Posted on 04/25/2013 6:41:58 PM PDT by Texas Fossil
How often do we use the old saw, “A person who doesn’t study history is doomed to repeat it.” ?
Well, here’s your history. And it bears repeating.
If you’re anything less than hard-core about your history lessons, you’re probably just like me when it comes to “those dang DATES”. I can get you to the right century, yes, and even to the right decade most times, but the year is not always as spot-on as I would like.
This applies, today, to some ideas for our future that I proffered on PQRM40.
The Democratic-Republican Party was formed by Jefferson and Madison in the 1790′s in opposition to the Federalists. The big difference being one that we see today; Strong states and a strict adherence to the Constitution vs. a strong centralized “Federal” government. The party split after the 1824 election of John Quincy Adams into the Democratic Party and the National Republican Party, (which devolved into just “Republican” as a matter of vernacular), absorbing the trailing edges of such parties as the Whigs.
This was your great-great grandfather’s America. Life in “the era of good feelings”. When people who produced were valued, be they farmer, carpenter or architect. These were the days when people understood that they had RIGHTS. Immutable, irrevocable RIGHTS. Rights that they recognized as being threatened with deletion.
The G.O.P. Is dead. That elephant has been scavenged by the vultures of special interests, big-government, big taxes, big spending, big lies and big babies. The elephant should have been their mascot for it’s virtue of “never forget”, but it failed. They have left the course in favor of “bi-partisanship” and “pork-barrels”. They brought about their own demise by way of turning their collective backs on the principles that made up their platform. Throw what’s left of the corpse onto the rotted wood of that platform and light it into a pyre. Good riddance!
Raise the new platform! Raise the new guidon! No, not an elephant. No, not an eagle, (lest we get caught up in the argument favoring the wild turkey all over again…), but a LION. I suppose an American lion, such as the cougar, puma or panther is called would be nice. But follow my POINT. No PREY animal here! Certainly not, either, anything so amorphous as a tea bag!
Leave behind us the days when we are described as a party of “old white men”. We can be “inclusive” without being obsequious, we needn’t grovel. We MUST NOT allow our party or our platform to be described by our opponents. We must put forth our message, loud and clear, to the people of America. They’ll hear us. In the hamlets of Kentucky and the townships of Maine. In the wilds of Alaska and the centers of Hollywood, New York, Detroit and Dallas.
Let’s hammer at this for a moment, shall we?
Take a conference room at a chain hotel. Not in Chicago or Seattle, but in a minor city. Fill it with people such as Col. West, Governors Palin, Haley, Walker and Jindal. Senators Rubio, Paul and Cruz. Congress people, mayors, police chiefs, state legislators, business leaders and even some celebrities. Pull some of our best media voices. Give them this minor history lesson and SIGN them UP.
The ISSUES must be ISSUES. Not little “litmus tests” foisted upon us by special interests or the media. Allowing them to steer us is what got us into so much trouble to begin with.
Taxes. Spending. Our borders. Foreign aid / relations / wars. The dismantling of countless agencies and laws. The elimination of bogus government “departments” and “Czars”. These are just a few of the TRUE ISSUES facing us. Believe it or not, the issues of such things as same-sex marriage and the “morning after pill” are NOT what is going to snuff the light out of our “shining city on a hill” this week. They are red herrings! They take our attention away from the drift toward communist totalitarianism we’re sliding towards.
So there you have it. A Grand NEW Party. The party of the Constitution. The party of “the various states”. The party of AMERICANS.
That has a nice ring to it. This is from a site run by one of my friends who lives in New Hampshire.
> “The ISSUES must be ISSUES. Not little “litmus tests” foisted upon us by ***special interests*** or the media. Allowing them to ***steer us*** is what got us into so much trouble to begin with.”
Special interests steer us because they have the funds and we don’t. We the People were taxed on our incomes according the newly adopted 16th Amendment for the first time one hundred years ago AT 1%.
Now we pay on average for middle class family of four about 24% federal (including SSI/Medicare/Medicaid) and on average 9% State and Local.
I don’t care what values or principles one has, if you haven’t got enough economic freedom to move around and get involved, then you’re not going to be effective in politics and that goes for any candidate or leader. They need to be financed. Most don’t have the farm enterprise or the business back home that will sustain their interest in serving their country without needing to put their hand out.
So it’s no mystery that money is the mother’s milk of politics in this day and age and has been for a long time but even more so today.
The only way for ‘People’ to effect change they need and want is to march, boycott, phone/fax, move around and go to Washington and knock on the office doors of their Congress people. But that takes time and money to sustain it. The only time you really see it is when an emotional issue or news items grips people. But then the members of Congress and staffers just wait.....until the emotion subsides and goes away. Then it’s back to business as usual which is to line up the next batch of contributions from the interests that finance the works.
The democrats are more fortunate because a lot of their finance comes from unions including government unions and also corporate heads who they have allowed to game the system by counter-bribes of favorable tax treatments.
The bottom-line is people are in economic chains and can’t do much for very long. And most are unwilling to engage in civil disobedience.
I know it sounds unrelated but the keys to freedom and having the luxury of participating and enduring in politics is in tax reform.
Here’s where people need to study:
http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer?pagename=FAQs
In order for taxes to be lowered in any scheme, the Fed Gov must be DownSized. Close entire Departments, move any worthwhile functions back to States.
Only keep in DC what is expressly granted in the Constitution.
It is Time. And it may be precipitated by a collapse.
Ain't that the truth.
Yes. I have always been a Republican. But the party has abandoned the small government crowd. Fact.
I am not going to leave the party, but am working hard to move us away from DC.
There are some bright spots. The Ted Cruz event during the TX GOP Convention illustrated the disgust with the “elitists”.
It is Time.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.