What's A Conservative to do in Political No-Man's Land?

With the GOP still making noises about pushing for the nomination of yet another RINO, despite the disaster of 2008, conservatives often feel as if we are in political no-man's land--homeless pilgrims in a strange and barren land. What's a conservative to do in these unfortunate times when conservatism seems to be abandoned, even by the Party of Reagan?

The writer is wrestling with some of the questions I pondered before the election. It was my view then that the struggle in the Republican Party would be between social conservatives and fiscal conservatives. I still believe that is largely true but it now appears that Obama has been as a radical and irresponsible as some of us predicted. It might well prove to be the case as soon as the midterm elections that the threat posed by unchecked Obama/Democrat suzerainty over the Republic is so dangerous that the conflict between social and fiscal conservatives will be put aside as trivialities. It will become a far more urgent question of the very survival of our economic and constitutional liberties.

Here is the reply to which I referred, originally written on the eve of the election:

There will be finger-pointing and acrimony but that is necessary and good. We must rediscover our soul and that cannot be done without bloodletting.

Speaking of bloodletting, it is absolutely vital that the conservative wing of the party come to a final victory over the moderates or we conservatives simply must leave the party. There will be no better time, we will never have less to lose. We will be in control of most of the elected offices and we will be in solid red states, few though they may be. The moderates will be geographically scattered in occasional congressional seats with some odds and ends in statehouses. They will have their voices in the media and some access to money. Many of them will defect to the Democrat party. Some might become libertarians. But conservatives must get lean and mean and come to a clear understanding of who they are and what they stand for. Moderates can come along but only after capitulation. There is no sense taking stragglers and mutineers along into the wilderness.

Not less important than finding our soul, conservatives must ruthlessly enforce party discipline. That can only come after moderates are reconciled to conservative leadership or have gone their own way. There can be no doctrinal accommodation with moderates. There is nothing more to be gained by compromising principle for a few more votes in the caucus because the caucus will have no power anyway. Conservative power will come from the moral strength of ideas. Eventually, if Obama only perverts and does not subvert the constitutional system, the public will realize the moral corruption of the liberal regime.

I believe that the big battle in the party will not be between conservatives and moderates but between social conservatives and fiscal conservatives who are primarily libertarian. Both flavors of conservatives find common ground in strong defense. Fiscal conservatives are generally not as enthusiastic about Second Amendment rights, but the issue is not a dealbreaker. Social conservatives are almost universally fiscal conservatives but not all fiscal conservatives share social conservatives concerns about abortion and the ancillary issue of the morning after pill, education, religion in the public square, homosexual union, stem cell research, and pornography, marital fidelity as a prerequisite to public service, and evolution.

I consider myself to be a social conservative with a pesky libertarian reflex. In other words I am ferociously opposed to abortion but I am less exercised about what homosexuals are doing to each other in private. I am very concerned about the war being waged against Christians by our own governments but I'm not very exercised about adult pornography. I recite all of this because I think the way I resolved my apparent dilemma is the way everybody should do it: look for the victim and protect him. The classic arguments in support of legalizing alcohol, drugs, prostitution and gambling all point to the "absence" of a victim so the traditional conservative bias towards individual liberty weighs very heavily. But I sure see a victim in partial-birth abortion so I don't give a damn about the mother's convenience. Indeed, I see no reason to grant exceptions to prohibitions against abortion for incest or rape because those circumstances do not justify victimizing innocents, that is, to kill babies. Life of the mother exception, to the contrary, makes sense to me because one can identify the mother now as a victim. So if all conservatives would only just do as I do, (you know, be as reasonable as Henry Higgins and I) which is to weigh the balance in behalf of an identifiable victim but otherwise to respect individual liberty, we would find much overlapping common ground upon which to build long-lasting compromise.

If social conservatives would accept formulations of public morality the organizing principle of which is the protection of an identifiable victim rather than the vindication of a moral precept, fiscal conservatives and libertarians would be much more comfortable in the party. Fiscal conservatives, for their part, must go to bat for Christians when they are embattled by the secularists who would rob them of their faith through the arm of government. Fiscal conservatives owe Christian conservatives one more consideration, they must stop their smug condescension and their eye rolling whenever Christians express their faith in public. Consider for example the execrable figure of the son of William F. Buckley Jr. abandoning the McCain/Palin ticket for ill disguised abhorrence of Palin's faith. This is probably the last kind of bigotry that is socially acceptable in America but it must no longer be acceptable among conservatives. Buckley claims that he is a "small government conservative" but I claim that no matter how small his government, he is no conservative at all but something quite alien to us.

If the conservative movement is to be salvaged, this dichotomy will have to be resolved either along lines that I suggest or some other way. The alternative is a further splintering of the party and that would be very, very unfortunate.

I wish I knew the answer. It seems to me that the GOP has no leadership that can rally everyone behind a single candidate. So, we fall apart because we are split between too many camps. How the hell we can be split between the sorry likes of Romney, McCain and Huckabee just baffles me. Talk about self-inflicted political suicide...

As for Romney, whether he or his supporters are behind the Palin smears or not, I wouldn’t vote for him if he were opposite Cynthia McKinney. It is beyond logic and reason at this point — it is personal and emotional. Most everyone I know feels the same way. Romney (spit) has a snowball’s chance in hell of winning the south. And it’s not just Romney. I feel the same way about Huckabee or anyone the McCain remnants support. Matter of fact, if I hear of anyone connected to McCain working for a candidate, that candidate automatically becomes radioactive to me. I would like nothing better than to see McCain and his campaign staff treated like political lepers permanently.

Did I mention that it’s gone beyond logic and reason and turned emotional for me? All you Romney, McCain and Huckabee supporters better hope that my point of view is not contagious.

If the re-puke-licans would like to see something other than continued democrat majorities for the forseeable future, then they had better start abandoning the incumbent, career politicians and start supporting fresh candidates very similar to Palin. Else, I’ll just sit on my wallet and watch the train wreck. And if that’s the case, then I sincerely hope it is a train wreck of unrecoverable proportions. From all I can see, that is the only way to rebuild a new party that actually stands for something.

And how in hell does a democrat (Steele) get to run a national republican organization??!!

Now I’m just rambling. I’m so damn angry I could bite off the lit end of a road flare...

Yes, Sarah is authentic, refreshing and polar opposite of everything wrong with the corrupt career politicians in Washington. Hope she runs, hope she wins, but at the very least she will expose the fake people who live in NYC and Washington, the people who are multi millionaires, who are corrupt and are ruled by greed. They are greedy for monetary affluence and the desire for fame. This includes corrupt Washington politicians and corrupt Journalists. People like Pelosi, Michelle Obama, Barry Soetero, Katie Couric, Maureen Dowd, Letterman.

Sarah is a breath of fresh air and her American constituents will expose the Hollywood Teleprompter Racist Axelrod Oprah production Fakes just by simply showing up and being Real. Axelrod knows you can't focus-group the ‘REAL’ factor which Sarah has in infinity.

Breath of Fresh Air - a welcome relief; “the new management was like a breath of fresh air, relief - a change for the better. Barack Obama aka Barry is sinking the Economy. Our nation is in free fall mode due to Barack Obama. It's on his watch that we are suffering. He's worse than Jimmie Carter and a laughing stock to World Leaders who are well aware that he's a Girly Man. Putin must know Obama likes to hang with men.

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