Doug Thompson?
As in, the guy who edited Capitol Hill Blue?
No sale. No thanks.
The Constitution Party. Right.....
A gaggle of idiot ass-clowns who think that they actually matter. They don't. Get a freaking clue.
Be Seeing You,
Chris
Posted on 01/31/2004 12:41:27 PM PST by jimkress
Had dinner with an old friend last night, a long-time Republican political operative who – in 1981 – talked me into taking a sabbatical from journalism and going to Washington as a press secretary to Congressman Paul Findley.
He’s been a Republican all his life. Grew up in a GOP family. Served more than one term as a county chairman as well as a Republican National Committeeman.
So it surprised me when he opened the dinner table conversation with: “I’m not going to vote for George W. Bush in November. I may vote for John Kerry if he’s the Democratic nominee.”
Strange things can happen in this world. Joe Gibbs can come out of retirement to coach the Washington Redskins one more time. Hell, the Carolina Panthers might even win the Super Bowl. But when a lifelong Republican tells me he might vote for John Kerry, I wait for a voice to start saying “you’re entering another dimension…next stop – The Twilight Zone.”
“I’m a Republican because I believe in less government, of letting states make the decisions that affect our lives,” he said. “I believe in a balanced budget. But my party no longer believes in any of these things. I can’t be a part of what I think is destroying this country.”
His comments echo what I have been hearing after three weeks on the campaign trail. Republicans are fed up with an administration that has created the largest federal bureaucracy ever, with record deficits and with increasing federal power and control over our lives.
But they’re not just fed up with George W. Bush, they’re fed up with a Republican-controlled Congress that passed the largest, most pork-laden transportation bill in history, that abandoned its promise to impose term limits and that broke most of the promises of the 1994 “Contract With America” that gave them control of Capitol Hill in the first place.
My friend’s theory: “You know the old bromide that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely? Well, my party has taken it step further. Absolute power leads to madness. It makes me, a Republican, long for Democrats back in control. That is pure madness but I can’t help it.”
I’ve been around politics as a journalist or an operative for nearly 40 years and the dissension within the GOP is the worst I’ve ever seen. At a Republican caucus earlier this week, California Republican Congressman Chris Cox headed a group of conservative members who told Speaker of the House Denny Hastert that a GOP Congress was being undermined by Bush's actions in the White House. One member reportedly said a GOP Congress could deal more effectively with a Democrat in the White House than they can with Bush.
“At least we know what to expect from a Democratic President,” he said.
If it's Bush vs. Kerry, it'll probably be close... and maybe he'll tell us what he thinks we want to hear.
So we'll cave, and vote for him, and he'll be elected, and he'll be a lame duck...
...free to ignore us during his second term, just as he has during his first.
We better start figuring this all out, before it's gone so far that Claire Wolf rethinks her time line.
I am serious. And I do know the answer.
I think you're over-estimating the "clout" of the stay-at-home-3rd-party voters this time around.
Perot was charismatic and patriotic. He captured the hearts and minds of unwitting folks. There's not a Perot-type in sight, and unlike his father, this President George Bush knows how to campaign and he's extremely likeable too.
No dispute there, but in the absence of an acceptable candidate to those who feel disenfranchised by the incumbent and not swayed by the arguments of the challenger, the voters WILL stay home.
Barbara Boxer is by most accounts the most liberal member of the Senate. We ended up nominating old Matt Fong against her in '98, and while the guy is patriot he sure as hell wasn't charismatic, nor did he keep his base secure. Same with Feinstein in '00, or even Ford in '78.
Even as we post, and before you started posting here, Kerry is and was determined to revoke the tax cuts. If November is a choice, which will you choose?
It is no simpler than this. Bush vs Kerry. It will be one or the other. No third party candidate will win. So which candidate should FReepers vote for?
You are not thinking this through, but are reacting emotionally.
It's always fascinated me how such a huge percentage of the most hardcore third party kooks are either relative newbies or else date back from the earliest days of FR (1997-98 signup dates). And also how many of those old accounts go relatively inactive until an election season comes along.
Any so-called "Republican"/"Conservative", who says that they're going to vote for Kerry, or any other Dem, is lying, mentally ill, or far too stupid to be allowed to vote.
The Constitution Party will get fewer votes than the American Socialist Party and far fewer than the GREEN.
Just saw today, in the N.Y. Post, that the LP is considering running the man who put Bette Midler in the movie, THE ROSE , as it's presidential candidate. Such a winner......I'm soooooooooooooooooooo impressed. LOL
There hasn't been a Republican Administration in at least 75 years that hasn't increased the budget, the bureaucracy, or the deficit.
With the exception of Clinton's lucky boom economy, the same is true of the Democrats.
If a third party took control, no matter what they promised, they would do the same in the end.
Politics Corrupts
and
Universal Suffrage Politics Corrupts Absolutely.
Bread and Circuses.
So9
Doug Thompson?
As in, the guy who edited Capitol Hill Blue?
No sale. No thanks.
The Constitution Party. Right.....
A gaggle of idiot ass-clowns who think that they actually matter. They don't. Get a freaking clue.
Be Seeing You,
Chris
Thank you.
So we'll cave, and vote for him, and he'll be elected, and he'll be a lame duck...
...free to ignore us during his second term, just as he has during his first."
LOL...
In the wake of the November 6, 2004 latest Zogby poll numbers freshly posted on FOX reflecting Kerry 52% and Dubya 48%, maybe Dubya sweeps the "Amnesty for Illegals" Waterloo he's proposed off the table (for the time being).
Of course feeling our "pain," may last all of 24 hours until the election results are in...
Quite frankly, as a "conservative," the man shall now officially be regarded as UN-RELIABLE.
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