Hey FReepers: Does your candidate unite or divide conservatives? Do you? (Vanity)

Conservatives have had an abundant number of excellent candidates for the Presidency, this election cycle.

From successful Governor's like Walker, Jindal, and Jeb Bush, to Cruz, Rubio, Carsen, on down the line.

News Flash: NONE OF THESE GUYS ARE BOB MICHEL, BOB DOLE, JOHN McCAIN, OR MITT "ROMNEYCARE" ROMNEY STYLE "RINO's".

Most of these guys have been pretty conservative throughout their history. Rubio and Cruz have been decent Senators - heck, amongst the MOST conservative Senators. Jeb Bush and Scott Walker were darn good Governors. ALL OF THESE GUYS WOULD MAKE ONE HECK OF A PRESIDENT, and far better than ANY Democrat of the past 100+ years. As Limbaugh said today, paraphrasing, the Democrat party is an evil institution that must be utterly destroyed for America to survive.

Like most everyone else on Free Republic, I was thrilled when Trump went all "un-PC" on the immigration issue. While most of the GOP office holders were still playing mind games and giving lip service, using the Democrat's lexicon in discussing this nation's terms of surrender, Trump went all "Rambo" on the immigrant invasion issue.

So, that was nice, maybe even essential. He framed the conversation and moved the dialogue. But then Trump went all Rambo on everyone and everything else in the GOP. Any conservative, no matter how solid his or her credentials, has been disparaged in personal terms by "The Donald". So, wait a second, is THAT what a "conservative" really is? Maybe Trump will be the GOP nominee, and possibly, he might be the best positioned candidate to win against the Democrats, but maybe not. I'll leave it at that, because this message isn't in support of any particular GOP candidate.

You see, I don't want to divide conservatives. However, Trump does. His lexicon and methods are Alinskyite, and even his supporters need to be honest about that. I'm not saying he's evil, or a progressive, a Marxist, a Democrat in drag, a liberal, or any other pejorative adjective. I WILL say that Trump is more "learned" than he lets on. He obviously has read Alinsky's "Rules for Radicals":

Do any of these concepts sound familiar, vis-a-vis Trumps campaign? He's used these methods to blow apart any cohesion within the GOP, and within the conservative movement. Maybe that's a good thing, to hammer the GOP-E into irrelevance. However, his target looks more like the CONSERVATIVE movement. Think about it. The GOP-e was never a threat to Trump, so he hasn't spent a whole lot of time attacking specific members of the GOP-e in personal terms. How can a progressive minded candidate win against a conservative dominated political party? Divide and conquer?

Here's the real problem with Trump, folks. CONSERVATIVES ARE PRINCIPLED, NOT MACHIAVELLIAN. We are not "ends justify's the means", just "get 'er done" Alinskyites. True conservatives believe in a Creator, in a Divinity, the God given absolutes of "right" and "wrong", and we're not going to sell our eternal souls just to win an election.

However, Trump's taking us there, to the standards of the American left. The author of all the pejorative, trash comments, the half-truths and mostly lies evolving in post after post on FreeRepublic is Donald Trump, via his Alinskyite verbiage and methods. He's influencing the behavior and language of Trump supporters, and it's ricocheting around the web between the campaigns.

Trump has been the ONLY "nasty" GOP candidate (read HIS lips and words, not mine). All others opposing Trump are in fact, NOT liars, traitors, mama's boys, girly-men, or whatever. If Trump supporters echo his insults, then it's you who are also a "nasty" liar. The GOP had great candidates before Trump entered the race, and we still do. These guys are not perfect, but they're good men, EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM. So, stop the Alinskyite crap game that some of you are running, or you're going to lose voters that the conservative movement cannot afford to lose. If you think that Trump's going to "reach across the aisle" and bring in enough Democrats and "new voters" to offset loss of alienated conservatives, then you're nuttier than a Hillary (or McCain/Romney) supporter. The Democrat "opposition research" effort against Trump will be legendary, and they'll have a million pounds of "meat" in Trump's past to use against him. Democrats will support the Democrat nominee, not Trump, because in the minds of the majority of Democrat voters, their virtuous goals justify any means they use to achieve them. Their "god" is progressive, secular humanism, and no other god shall stand against them, including Trump.

Like many other conservatives fed up with the GOP-e running the party into the ground, co-opting our issues and then betraying us by enacting progressive legislation or blackballing conservative jurists, I felt that anything that shook up the GOP-e status quo couldn't hurt. If a stick of political dynamite was required to shake McConnell-Ryan (et. al.) congress up, then Trump might be just the guy to do it. A lot of Trump supporters are right there - right now, with that feeling, and I can sympathize. Heck, ever since I was 18 and first voted, whenever the GOP actually won control of the Senate, the RINO Octogenarian, "lifetime Senators" controlling all committee chairmanships sold out the GOP electorate on every conservative issue.

I'm not going to use absolutes about the 2016 election, I won't say "I'll never vote for .." Trump, or any other candidate. However, I guarantee to you that if the Trump supporters continue the attacks willy-nilly on Cruz, Rubio, Bush, Carsen, and their supporters, on FR and other forums, the GOP has lost this election. YOU and I may vote for Trump in the General Election, but a majority of conservatives will stay home rather than vote for "Alinsky-Trump" in 2016. You can say "neener ...neener...neener, you're responsible for electing a socialist and destroying the country ...", but it won't matter diddly. Alienated conservatives WILL STAY HOME, and the GOP will lose in November. No matter how many babies Trump kisses after the primaries, he won't unite conservatives against our common enemy. You can't demagogue a candidate's character for 9 months and expect his candidates supporters to throw in their lot with your guy after the primary election is decided. FReepers insulting fellow conservatives directly makes it that much more personal. Sure, some will hold their collective noses and just vote against the Socialists, but the GOP doesn't need to lose much of the conservative electorate for it to be "game over".

Trump doesn't think this way, i.e. for or against conservative principles. He defines "winning" his own way. We could lose, and he could win, and it's all good. Trump is for Trump. He's Charlee Sheen with his "WINNING!!" strategy. If conservatives are divided, if he needs to "make a deal" with Democrats that compromises core conservative principles, well, then #WINNING.

Rush Limbaugh asked a question of his viewers today, e.g. "Well, how would you beat Trump, if he can't beat himself (i.e. via is own conduct and errors)?" My response would be to let Trump collapse upon himself. Ignore him. Don't respond to his ad hominem attacks. Instead, COMPLIMENT the strengths of your GOP opponents, while delicately (and accurately) distinguishing between legitimate policy differences. As an example, George W. Bush looked so much more "Presidential" on the stump for his brother than Trump ever has, using the wink of an eye, some humor, and just plain "class". "W" is a decent man and was behaving conservatively (even if he didn't govern entirely that way on social policy).

Which takes us to this: Trumps comments regarding 9/11 and the origination of the War in Iraq, that "Bush lied, troops died" (paraphrasing), and that Bush was directly responsible for allowing the 9/11 attack. That's unforgivable, because these are demonstrably untrue lie promulgated by our political enemies. On the war, substantial documentation exists documenting Iraq WMD's, including the entire, years-long UN Inspection program. In fact, Iraq's Nuclear centrifuges and fuel were destroyed IN SYRIA by Israel in an airstrike, and other WMD's were discovered both in Iraq and Syria. Aside from that, Trump ignores Iraq's refusal meet terms of the end of the last (1992) war, with Nuclear inspections and dozens of violations of the UN mandated "No fly" zone. Regarding the scurrilous 9/11 lie, the entire event is taken out of context, ignoring Clinton's mismanagement of America's defense and DOJ establishments prior to 9/11. It ignores the fact that Bush didn't even have his key Cabinet and some other 1000 critical appointees in place because nine months after Bush took office, the Democrats were still blocking nearly all nominees in their post 2000 Gore post-election temper tantrums. Bush faced 9/11 with Jamie Gorelick's insane constraints on the FBI/CIA intelligence sharing intact, because Clinton's appointees still served in their interim positions.

Most critically, it ABSOLUTELY breaks faith with the men and women who volunteered, and served in theater. Kids like my U.S. Marine son-in-law who enlisted at age 17 for two Iraq tours in 2005 after the war was "uncool", i.e. after Kerry and the Democrats rewrote the history of the war into a 1960's meme in their attempt to win the 2004 election. (Kerry's Democrats encouraged the enemy, adding a heck a lot more body bags to the cause between 2004-2005.) Kids like a SPEC OPS friend of the family who just quit after 5 tours in 8 years. It breaks faith with the families who lost loved ones, and the kids who came back broken. I'm sorry, Mr. Trump, but I have a damn good recollection of history, and these kids did not go to war for a lie, and they did not sacrifice for nothing, regardless that the current President's screwed up policies gave it all away, and lost a war than had been won. Really, Trump must walk that back. I'm not buying that Kool-aid.

Limbaugh speculated that Trump intentionally risked losing conservative votes by attacking G.W. Bush, because he believes his best chance of winning against an ascending Cruz candidacy in South Carolina by pulling Democrats voting across party lines, and he may be right. But again, Alinsky-leftist methods are NEVER justified, period. Those comments about the war tells America more about Trump than it does about "W's" successes or failures as a war time President.

As to my personal preference for the GOP primary, it's irrelevant. I have two concerns about "the Donald": In my observation, his life has been lived 180 degrees out of phase with Christian principles, and therefore, he's inherently untrustworthy. Second, he reminds me way too much of Arnie Schwarzenegger, who entered California politics as a "conservative", governed like a (Ted) Kennedy-Democrat, and took the California GOP down the rabbit hole of political irrelevance in the process. Yet, Trump's "conservative" credentials are thin when compared to Arnie's.

If Trump pulls the same routine as Arnie, if it's "let Trump be Trump" time after the election, the national conservative movement may also be toast for decades as well. Support Trump if you wish, but please do so honestly and with decorum. If you're going to call someone a liar and cheat, and particularly another FReeper, then you'd ought to have links and specifics in that charge, or you're just another troll.

If Trump wins the nomination, I hope he is more like Reagan, and much less like Obama (i.e. coarse behavior, narcissism). I hope Trump allows Arnie Schwarzenegger's Kennedy-Democrat policies no where near the Trump White House. It'd be a nice start if he started acting with the graciousness and decency of Reagan, Bush I, and Bush II, as he campaigns against his "fellow travelers" in the GOP.

I'll conclude this little screed with this: FReepers, we've got to stop it. We have to cease with the ad hominum personal attacks on each other, AND each other's candidates. We have to unite in our common values.

It is certainly Jim'Rob's living room and to zot or not to zot is up to him as it should be.

That said, I invest a fair amount of time here and I thoroughly agree with your post which makes a very worthwhile contribution here during this season of ongoing political misery. I supported Scott Walker, the finest governor of this generation and possibly even better than Reagan. When he failed to inspire the celebrity-oriented GOP voters of 2015-2016 and dropped out, I turned to support Cruz and I am thoroughly fed up with many of the attacks on him by the supporters of TRUMP!!!

Now maybe I am just getting old and cranky (no maybe about it!) but I have never experienced anything like the mob mentality supporting TRUMP!!! It is going to take a long time to heal the wounds inflicted by his Alinskyite campaign, if ever those wounds can be healed. Longer than we have before November. AND, if TRUMP!!! is elected, what do WE get? Just another self-centered narcissist like Obozo (as Thomas Sowell observed yesterday) but with a REALLY AMAZINGLY foul mouth to boot.

My mother was deaf and had to drop out of school after graduating grammar school. She worked for decades as a non-union production worker in a garment factory (often treated like dirt until finally she quit) and immediately afterwards, in her final years, opening the mail and filing at the Yale University Undergraduate Admissions Office for lower pay. She came home from Yale every day, marveling that they treated her like a lady, opened doors for her and called her Mrs. _____. Like your mothers and fathers and probably The Donald's, my mom and dad brought me up to have good manners and to speak only the words of a gentleman. All men are fallen and we all occasionally stray from such standards but we don't have to raise it to an art form.

These are simple courtesies, along with keeping a civil tongue in one's mouth, but they made her life far more enjoyable. It is fortunate for her and, maybe for the Donald, that she did not live to see his low rent campaign. The Donald is to civil behavior as Slick Willie was to marital fidelity.

I did not vote for Romney and, if this stuff from TRUMP!!! continues, I may not vote for him either. It is too far to fall in one lifetime between a gentleman like Ronaldus Maximus and, well, TRUMP!!!

It as though Carville and Begala and Axelrod and Jarrett and Soros were orchestrating TRUMP!!!'s campaign in a diabolical effort to destroy the GOP as the only major party vehicle for the translation of conservative ideals into public policy and destroying it effectively.

Of course, the destruction of the GOP and of our country is also ably assisted by the despicable likes of Boehner, , Ryan-O, McCarthy, McConnell, Cornyn, Light Loafers Graham, Thad Cockroach, LAMAR!!! Alexander, Bob Corker, and so many other Demonrats in GOP drag.

We have had a variety of spectacles, courtesy of The Donald. First, there is his foul mouth. I am quite permanently offended by his lowlife comments on Megyn Kelly having "blood coming out of her whatever" because she asked him about his lowlife comments as to other women. Can anyone remotely imagine Reagan behaving like that? I won't reconsider unless or until he apologizes to Ms. Kelly who is concededly not a perfect conservative either but she DOES deserve to be treated like a lady especially by one applying for the job of POTUS.

There was only one Messiah and TRUMP!!!! clearly ain't Him.

Then we had The Donald telling NBC "News" and Chuck Todd that he favored the availability of partial birth abortion and was as "pro-choice" as anyone in the USA. Then, realizing that he is running in the REPUBLICAN primary and not running with his usual leftist Demonrat pals, he "discovered" that he was actually pro-life when bouncing the REALLY AMAZING baby of a friend in his lap. This leaves many obvious questions which the lamestream media avoids asking to protect The Donald. Weren't his own kids (mostly born BEFORE he talked to NBC and Todd) not REALLY AMAZING too? If not, did they and other more "average" kids deserve to live? How about below average kids? Etc. Many of us were born at night but it was not last night. Again, when Reagan explained his change, he was as credible as The Donald is not.

Did I mention that The Donald insisted on allowing a "transgender" to compete in his "Miss Universe" contest and that he included a striptease joint in his Atlantic City TRUMP!!!! Casino? As is traditional with such operations, was there merely a backroom or a full-scale rent-a-girl accessory "profit center?" In addition to his infernal mouth and his Alinskyite tactics, these are reasons that make it verrrry difficult for a lot of us to vote for TRUMP!!!! even in the finals much less in the primaries. These are not qualities that I seek in a candidate I can favor.

Then we have the matter of TRUMP!!! during this campaign going "Code Pink" on George W. Bush actually accusing him of being responsible for the occurrence of 9/11. Makes you wonder what he smokes in his spare time or what fashionable leftist soiree taught The Donald that lie. Of course that lie is fashionable in The Donald's thoroughly, yes, Establishment Manhattan habitat.

Ahhh, but that should have been no real surprise since The Donald had already long since gone Code PinkO on Single Payer Healthcare just like Comrade Bernie and Comrade Shrillery and a bit further than the unlamented grandfather of Obozocare, Moral Monster Mitt Romney.

Will The Donald's running mate be Kim Kardashian (daughter of an OJ lawyer) or one of the dancing bears? Either might bring improved, ummm, substance to his campaign: Kardashian with acres of silicon enhanced flesh, displayed by "wardrobe malfunctions," as a distraction or the dancing bear by avoiding profanity. A balanced ticket, so to speak! Them that lives by celebrity, dies by celebrity.

Now I do disagree with a couple of your points.

John Ellis Bush was apparently a good governor of Florida, as you say. I was determined to give him a fair hearing this time around. I did. He began, however, to lose me when he insisted on sticking with Common Core which is a euphemism for misedumakating the unwashed to be serfs and to understand their place, if any, in our future as a society.

I did not like Bus h the Elder at all (or Barbara either) and his elitist New World Order scheme and Jeb also seems sympathetic to NWO and to a "reform" of our internal order. Another "transformative" presidency is not what I have in mind. The final straw was his declaring his intent to win the GOP POTUS nomination "without the base." Well, he's not getting the base and that's not all he's not getting.

Final disagreement for now. FR is still FR. The quality of dialogue is, as you say, badly degenerated by the rise of ad hominem argument against other FReepers or attacks on other FReepers as the default position. I am ashamed to say that I have recently been contributing to these sad trends. I owe better to my felow FReepers, no matter the disagreement and no matter the provocation. Your post, OldSaltUSN, gives me a firm intention of mending my recent ways and will similarly inspire others.

Attacking candidates is one thing and often quite justifiable but not personal ad hominem attacks on other FReepers.

So long as Free Republic retains its core of quite conservative and decent and well-informed members (and that obviously includes you), there will be a Free Republic and likely a free republic as well. Conservatism is a beautiful tapestry, somewhat complex with some acceptable internal variables. Conservatism is the tapestry of Western Civilization. We may argue over free trade, tariffs, interventionist vs. isolationist foreign policy, sadly over religious questions which ought not divide us but they do, libertarianism vs. traditionalism, etc., etc., etc., BUT we should agree to agree whenever we can and to disagree civilly and respectfully when we cannot agree.

Again, I am certainly not without fault and I intend by this post no disparagement of any FReeper. If anyone feels offended, that person should look to his/her own faults as I have looked to mine.

We can rebuild a sense of purpose at FR and in the conservative movement generally. Return to first principles. Start a Free Republic "book club" not to sell books but to discuss them. It might be a separate forum like the Smoky Backroom.

When we understand the economics books of Friedrich von Hayek (Road to Serfdom), Ludwig von Mises (On Bureaucracy or On Socialism or The Anti-Capitalist Mentality), Milton Friedman (Capitalism and Freedom), Thomas Sowell (almost anything including his books on ethnicity and race relations); when we understand the history of our nation as explained by James I. Robertson (on the Civil War such as Stonewall), Samuel Eliot Morrison (History of the American People), Paul Johnson (A History of the American People), Larry Schweikart (A Patriot's History of the United States/Schweikart is a fellow FReeper), David McCullough (anything), the rich gold mine of history as to the Revolutionary War and the Civil War, biographies of George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan, The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution; Free Republic will get over

Thanks for your kind post, that you invested considerable time with. I'm glad we have points of agreement, and can also "agree to disagree" on others.

GHW Bush: Same feelings - disappointment. In fact, he was my first choice for President in 1980, due to an impressive resume of service in critical posts. I was suspicious of that Reagan guy, and cringed frequently with a few of his faux pas. Plus, a few of his policy compromises ticked me off (e.g. immigration compromise; give amnesty first and trust the Democrats to keep their word on enforcement?? Non-starter. Happily, I came to agree with assessments that the Gipper was the best in generations, arguably the best President of the 20th century. Bush I, on the other hand, taught me a lesson about RINO's and conservationism. Nuff said.
G.W. Bush: Again, not my first choice, but good enough given the alternatives. As a war President, this guy had "brass one's" that just astounded me. I can think of no other Presidential candidate since Reagan who would have turned on a dime, and with clarity of thought put together, gathered support for, and implemented the war plan as he did. He was the right President for that moment in history. That said, his family "social values" side nearly destroyed his Presidency, and certainly tarnished his legacy. He let State, which consists of 95% career progressives, build and implement the post war policy. In my opinion, he willingly compromised on social programs and spending to buy off the progressive left long enough to pursue the war. However, a lot of that spending was "Bush ... from the heart", which is a cautionary tale for putting Jeb into the White House. Hanging the 2008 crash on him - just rubbish. It was a purely "progressive" recession, caused by policies going back to LBJ and W. Clinton. Given the period, he was a great President.

re: Trump: I oppose Trumps tactics, moral principles, temperament, and language. I fully understand why folks would support him. The GOP has earned it chance to become the next WHIG party - in spades. Trump serves as dynamite to blow up the GOP-e. I get it.

However, as I said before, I won't support Machiavellian, Alinskyite morals. That ain't me, and won't ever be. That's the problem with what's going on now in the GOP, and reflected on dialogues at FR. How do you "walk back" personal attacks like "He's a liar, he's the biggest liar there ever was, he's just nasty â€¦ just a nasty, nasty person". And that's not the exception with Trump, it's the rule. If Mother Teresa were still around to scold "The Donald", I'd hate to hear the words he'd use for her. Trump is permanently fracturing not just the GOP-e, but the conservative movement in general.

Why doesn't that concern him?

As far as Trump's late conversion to certain conservative positions, I say "welcome to the big tent, Donald". However, the burden of proof is on him. When conservatives question his credentials, and he issues invective and ad hominem attacks in return, that response doesn't support his bona fides, not at all.

As I've said before, I want to find a way to support Trump if he's the GOP nominee, but there are real problems. TRUMP has caused those problems. Just like his comments about "W", 9/11, and the war, he needs to "fix" this stuff fast.

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