The social conservatives are the reliable conservatives. The country club wing of the Republican Party is the wing that sells out Israel, is squishy on abortion, has no stomach for right to keep and bear arms, raises taxes, wimps out on the War Against Terror, and generally goes along with the Traitor Party....but not quite as fast. In short, they are Democrats in all but party affiliation (look at the voting records of Chaffee, Snow, Collins, Specter, Hagel, Lugar and the other RINO POSs in the Senate for confirmation of that assessment)!
Basically, it was the country clubbers who prompted me to leave the Republican Party. I am a fiscal and social conservative and not ashamed to be. I am not a caveman who is only good to provide a vote for the Rockefellers/Bushes of this world. I am a thinking conservative who believes in small government, individual liberty, and personal responsibility! I have been fooled by the Republican Party before, and will not be fooled again! You sold us a "conservative" candidate in Bush 43, and instead, we got 41 redux! A Texas accent does NOT make someone a blue-collar conservative, and so far, this Bush has shown the same country club tendencies as his father did. If it weren't for the blue-collar conservatives the country clubbers wouldn't get elected to spit! After all, why vote for Democrat-lite when the libs can vote for the real pile of filth?
The Republicans had best learn a few things, and internalize them:
The Dems DON'T like you!
The media DON'T like you (unless you sell your conservative constituency out)!
TRUE conservatism wins EVERY TIME IT IS TRIED!
Conservatives place principal over party....we have other places to go, and we may just build up a TRUE conservative party if you keep crapping on us!
Bush and his crowd have been crapping on the conservatives for a LONG TIME, and I can't speak for others, but I'm sick of it! If he nominates another O'Connor, Souter or Kennedy, I swear as God is my witness that I will work with all my might to see the defeat of that nominee and to see Bush turned out to pasture as soon as is possible!
This country cannot survive any more "moderation"!
All a "moderate" is is a liberal who is too white livered to admit it....or too duplicitous!
I'm in Boston, and I believe it was the country clubber, "Rockefeller Republicans" that have kept Republicans from gaining a foothold in the Northeast lo these many years. (That's pretty much all we've ever had up here; there are probably exceptions, but I can't think of any.)