Posted on 11/07/2012 10:34:51 AM PST by C. Edmund Wright
...what the voters are craving in the debates and on the stump is someone who can look liberals squarely in the eye and tell them why we are right and they are wrong. The American conservative base has had to put up with being called stupid, racist, greedy and unfair for decades by not only the Democrats but the vast majority of the media. The pent up frustration of these decades is magnified by the fact that George H. W. Bush, Bob Dole, George W. Bush and John McCain would not or perhaps could not confront this. In fact, rare is the Republican candidate at any level who refuses to put up with this and fights back. When they do, they become sensations.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
In America, beginning in the late 1800's, under the name of "liberals," now known as "progressives," that movement began its now decades-long effort to remove the principles and ideas underlying our Constitution's protections from the nation's textbooks and public discourse.
On another thread today, the question was aked, "What do we need to do differently?" Good question!
Constitutional illiteracy--that is the primary reason we are continuing on the road to tyranny under deficit, debt, and government control! The secondary reason is the GOP's failure to use its billion-dollar campaign to focus like a laser on educating voters!
During the primary season, one of my FR posts stated the following in response to a Jonah Goldberg comment about Romney:
Sorry, Jonah, but this is not as simple as "not speaking the language (of conservatism) naturally." When a person is steeped in the ideas of Jefferson, Adams, Madison, and Washington, it just "naturally" slips through in the ideas they convey. Remember Reagan?Do Republicans seriously want to conserve America's constitutional principles? Or, are they just objecting to Democrats? Do they have a passion for liberty? Is this just about changing the Party in power, or is it about preserving freedom?
If their concern is for convincing enough voters to reject the idea of "a government big enough to give you everyting you want" and turn to advocacy for "a government small enough to allow you freedom to keep most of what you earn," then they'd better get busy seeing that someone is nominated who has been "marinated" (to use a word coined by Ingraham last night on "The Factor") in the Founders' ideas (isn't that what conservatives purport to "conserve"?).
So far (February 2012), Mitt Romney, though a good man, demonstrates no such "immersion." He has been "successful" in benefiting from those ideas, and he recites familiar words and phrases from patriotic speeches and songs, but that is different from understanding and being able to call up and articulate the philosophy which made such success possible.
Ronald Reagan's life and letters reveal that he had "immersed" himself in those ideas for years before he agreed to run for President, and that is why he could set "issues" in light of constitutional "principle." and explain his advocacy or rejection of solutions in by that light.
The other three candidates in the Primary--Paul, Santorum, Gingrich--couch their answers to questions in a manner which indicates personal pursuit and understanding of the Constitution's protections, each in his own way.
Of the two so-called "frontrunners," however, the lifetime history scholar, teacher, legislator, and participant in what was called "the Reagan revolution," appears to be the one most likely to be able to successfully articulate and distinguish those ideas to voters, if given the chance to compete with the "counterfeit ideas" of tyranny cloaked in righteous benevolence by Obama.
Is "politics as usual" to win the day, or might we not bring Gingrich, Santorum, Paul, and others who embrace founding principles together to help to create a "passion" for liberty among citizens sufficient to defeat the counterfeit ideas which are leading the Republic to ruin?
The following is excerpted from "Our Ageless Constitution," p. 181:
"It was John Adams who said: "The foundation of every government is some principle or passion in the minds of the people." Clearly, the Founders' passion was liberty, and in order to secure that liberty, they sought out and incorporated into the United States Constitution those ideas and principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence.
"The French historian, Guizot, once asked James Russell Lowell, "How long will the American republic endure?" Lowell replied: "As long as the IDEAS of the men who founded it continue dominant."
"Herein lies the answer to the question, "Will the Experiment Succeed?"
"It can and will succeed IF the motivating "principle or passion in the minds of the people" is LIBERTY, and if that passion causes them to exert the determination and will to complete the needed restoration of the IDEAS upon which the great American experiment was based." ---(End of excerpted material)
My call to the GOP and all lovers of liberty is the same as then! To rediscover and recover liberty from the hands of those who are turning America into just another failing nation dominated by a government-over-people ideology, a determined and massive education effort should begin November 7, 2012, focused on the teaching of the fundamental principles essential to the survival of individual liberty for a people.
Face it Ed. The American electorate is stupid, brainwashed, complacent and uninformed.
America voted for the American Idol.
Obama sings better than Romney. That apparently was the deciding factor.
It certainly wasn’t decided on issues.
1000%....we don’t even need a candidate- we need the pu$$y’s in charge of the GOP to start doing this tomorrow...fact is if someone calls you a dumba$$ every day and you do nothing to counteract it or push back against it, people will eventually come to believe you are a dumba$$- that’s where the entire GOP is today because of their cowardice to fight against the rats...
No. If you want to use an American Idol analogy, Mitt sang much better than Obama but Barry was much cooler and had a prettier face and better moves so he moves ahead as the less sexy guy gets cut.
the GOP is equally as stupid- they were unprepared and unwilling to fight obama or the media despite their experience in 2008 and over the past four years...
if you are unwilling to inform the electorate and let the other side dictate the narrative with lies you deserve what you get...
Well PeePee, that is my point...we have allowed them to become stupid, brainwashed, complacent and uninformed because we STOPPED informing them for eight long years under Bush and Rove’s guidance - and that continued with the McCain campaign and also the Romney campaign. In 2010, we informed, and we won. Newt would have run a campaign of informing. And he is brilliant at it, for all of his other faults (and yes, there are many...yada yada...)
And FTR, there’s no one named Ed here. Chuck, if you must go informal.
Well, that was quite my points...yes....
Newt could not have "educated" the electorate because the electorate would not listen to him. The electorate has been convinced that conservatism is racist and sexist and pure evil.
No, I am convinced at this point that the only way the US Electorate will be convinced of their folly is if the entire structure of American society collapses under the weight of liberal idiocy. Until then no conservative or Republican can get elected to a national office. We have reached that point.
Romney was a liberal, but the mere fact that he was a Republican was enough to scare the living daylights out of the liberal drones and uninformed masses. Newt would have spoken the truth, but the masses would not have heard it.
I have squandered my resistance
For a pocket full of mumbles
Such are promises
All lies and jest
Still a man hears what he wants to hear
And disregards the rest
Paul Simon
You’re onto something I’ve been pointing out for years. Marxists knew long ago that in order to realize their vision (change the culture) they needed to have the power to shape young minds. Public schooling and the media.
Not sure where you are going with this. We agree on the state of the electorate. We agree on what got them there. I was pointing out what our candidates have done to reinforce this, what others have done to fight it, and that “what if” we had battled them this time.
BTW, we WON these battles in 1980, 1984, held that momentum in 88, even though we later found out our own candidate didn’t believe them - but we won these arguments in 94 (yes, we threw them away, but we had won them) and then we won them again in 2010. We can win these fights, but we must understand the fight we’re in first.
Newt did. Again, “what if” is the tenor of this post, not slam dunk...
Not sure where you are going with this. We agree on the state of the electorate. We agree on what got them there. I was pointing out what our candidates have done to reinforce this, what others have done to fight it, and that “what if” we had battled them this time.
BTW, we WON these battles in 1980, 1984, held that momentum in 88, even though we later found out our own candidate didn’t believe them - but we won these arguments in 94 (yes, we threw them away, but we had won them) and then we won them again in 2010. We can win these fights, but we must understand the fight we’re in first.
Newt did. Again, “what if” is the tenor of this post, not slam dunk...
Talked to a lot of friends today in families that are divided, politically. The younger crowd’s number one issue, terrified that Romney would stop abortion. It seems the second greatest issue was Romney’s wealth and Bain. Actually, we were warned by a brilliant Republican that Bain and his wealth would be a problem, no one listened, he was declared the only one who could beat Obama..........
Well written and reasoned, thanks for refreshing our memories.
What seems incomprehensible to me is, why can so few (Newt, Rush, and Mark Levin being notable exceptions) articulate the tragedy of liberalism, and it’s historic failure to improve the human condition?
It’s not hard, in fact we’ve had some pretty good conservative spokespersons do it, but in books, or radio talk shows or TV guess appearances - not on the campaign trail. Not since Reagan to my recollection. Why?
I believe Romney is a good and honorable man, and he cast a big vision for ideas that could make this country great again - but they were not rooted in the soil of conservatism. Rather, they were carefully crafted marketing messages aimed at bridging gaps and appealing to segments of voters. That didn’t work. And if we want to take the niche marketing approach, the winning approach is simple: offer more free stuff.
You’re right, whether you call it the “roar” or the elephant in the room or whatever metaphor one likes. The conservative message is not getting across, because our candidates are not presenting it.
Writing this reply was my most constructive vent after the dismal election, so thanks for that!
I’m sick to death of listening to this.
We have had those candidates handed to us on a silver platter twice now, but WE rejected them.
in 2008, it was Fred Thompson and this last time it was Newt Gingrich.
Both of those men, especially Fred, qualify as classic statesmen who are students of the founding of the USA.
But for some reason we accuse Obama of being a “rockstar” president with no substance and yet we dismiss our own men of substance as boring.
I think back in 2008 we had a chance of winning in ideals, but based on what just happened yesterday I don’t think it would have mattered if we did have someone who could articulate the message perfectly. The machine and the takers have the system locked up now.
Too late for all that. See my next editorial for details.
Well, it’s too late for Newt in 2012 yes. But it’s right on time to figure out what went wrong.
Yes, I wish the campaign had been more ideological, but we can’t discount one huge factor: the country has turned center-left, and the c-left people are quite immune to logical arguments. You could argue until you’re blue in the face about liberalism and leftism and the whole rotten socialist world. These people can’t be persuaded, because they don’t respond to facts, logic, and reason. We’ve passed the tipping point. Time to think about a permanent split.
We may have missed the tipping point, but there is no basis for you to say we can “argue til we’re blue in the face” until we run a candidate who argues til he, or she, is blue in the face - and loses.
Every time we argue til we’re blue in the face - we actually turn the nation red.
How about this. We did not lose the battle last night, we lost the war. The American Electorate, in the tradition of all democracies, has chosen for itself leaders who will buy their votes with money from the treasury. There are now more takers than producers.
It's over Chuck. We can't educate these fools. They are the majority now. The only way to turn them is to cut off the spigot that feeds the trough from which they feed.
For the foreseeable future, until the collapse of the dollar and the institution of our own Weimar Republic, the American electorate will feed at the trough and continue to elect politicians that promise them more and more hog feed. Those who promise them less, will be rewarded by being defeated at the polls.
Perhaps the answer is in Revolution or Secession.
IMHO the only answer is that America must repent and turn to God and stop worshipping the idols of political power. The only thing that will change our country is to have a change of heart. The only way we change our hearts is if God gives us new ones. The only way we get new hearts is if we repent.
America is collectively committing the sin of covetousness, greed and pride. No candidate will educate those who do not wish to be educated. The electorate has spoken. You don't want to hear their message and they don't want to hear yours.
Stalemate.
Time to turn to God. But it may be too late.
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