[Jim Robinson]

An ant crawling up the elephant's leg...

[Helen]

"When conservatives unite outside the big tent of the GOP, there’ll be a revolution in America’s political arena. Many believe a revolution has already begun."

A revolution HAS already begun. It's called Free Republic. All we need is a Free Republic candidate.

[Always Right]

There will never be a better chance to run them out of town than we have right now.

Yeah, that's the ticket.

[thoughtomator]

"When conservatives unite"? Is that something like "when pigs fly"?

Perot '04!

[jwalsh07]

Run Ralph Run.

[netmilsmom]

bttt

[TomServo]

For read later...

[Fearless Flyers]

oops, copied from the wrong window.correction as follows..

With the Republicans waiting until 60 days before the National election to finalize their platform, the Independents have less time to dissimulate it.

[arasina]

All aboard! Third Party Railroad is ready to take you places you've never seen before! Swing Voters, step right up!

[Agnes Heep]

Cotton, slaves and arrogance ... without the cotton and the slaves.

[u-89]

I know an 80+ year old conservative who's been active in politics all his life. He sadly remarks how no matter who is in charge the country has consistently moved to the left during his entire lifetime. All he sees now is an acceleration in that movement. He gets a kick out of people who think conservatism made progress under Reagan or the Gingrich revolution.

[u-89]

P.S. Actually he thinks conservatism has made progress - leftward!

[ChadGore]

"I just had a birthday, punk.
You think you could say something
nice about my party ?"

[deport]

Matthew is sometimes a temperate antagonist, sometimes a Fire and Brimstone Preacher. But make no mistake; he has an agenda, to awaken the People to their own strengths as guaranteed them by our Constitution for the United States.

---

Matthew... They make think you're giving them hell but the truth of the matter is that with only 3.7% of the vote in 2000 the 3rd parties aren't going to be a player for a long time to come..... Even with your mention of Perot at some 19% of the vote he got zero Electoral College votes and not one Congress seat. Now how do think that after having dropped from a high of 19% of the popular vote in 1992 to only 3.7% in 2000 do you think you have them on the run....

Maybe only in your imagination?

[FairOpinion]

TWo words for you:

Perot and Clinton.

[goldstategop]

A change to proportional representation from our current first past the post election system would both break the evil of gerrymandering and encourage the formation of true ideologically based parties in American rather than the two broad-based coalition parties that exist under our current electoral system. It would create a political order far more representative of voters' opinions. I think we'll be going in the direction of Canada and it'll be region based first and then become ideological and once the public accepts the existence of viable third parties they'll never want two parties again.

[E=MC²]

After 9-11 this election has been the President’s to lose

Not really, when 43% of this nation's voters' loyalty hangs on their next government handout and 20% is fickle and easily swayed by the bash du jour and 10% is stubbornly insiting on EVERYTHING they want IMMEDIATELY even though it took 60 years of incremental pinkoism to get us to where we are.

[Terpfen]

"When our Nation was being formed and the Constitution debated, the policies of today’s Democrats and Republicans would have been laughed out of the forums. The debates of our Founders were more inline with the policies of Constitutionalists and Libertarians. But the Nation will never be able to return to those debates as long as Republicans and Democrats are allowed to dominate the national spotlight with their liberal philosophies."

This is the only part of the article I have a problem with. The reason we don't have the same debates as the founders is largely because we've resolved the issues they spent years debating on. The issue conservatives face today is not creating Constitutionalism, as the Founders did, but enforcing Constitutionalism. This is what Republicans and conservatives both need to ask themselves at the polls; "Who will best enforce the Constitution?"

If Jefferson ran today, he would be considered unelectable. If Lincoln ran today, he would be considered unelectable. If Teddy Roosevelt ran today, he would be considered unelectable. If Eisenhower ran today, he would be considered unelectable. If Reagan ran today, he would be considered unelectable (and I ain't talking about his health).

[Consort]

Third Party fatigue.

[Leroy S. Mort]

"When I began entering into the give and take of legislative bargaining in Sacramento, a lot of the most radical conservatives who had supported me during the election didn't like it. "Compromise" was a dirty word to them and they wouldn't face the fact that we couldn't get all of what we wanted today. They wanted all or nothing and they wanted it all at once. If you don't get it all, some said, don't take anything.

"I'd learned while negotiating union contracts that you seldom got everything you asked for. And I agreed with FDR, who said in 1933: 'I have no expectations of making a hit every time I come to bat. What I seek is the highest possible batting average.'

"If you got seventy-five or eighty percent of what you were asking for, I say, you take it and fight for the rest later, and that's what I told these radical conservatives who never got used to it.

~~ Ronald Reagan, in his autobiography, An American Life .