson, too. Not just that "The Establishment Will Always Crush You," but the lesson that There is no hope in any kind of conventional politics for those of us who want better than this Pile of Shit the two parties give us.

You can deal someone a defeat, but you contend with hurricanes when you seek to kill all of their hopes as well.

I am now well and truly convinced of the Object Lesson our Establishment Masters sought to teach us last fall and this past winter:

They will lie to us, always, so that we cannot even have an argument about policy differences with them. We cannot explain to them why amnesty is a bad deal because they lie and claim that they are already against amnesty.

They will not even respect us enough to have the argument with us.

They will betray us constantly, because they think they can.

They think that our desire for a better America will draw us to vote for the Least Worst candidates.

But many of us now feel like the Communists, or the hardcore paleocons: There really is not a large enough difference between the two parties any more to bother oneself in terms of emotional and financial investment any longer.

Either way, we will have some form of repressive, unresponsive socialism in this country; what should we care whether the National Welfare Depot is painted in Red or Blue?

I'm not coming back. I'm done. For the past ten years of my life, I've made arguments, some of which I knew to be false, to defend and apologize for the GOP; I see now that I was a fool to do so.

I actually do not care very much if Hillary Clinton is president. What would really be different? Oh, of course she will be cruel to her political opponents, siccing the machinery of the government on them; but I no longer intend to be her political opponent, not in any more than a chiding way, so what do I care about that?

Besides, her Enemies List is long and luscious; I'm sure I'm way down on it.

Now actual Republicans may have cause to worry but that's their own business.

This party has betrayed me for the last time.

You won your battle, GOP establishment. You taught us all that us Lowly Voters were not going to tell you People of Rank how things were to be run.

Well, I believe you. You will never permit we Lowly Voters a say in how we manage our lives and our country. You have to Deliver your Deliverables to your Donor Class.

Well, I hope they have enough money to buy people's votes, because a lot of us are done with politics, except in an abstract, philosophical way.

I'm now a spectator. I will root for this team or that, as I might root for European soccer teams: that is, out of boredom, not conviction.

You killed all hope that I had. You killed the hope in many of us.

Good luck with your convention and all. I'm sure there'll be a lot of people who are Totally Psyched about the balloons and confetti.

Some of us need more, or need less, and I as I can't have more, I'm choosing less.

Here's Some Truth: We all know this, but being Part of the Team, I felt obligated to lie, because I figured you expected me to lie, even though you didn't believe it.

So yeah: The GOP is never repealing Obamacare or even trying hard to do so. They will make false efforts at doing so which they can present to voters as a Good College Try, but aw shucks, we couldn't quite do it.

It's a relief to no longer have to propagate this obvious, feeble lie.

I know very few of you believe the GOP has much intention of repealing Obamacare, but, being a Republican, I have previously felt the need to present The Official Party Position even knowing it was total bullshit.

I've known it was a lie for a year, which is why I hate when it comes up on, say, the Podcast. What am I supposed to say? Am I supposed to pretend the GOP is going to repeal it?

So they're not. They never were.

It was always a lie. To get you to vote for them. We lose on the issue, so then we Have The Issue to run on.

So now we should just start appreciating the Good Parts of Obamacare, because there's no sense being angry about something the Establishment has decided you can't change.

[DiogenesLamp]

Look, you can sit around and play patty cake with the GOP and work within their Roberts Rules of Order, or you can do something outside the box that just might work.

Back when I was politically active, Just about everything I did was something outside the box. It worked pretty well too. My state has pretty much been flipped to conservative control, so my services are no longer needed for my area.

It's a shame though, because I really enjoyed being politically active. It was a blast.

[libbylu]

Amen.
I am there also.

[taildragger]

Wellllllll, Mr. Levin...we’re waiting.

I believe Hannity is a registered Independent, but to expound on your question with a similar one....

Wellllllll, Mrs. Palin...we’re waiting.

I wish I could get into why I feel this way, I can't. I realized the E-GOP was screwing us in in or about winter 2010/2011 and I kept asking here in FR when does the Tea Party set it's sights on the real crusher of our Liberty, "K-Street" hardly anyone here gets it or responds.

A huge lost opportunity IMHO, and maybe Allahpundit doesn't get either whilst we are all sick of the E-GOP and I have been on a screed to move out, because they divorced us a long time ago and we are too stupid to do so, the real problem is they are hogs gorging on the slop of K-Street and we are all bacon lovers and are overlooking the disgusting inner workings of the pig farm....

[spodefly]

The Republicans are gutless, unprincipled liars pretending to be an opposition party. Knew this since 2006 and haven’t given a dime since.

[EternalVigilance]

Look, I’ve tried it every which way from Sunday.

Every way that doesn’t involve giving up the core principles of the country.

And I’ll keep trying.

All we really need to make any number of good things work is a sufficient mass of people who are finally willing to quit messing around with compromise and start taking principled action.

[stockpirate]

It is nice to learn that he is following in my footsteps, I left after after the 2012 elections.

[SharpRightTurn]

Thanks for posting.

I am at general disillusionment squared.

[nathanbedford]

Not willing to believe that your "alternative" was to curse the darkness, I looked at replies in this thread and discovered:

All we really need to make any number of good things work is a sufficient mass of people who are finally willing to quit messing around with compromise and start taking principled action.

I am relieved that you commit to soldier on because we have no other choice except perhaps to accept Voltaire's prescription and tend to our own gardens. That attitude, too often, is but the way to the guillotine. We are conservatives, we do not quit and I'm glad you are ready to take principled action.

I think we need more than a sufficient mass of people, I think we need a cause, a spokesman, a vehicle, and money. We will never have enough money, we will never have the perfect vehicle (God knows we agree on that about the GOP), we will never have the perfect spokesman, (even Ronald Reagan was flawed), and the perfect cause is illusory but a very popular cause will do. In other words, I say do not let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

We have a vehicle ready to hand, the Article V movement which has the virtue of sidestepping the corrupt Washington elitists who currently dominate the Republican party. Those who call for a convention and who would attend the convention would not necessarily the Washington elitists and they would not necessarily have the same set of venal motivations-no doubt they will have their own but they will be different. This runs around the "garbage in-garbage out" objection.

Article V does not require a lot of money although it will be opposed by an avalanche of money. Either Ted Cruz or Scott Walker might decide that they can break through the media barrier and the establishment moat by aligning themselves with this movement. In a stroke, they can make the campaign one about the kinds of issues that might actually save the country, which many of the cynics on this thread think is an impossibility.

I might also add this combination of candidate and vehicle offers the hope of process reform which, again contrary to many of the cynics on this thread, offers real possibility for real reform, the kind of reform that might actually save the Republic from its impending cascade over the Cliff. Process reform is indispensable to our present political situation in which we were up against an establishment, fixed interests, money, media, and a demographic tsunami.

without reform the process or any political appeal, no matter how committed the candidate might be to your principles, will inevitably fail.

[who knows what evil?]

...the real problem is they are hogs gorging on the slop of K-Street and we are all bacon lovers and are overlooking the disgusting inner workings of the pig farm....

Word.

[Chuckster]

The wheel always turns in the same direction and the cycle always ends in the same way. Your final sentence indicates you know this but, like any sane person, you don’t want to believe it.

[Nacho Bidnith]

It just so happens that I received a “State of the Nation” survey form the other day, which includes a postage paid return envelope.

I had been contemplating what to do with it until I read this post, and now I know.

I’m going to print out Ace’s essay and return it to “The National Republican Congressional Committee” using their return postage envelope along with the survey form they sent me. Even though the survey form contains my name and address, I will make no comments on the form, I will return it as is.

Just in case, I’ll keep a copy of Ace’s essay for future use, because what he wrote is exactly what I would tell these bastards if I had the chance.

[Yaelle]

What’s Rush Limbaugh gonna do? Is he really going into this next election season carrying water for the Pubs? He seems to put money over principle. Yesterday I heard him for the first time in a long time and he was incredulous that a football player would turn down millions in order to protect his health. In a free country, we should be able to make those kinds of decisions. If you love football, play. If you get injured, it was worth it. If you don’t want to risk it, that should be ok, but Rush was apoplectic. Turn down millions?? I think his reaction says a lot more about himself than the football player. Rush is clearly bought and paid for. Even if only subconsciously.
I’d love to see big people like Rush turn away from the Republicans and tell people NOT TO GIVE THEM ONE RED CENT. That might actually make a difference, but Rush doesn’t even take a stand on elections at all. He says he wants to be neutral but in doing so, he wastes his bully pulpit which could help America. He dares to read what the founders sacrificed every year on July 4. I love Rush, but I’d have so much more respect if he would risk a little something to help save this country from statist tyrranical socialism.

[navyguy]

I don’t think a 3rd party is the solution. It’s easier, but I don’t think it will work.

We must destroy the establishment from the inside and take over the party.

There are many ways to do this but we can start by exposing the GOP establishment as Liberals in golf pants. On a more direct level we need to hound them endlessly through phone calls, mails and election tactics that expose the fact that these people are bought and paid for by the SAME groups that own the Democrats. The Tea Party movement has already created most of the needed infrastructure to do this.

[sarge83]

I contend the Republicans would sell their moms, daughters and wives into prostitution to keep their seats and personal power, they are utterly devoid of morals and character.

Beck is a jabbering kook, trying to listen to his radio show for 5 mins. is excruciating. However he is right the GOP has become the Democrat party circa 1988-1992. They are socialist but just haven’t come out of the closet for all the world to see.

[zeestephen]

On the issue of immigration - both legal and illegal - your confidence in Ted Cruz is wildly misplaced.

On multiple occasions, Cruz has stated he will not deport illegal immigrants who have not broken other USA laws.

Cruz submitted amendments to the Gang of Eight Amnesty that would increase “high tech” work visas by a factor of five, that would almost double the number of Green Cards issued each year, and that would expedite Green Cards for Mexicans and Chinese.

Cruz has never called for a reduction in LEGAL immigration, which now stands at 1.25 million per year, and 780,000 new citizens per year, who vote 80% for the Democrat Party.

Cruz has publicly stated he would have voted for the Gang of Eight Amnesty if border security was “certified” and there was “no path to citizenship.”

Both of those provisions are supported by every Amnesty RINO because they know border security will never be vigorously enforced, and because they know the “citizenship” issue is probably unconstitutional and would be absolutely untenable politically for the GOP in future elections.

[zeestephen]

Re: “I don’t think a 3rd party is the solution.”

It could be very powerful in a Parliamentary system, but, in the American system, we would have no more power outside the Republican Party than we currently have today, inside the Republican Party.

Re: “We must destroy the establishment from the inside and take over the party.”

I don't think that would work, either.

Almost everyone at Free Republic seems to believe that the GOP leadership and our major candidates are motivated by their character flaws.

I disagree.

I think almost everyone in the Republican Party is guided by political principles.

The problem is that Boehner, McConnell, Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Reince Priebus, and close to half of the Republican Party are guided by Center-Left principles!

[RKBA Democrat]

This is a good article. Looks like the scales are falling from a lot of eyes of late. Or perhaps more accurately, the public admissionsthat the scales have fallen have been coming fast and furious of late.

With regards to his mea culpa “It’s a relief to no longer have to propagate this obvious, feeble lie.” I will point out that you don’t have to feel guilty if you don’t lie. Especially to yourself.

[RKBA Democrat]

I will pooh pooh your idea, as you put it, but for a different reason. Sure, you can set up a second party. You can spend your resources and time to do so. But once you start you’re going to find out that the electoral system is completely rigged to smother second parties in their cradle. The first problem you’ll face is that the electoral laws make it virtually impossible to get a second party on the ballot. Assuming that you can cross that hurdle, you’ll then have to deal with the skepticism of voters who “don’t want to throw their vote away.” Now assumimg that you can get past those two hurdles, you’ll get to face a media that will completely ignore your second party, and the combined efforts of the uniparty to defeat it. Keeping in mind that the uniparty has over 150 years of experience in marginalizing, criminalizing, and suppressing those who challenge their hegemony. And did I fail to mention that they’re very, very good at it?

Let me note just one example of a second party that has gone nowhere: the libertarian party. They’ve been around since the early 1970’s. Objectively speaking, a significant number of Americans and perhaps even a majority have views that could be characterized as broadly libertarian. Yet the party has yet to get more than say 1% of the vote in a Presidential race. They have yet to elect even one governor or even one member of congress.

So given incredibly long odds, I wish those who want to spend their time establishing a second party all the best. Its true that every now and then David wins against Goliath. It’s just very rare.

[RKBA Democrat]

“Quitting and becoming a spectator is not a decent alternative.”

Quitting is an outstanding alternative. Being a spectator, not so much. Since the author didn’t posit an alternative, I will.

My alternative is very simple: stay away from electoral politics. Its three card monte writ large. If you want to increase your freedom and those whom you care about, why not take that goal in hand and increase your liberty? Do you need the permission of our beloved kleptocrats to be free? We already have the tools to be vastly freer as a result of the free market. That same free market that has done more to free more people in the last 20years than the political class has done in the last 200. So why are we wasting our time with electoral politics?

I would also suggest that while electoral politics is a waste of time, grassroots activism can be very effective. A small example of that was with the ammo ban that the ATF backed off on this week. So while I would agree that tending your own garden is the best overall strategy, doing so wisely with an occasional foray into grassroots politics can yield very good results.

[RKBA Democrat]

Its the same game in the rat faction of the uniparty. Something that I have personal experience with.