Posted on 06/21/2005 4:56:33 AM PDT by Badray
PRO and CON: Can a divided Party stand?
Abortion. Globalism. Animal rights. Homosexual rights. Women’s rights. Union rights. Freedom from religion. Government schools. Welfare rights. Gun control.
What do these interests have in common? All are part of the Democrat agenda. Democrats have built their "Big Tent" and various interests each have a seat at the table. While each constituency within the party vies to win the Party’s nomination, once the contest is over and the nominee is selected, the fighting ends and they all coalesce behind the anointed candidate. The process has worked very effectively for decades, and in the past, has made for a strong and formidable coalition.
Even though Democratic alliances have not been quite as effective of late, the Republicans are nonetheless still trying to emulate the Democrat’s methodology.
The Republican version of the Big Tent has never truly been effective. It is at odds with itself, not only during the primary season, but also leading up to and thru the election. There is a tension and even a bitterness that permeates the ranks. Why is that? Are the Republicans just mean and can’t get along as well as their Democrat counterparts? Or is it deeper than that? And is the fix simpler too?
Unlike the Democrat tent, the GOP version is schizophrenic. It tries to assemble a coalition that is at once pro life and pro choice; pro gun rights and pro gun control; small and limited government advocates and larger, nanny state government statists. The GOP tries to take both sides of every issue. WHY? Why is our candidate ‘the lesser of two evils’ when we could be offering a true, clear choice that will uphold our values? The GOP desperately tries to hold on to each wing of the party for fear of losing elections, but how do you build trust with those built in conflicts? How do you build an effective Party with those conflicting ideas? Should you even try? What good comes of it?
We have tried, and, undeniably, we have failed to be a cohesive force. The process has been extremely damaging, not just to the party but to the nation as well. While attempting to build our tent, we included many liberals and their candidates, giving them a second chance to win office and wield power. Once included and labeled as ‘moderate’ Republicans, their support for left of center ideas give credence to those ideas and has allowed the media to paint those who oppose them as "extremists." (Why is it that the ‘moderates’ always differ with us on the core issues and not the minor ones and can still say that they are Republican?) In more than one instance, this element, in crucial votes, have failed to support the GOP, allowing their Democrat friends to win a cherished victory. The recent phony filibuster deal is just the latest manifestation of such behavior.
These liberal ideas are the antithesis of what many of us believe. What’s the point of voting for ‘your’ party when the result is that the goals of the opposition party are advanced? When the Party no longer works to advance our principles, the principled leave the party. Their pangs of conscience will not allow them to support or vote for candidates or a party that violates their principles.
Where does that leave us? What should we do to correct this?
I believe that the GOP must end its identity crisis. It cannot continue trying to be both pro and con on every issue. It’s hypocritical, self-defeating and opens us to ridicule. The State Committee in PA is currently condemning the presumed Democrat challenger to Rick Santorum for not clearly stating whether he is pro life or pro choice. But where was the GOP last year when pro life Rick was working feverishly to reelect pro-abortion Arlen Specter? There seemed not to be any problem with abortion during that race.
It’s time to decide. Will the GOP continue to be a haven for liberals looking for a ballot slot? Will it come to an early demise for not differentiating itself from the Democrats? Or will it just continue to struggle for every victory because of this infighting?
We have a rare opportunity to show that traditional Republican values are the better ones. Most of us have lived under Democrat leadership all our lives. If we don’t act now, our children and grandchildren may face the same fate. We are witness to one failure after another of their policies. To the extent that we have allowed liberals to share our label, we are just as responsible. The ‘solution’ is always to throw more money at it. Our large cities are still the stronghold of, and showcase for, Democrat leadership. That should be reason enough to want to be different. Why mimic the party whose policies have destroyed our great American cities? Name for me a big government solution that works as promised. Forget effective and cheap, just one that works.
Will we have the courage to shed liberal Republicans from the ballot? Candidates that fail to abide by the platform should lose Party support. For the GOP to survive and thrive, I believe that voters need to be offered a distinct choice, not an echo or a shadow of the Democrat Party. Further, I believe that people will choose this new, vibrant, and principled Republican Party in droves. In fact, we will attract proud and committed voters that will more than make up for those that we will, and should, lose.
Will the GOP become the party that will lead America for generations to come by being the party of our Founding values and proudly stand for a sovereign America, small, limited government, low taxes, and individual liberty and responsibility?
I know that it should. I think that it can. What say ye?
Not to be a Durbin but these are nearly the same exact policies of the Nazis - just throw in class warfare...
Just the nature of things - liberals always have stayed in goosestep with each other very well while, as someone once said, trying to get conservatives to agree on anything is like trying to herd wildcats.
Their biggest constituencies are people who think they are Victims (except crime victims) and people who hate Republicans.
Actually it's a pretty huge tent.
Ping!
The libs come down, almost universally, on the side of all these items.
The GOP tries to take both sides. It's lunacy.
But why to we take both sides?
Aren't there enough of us opposed to these things to have a Party that isn't schizophrenic?
What all of these "rights" have in common is that they are not rights listed in the U. S. Constitution.
There are many Democrats who are not Demosocialists and the party is indeed splitting between the leadership and the rank and file membership -- those that are left.
The Democrat party has become the mirror-image of the British Labor Party. Everything the Democrat party stands for is taken directly from the Communist Manifesto.
Democrats, led by Dr. Dememto Dean must be strident because he cannot sell the socialist agenda up front. He must set the agenda on character assassination and on phony "issues."
How many Americans really belive that abortion is right? How many believe cockroaches have rights? How many believe America should join totalitarian countreis and disarm the population? How many believe that only government has wisdom? or that the U. S. Constitution is not longer valid?
Not many I believe. The Democrat party as our grandfathers knew it is gone. In its place is a pale immitation of the party that used to be.
But we willingly take in those who support the same things. WHY?
I say we need to cleanse the ranks.
I agree.
But why to we allow those who believe in that crap to infiltrate and dilute our (GOP) Party?
They are imploding. My point is that if we offer a clear and distinct choice, that the Dems will fade into history. If we don't, we will be the ones without a future and our values will be lost as well.
It seems to me that to be a Dem/Lib you have to "be" something - union member, femenist, gay, minority, etc.
To be a Conservative you have to "believe" some things - patriotism, faith, personal liberty limiting government, free enterprise, etc.
Even the "be's" in the Dem/Lib camp can ultimately adopt Conservative "beliefs".
I wouldn't worry too much about the Republican's inept attempts at the "big tent." That is the MSM trying to dilute the Conservative message, just as the MSM is trumpeting McCain to try to pre-empt true Conservative candidates for '08. The truth - as Rush and Laura Ingraham and others have stated - is that Republicans will win elections when they run unabashedly Conservative campaigns without worrying about the "middle ground."
I've been up all night working and need to get some sleep. I'll be back later.
I'm hoping for comments on the GOP, moreso than the Democrat Party. Why do we need to support candidates that support the philosophy that will destroy our country?
Are we brave enough to take a stand and take our party back from the liberals?
You are right. As is Rush and Laura,
BUT
The party clings to the liberal candidates -- like McCain and Rudy, and Specter, et al.
I believe that it is time to stake out our ground and tell those who don't accept our core tenets to either come on board or go away. We can't take both sides of these issues as we have been doing.
Our values and ideas are definitely the best. We just need to run on them, not away from them.
This looks interesting. i will bookmark to read later.
Not to be a Durbin but these are nearly the same exact policies of the Nazis - just throw in class warfare...
What do you think affirmative action is? And the Social Security issue? And multiculturalism/diversity? The entire concept of the DemocRATic Party is built around class warfare. Old/young, black/white, rich/poor, union/nonunion, gun owner/gun hater, straight/homosexual, urban/rural, abortionists/pro-lifers, etc, etc, etc. Show me a DemocRATic issue and I'll show you an issue meant to divide two groups.
Republican liberals are at least as damaging to the Republic as Democrat ones, and the case can be made that they are worse.
All I can say is that we just have to keep on fighting on every front. We have the resources to do so, if conservatives will just realize it. The conservative coalition is vast and is everywhere, even in the deepest, darkest pockets of the liberal wastelands.
I think that's because, contrary to popular belief, modern conservatives tend to be more independent-minded than modern liberals.
Not many I believe.
More than you think, I'm afraid.
Good analysis.
****Abortion. Globalism. Animal rights. Homosexual rights. Women’s rights. Union rights. Freedom from religion. Government schools. Welfare rights. Gun control.****
I've come to realize that the Democratic Party is no more than a bunch of minority opinions glued together.
How many people support abortion? Not the majority.
How many people support PETA? Haha, do I even need to answer that one?
Gay marriage? That one's in the minority.
The feminist movement? Practically irrelevant nowdays.
Unions? I used to be in a union (summer job). Not cool.
Religious freedom? Last time I checked, most people have a religion (to varying degrees) and would prefer to keep it that way, and not allow a very small % to tell them what they can and can't do/say in public.
The list goes on. But as you see, all of these categories (as far as I know) are in the minority. Ask a union worker if he feels for the poor starving cats, and he'll probably tell you he could care less. Ask an atheist how they feel about guns, and it probably wouldnt have anything to do with their religious choices.
Conservative issues, on the other hand, are intertwined much nicer than our counterparts', and that's the very reason we have potential to stand much stronger than the Democrats, or than the current Republican Party. I agree with the author that we need to run the party through a conservative sieve.
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