Posted on 03/17/2016 10:05:10 AM PDT by Kaslin
For years, conservatives have told themselves the pretty bedtime story that they represent a silent majority in America -- that most Americans want smaller government, individual rights and personal responsibility. We've suggested that if only we nominated precisely the right guy who says the right words -- some illegally grown Ronald Reagan clone, perhaps -- we'd win.
Donald Trump's impending nomination puts all of that to bed.
There can be no doubt: The Republican Party has successful killed the legacy of Ronald Reagan. By consistently moving to the left in every presidential election, by granting the left its general premise that government is generally a tool for good rather than a risky potential instrument of tyranny and by teaching Americans that the problem isn't government itself, but who runs it, Republicans have ensured that the vast majority of Americans no longer hold to conservative principles.
In fact, a significant swath of Republicans themselves don't believe in conservative principles. Trump, obviously, is no conservative. He's a protectionist on trade -- a position that smacks of populist pandering rather than informed conservative economics. He believes in an authoritarian executive branch designed to make deals that achieve a win for Americans, rather than a heavily circumscribed executive branch with prescribed powers of enforcement. He believes that judges sign bills, that legislators exist merely to bargain with the great man in charge and that the military exists to serve as his personal armed forces.
All of this attracts people.
The angrier Trump gets, the more he talks about how he's going to set things right rather than giving Americans the power to do so themselves, and the more Americans flock to him.
So, let's look at the facts. Today, at low ebb, Trump garners approximately 4 in 10 Republican voters. Let's assume that at least half of those Americans aren't conservative -- a fair guess, given that many have admitted bias in polls in favor of government interventionism in the economy, a sneaking love for government entitlement programs and a strong position against immigration -- not for safety reasons, but to prevent economic competition. Meanwhile, more than 4 in 10 Americans support Democrats outright.
This means that at least 6 in 10 Americans support a big government vision of the world.
Which means conservatives have failed.
In order to rebuild, conservatives must recognize that they think individually; leftists think institutionally. While the left took over the universities -- now bastions of pantywaist fascism hell-bent on destroying free speech -- the right slept. While the left took over the public education system wholesale, the right fled to private schools and homeschooling. While the left utilized popular culture as a weapon, conservatives supposedly withdrew and turned off their televisions.
Withdrawal, it turns out, wasn't the best option.
Fighting back on all fronts is. Republicans need to worry less about the next election and significantly more about building a movement of informed Americans who actually understand American values. That movement must start with outreach to parents, and it must extend to the takeover of local institutions or defunding of government institutions outright. The left has bred a generation of Americans who do not recognize the American ideals of the Founding Fathers. Pretending otherwise means flailing uselessly as demagogues like Trump become faux-conservative standard-bearers.
Probably because Trump is a populist and not a conservative.
“King Obama”
Give it up
Off your meds today?
Not sure where the delegate count came into it.
Using your numbers it’s highly unlikely that anyone wraps it up prior to the convention.
Well lunch is over. Have fun freepers!
Well the conservatives we did send have done nothing for abortions, gay marriage, protecting religious, nothing. Once they get their job they produce nothing. Give me a leader who will get things done or die trying. Trump is the right person for this time in history.
You poor folks can’t read, hear, or see.
People change.
Is Trump pushing the same things he was years ago? No.
You still don’t know it.
Let’s say you’re right. Cruz still needs to win 83% of the available delegates. He has won 29% so far.
It is over.
Trump is an American nationalist in the vein of George Washington, Andrew Jackson, or TR.
You clearly can’t look at data and discern meaning from it.
Even in the proportional period of this campaign, Trump obtained over 47% of the delegate allotted to this point.
Now that it is winner take all, he only needs 56% from here on out.
Do you see Cruz winning half the states from here on out?
LOL
Good luck with your assessment.
You also totally miss the point that Trump is a natural Conservative, whose attention is now finally focused on what has been destroying his homeland, its people's future, their cultural, spiritual & material heritage.
Based on over 60 years of observations on how natural Conservatives progress when they finally wake up to what is going on:
The essence of Conservatism is Nationalism, which has long ceased to be part of “Conservatism.”
There’s some hardcore truth in that statement.
Yeah, and by his platform, Jimmy Carter was a conservative Democrat. We know how he governed.
Because we are today challenged on things, which in Teddy's day were still so sacrosanct, that they never really engaged Teddy's attention in a way to offset his focus on some legitimate complaints which did engage him.
Teddy's son, Archibald, was a stalwart Conservative in the late 1950s & early 1960s, in ways which reflected the dominant patriotic side of his father, as opposed to his father's sometime sympathies for the non-Marxist muckrakers.
People change.
Is Trump pushing the same things he was years ago? No.
You still don’t know it.
Let’s say you’re right. Cruz still needs to win 83% of the available delegates. He has won 29% so far.
It is over.
It's crazy how some here treat Trump as if he was a career politician, he is not and has never been up to this point. He is a career successful businessman and private citizen.
CGato
No, Jimmy Carter did not campaign as a Conservative anything.
He was a Leftist ilk, and anyone with any common sense knew it.
It is interesting to read what folks are thinking...
You’ve given up?
On a free America? No. Have you?
This twerp has already shown his biases. It’s not worth reading him.
*Supporters.
As we wrote in “A Patriot’s History of the US,” Teddy’s main flaw was that the man did almost everything-—except run a business. If he had, no doubt some of his goofy Progressivism would have been curbed.
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.