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Conservatives sitting out 2006 hurts the GOP’s right, not the RINOs
National Reviews ^ | May 15, 2006 | Jim Geraghty

Posted on 05/22/2006 10:21:56 PM PDT by FairOpinion

What’s really stunning is this absolute certainty of angry conservatives that A) Republicans will learn the right lessons from the defeat, and not, say, respond in a panic by embracing their inner RINO and flailing around for MSM approval and B) that the Republicans can easily win back Congress in 2008, just by stiffening their spines and pledging to return to their conservative roots.

I have my doubts on both counts. For starters, why would Republicans get the message that “we need to be more conservative” in a year that conservatives were knocked out?

In the Senate, a bad year for the Republicans would mean the loss of Rick Santorum (who has lifetime American Conservative Union rating of 88 out of a possible 100, and a 92 in 2005) in Pennsylvania, Jim Talent (93 rating lifetime, and a 96 in 2005) in Missouri, Conrad Burns (91, and a perfect 100 in 2005) in Montana and Mike DeWine (80 lifetime, only 56 in 2005) in Ohio. Of course, Ohio voters who sit this one out will replace DeWine with Sherrod Brown, who has a lifetime rating of 8 and 4 for 2005.

If the GOP base doesn’t show in Maryland, you get Ben Cardin (lifetime rating of 6, 2005 rating of 0!) or Kweise Mfume (lifetime ACU rating of 4) instead of Michael Steele.

Nice job, guys. Your effort to re-conservativize the Republican Party in Washington by staying home this year will have the effect of massacring the actual conservatives and empowering the moderates who you disdain. Perhaps we can call this counterproductive maneuver “RINO-plasty.”

Once the Democrats regain control of Congress, a GOP takeover is going to be exponentially harder than it was in 1994. You’re never going to catch the Democrats as flatfooted again.

(Excerpt) Read more at tks.nationalreview.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2006; congress; conservatives; elections; lincolnclub; mainstreet; newmajority; newmajorityrinos; rinos
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To: nopardons

After Bush's desire for amnesty became clear and his run to the amnesty goal post began, I've become a simple consumer. I'll vote (buy) only for what I like: patriotic conservatives.

If a candidate is not conservative, then he doesn't get a vote.

I can see what "great" results can happen (give the country away) when you make a pact with the Yalie devils (RINO's). I have voted 'party line' for the Republican Party's candidates since I was eligible (many, many moons ago). But no longer -- strictly on this immigration issue. This is such a non-starter for me, I can't fathom Bush and Rove not figuring this one out. How can this be off their radar screen?

I'm for immigration that helps the U.S. I'm for the U.S. choosing who those people are. I'm dead set against granting amnesty to illegal aliens -- because they chose to be line jumpers, to start off breaking the law.

Good luck with the RINO's and have a nice day.


101 posted on 05/23/2006 12:29:12 AM PDT by Hop A Long Cassidy
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To: nopardons
Then YOU are aiding and abetting LIBERAL DEMS RINOS.

There.. Fixed it for you..

As for my memory, there's nothing wrong with it.. Use of snuff notwithstanding..

102 posted on 05/23/2006 12:34:43 AM PDT by Drammach (Freedom... Not just a job, it's an adventure..)
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To: Hop A Long Cassidy
And the president can do what you want, WITHOUT Congress......right? Just wave a "magic wand"; can he?

You LOVED both terms of the Clinton administration, didn't you. You also simply adored 40 years of the Dems control of both Houses as well, I guess.

Okay, answer me this...WHY DIDN'T YOU THROW A HISSY FIT AND BAIL ON THED GOP, WHEN REAGAN GAVE BLANKET ANMESTY?

103 posted on 05/23/2006 12:36:10 AM PDT by nopardons
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To: Hop A Long Cassidy
And the president can do what you want, WITHOUT Congress......right? Just wave a "magic wand"; can he?

You LOVED both terms of the Clinton administration, didn't you. You also simply adored 40 years of the Dems control of both Houses as well, I guess.

Okay, answer me this...WHY DIDN'T YOU THROW A HISSY FIT AND BAIL ON THE GOP, WHEN REAGAN GAVE BLANKET ANMESTY?

104 posted on 05/23/2006 12:36:33 AM PDT by nopardons
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To: nopardons
Hey, You're throwing such a "Hissy Fit" you're double posting and stuff...

Take a chill pill before you end up with a heart attack..
( No Bull.. I did... Nov. 7, 2005.. while arguing on FR..)

105 posted on 05/23/2006 12:39:02 AM PDT by Drammach (Freedom... Not just a job, it's an adventure..)
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To: Texas_Jarhead

Perspective - it means looking at the big picture.

No, its not situational ethics.

It does mean making tradeoffs, which by their nature are usually going to be something imperfect, or even bad, vs something worse. Refusing to make such decisions doesn't get rid of the moral problem, no choice or abdicating the choice to someone else doesn't work in Christian ethics.


106 posted on 05/23/2006 1:00:02 AM PDT by buwaya
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To: Drammach
I'm throwing no kind of fit at all, but thank you for your concern. I am, in actuality, as calm as can be.

I'm sorry that you had a heart attack, whilst posting to FR. I'm happy to see that you recovered your health; however, considering what terrible effects posting has on you, perhaps you shouldn't. After all, why put your life in danger, yet again?

107 posted on 05/23/2006 1:09:46 AM PDT by nopardons
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To: nopardons

No danger.. I now have... Perspective.. Heh..


108 posted on 05/23/2006 1:15:02 AM PDT by Drammach (Freedom... Not just a job, it's an adventure..)
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To: Drammach

Oh, well, that's a good thing to have. :-)


109 posted on 05/23/2006 1:16:38 AM PDT by nopardons
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To: FairOpinion

Much as I wish it were untrue, Geraghty has a point. All you have to do is look at the United Kingdom. When the Conservatives started losing elections, they started tacking to the left. My feeling is that if conservatives want to register their objections, the time to do it is during the primaries.


110 posted on 05/23/2006 1:44:33 AM PDT by Zhang Fei
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To: Hop A Long Cassidy

"If a candidate is not conservative, then he doesn't get a vote. "


===

Then how do you justify to yourself helping put Congress into the hands of leftist Dems?


111 posted on 05/23/2006 1:48:05 AM PDT by FairOpinion (Dem Foreign Policy: SURRENDER to our enemies. Real conservatives don't help Dems get elected.)
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To: All

Losing Now to Win Later, or, Geraghtyites v. Tapscottians

http://tks.nationalreview.com/post/?q=N2IzZjA1OGUzYzQ0MDhhYWI3M2NhMDU2NThiODg4ZDI=


Maybe the public will strongly oppose the Democratic agenda after two years. But then again, maybe they’ll like it, or find parts of it they do like, or maybe they’ll just get used to them. The “let’s lose this year” strategy hands a bunch of Democrats the handy tool of incumbency to keep those seats. And in the Senate races, the candidates get to keep their seats until 2012.


Mark calls a two-year performance of a Democratic congressional majority “the perfect setup for a strengthened conservative majority to return in Congress in 2008, most likely with a White House occupant wise enough to recognize that the ‘emerging Republican (i.e conservative) majority’ had become a reality.”


Maybe. Or, you know, Republicans could skip the losing part and try the crazy idea of winning this year.


112 posted on 05/23/2006 2:08:19 AM PDT by FairOpinion (Dem Foreign Policy: SURRENDER to our enemies. Real conservatives don't help Dems get elected.)
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To: Fruitbat
I will never vote Dim. But perhaps a GOP loss in one of the two houses may be a silver lining for '08.

Not if the Dims control the house enough to rewrite the Constitution in that amount of time. Imagine a new law "The FReeper Registration Act" or perhaps "Elimination of the Electoral College Act"...

Anyone believe for a second the RINOs wouldn't side with a "Constitutionally Questionable" law or that the President wouldn't sign it?

113 posted on 05/23/2006 2:29:16 AM PDT by Caipirabob (Communists... Socialists... Democrats...Traitors... Who can tell the difference?)
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To: MississippiMan
Here's reality: The GOP is growing more liberal and spineless by the day

The reality is, there are not enough conservative Republicans in Congress to provide the critical mass required to implement the best conservative ideas in the form of legislation.

The solution is not to sulk, withdraw from the fray, and allow the Democrats back in. The solution is to hold EVERY Republican seat, replace vulnerable RINOs in primary battles where this can be done, and work to replace vulnerable Democrats with the most conservative competitive Republicans that can be rallied around. This cycle recurs every two years, providing optimistic and dedicated conservatives a continuous opportunity to progress.

See, you're upset because we've only been able to build a Yugo from the raw materials and engineers we've voted into power. If you want to cruise in a BMW, you need to keep the raw materials you have and vote in more and better additional materials and engineers.

It's simple, really. We could crush the Democrats and increase the proportion of true conservatives in Congress. All we have to do is DECIDE to do that and get it done. Will we? Will you?

114 posted on 05/23/2006 2:52:19 AM PDT by JCEccles
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To: Mamzelle
Yours is a searingly eloquent and heartbreaking post.

You have articulated the fatal hypocrisy of George Bush and why, ultimately, his will be a failed presidency. I assert this with the deepest sorrow and can only say to those who will swarm in anger against me, that I have faithfully posted on this issue for years and have not come lately to my stand on immigration. It took your post, however, to link it to the war in Iraq.

It's the Joe Sixpacks who produce the sons who serve in the military, it isn't the children of neocons who do this job.

Why do they serve? For love of country, because they are patriots. They serve their country. They do not die to further the Neocon Worldview. They do not serve the cause of Israel. Neither do they fight for Mexico. They serve America. They serve their own nation. They believe in the nation state. They die and sustain terrible wounds because they believed their government when it told them they must invade Iraq to preserve America.

George Bush has unmasked himself: he does not believe in the nation state, the sovereignty of America, because, if you have no borders, you have no country. Rather, he believes in a larger concept, perhaps grander, perhaps not, but he does not believe in America as the core reality. He believes in other values first. He sees America as a part of a grander whole, perhaps a part of North America, or an alliance against terrorism, or as a transitional stage on the way to world government or, whatever, but not the nation. Thus, he can value his personal relationships with Vincente Fox over the interests of the nation state he has been elected to represent faithfully. Thus, he can deceive himself that his bonhomie with Putin will deflect Russia from its perceived national interests. Thus, he sees not even a perceived issue with Dubai Inc. controlling our ports - they are just like us (the James Bakers and GHW Bushs of the world)

Bush does not see himself as a lawyer representing a client to whom he alone owes (within the bounds of ethics) fealty but he sees himself under noblesse oblige to answer a higher call. Some dare call it elitism.

All of this leads to your next sentence, which you have put so succinctly, "Bush has broken faith with the middle-class conservative citizen that has provided the support for the WOT.

Why die in a war against terrorism, in which the terrorists seek to destroy your country, if the elitists all around you are destroying your country before your eyes? What are you fighting for? A multi-national corporation? The survival of Israel? The betterment of Mexican peasantry? One world government? A north American trade zone? What, if not your country?

But whose country?


115 posted on 05/23/2006 3:00:58 AM PDT by nathanbedford (Attack, repeat, Attack..... Bull Halsey)
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To: JCEccles
All we have to do is DECIDE to do that and get it done.

Okay. I did the first part. I decided. Now what? The "get it done" part is a little harder.

I have written every Republican group that asks me for money and said I'm very disappointed in the direction they've taken lately - AND I gave them a little more money. So far the response has been to ask for more money.

Paying for a really crappy lesser of two evils is discouraging. Not paying (or voting) for it seems to give the greater of two evils a better chance of dominating. The "anti-ameliorationist" approach seems, at best, risky. But there seems to be no way to get their attention.

116 posted on 05/23/2006 3:16:00 AM PDT by Mad Dawg (If you find yourself in a fair fight, you did not prepare properly.)
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To: Fruitbat
I hate to be the one to break it to ya, but this entire nation is gonna be lost (altered for the negative forever) unless we do something about our borders.

That's an interesting outlook. Did you feel the same way during the presidential campaigns of 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000 and 2004?

117 posted on 05/23/2006 3:25:51 AM PDT by Alberta's Child (Can money pay for all the days I lived awake but half asleep?)
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Vote for RINOs, you just get more RINOs.


118 posted on 05/23/2006 3:32:44 AM PDT by mewzilla (Property must be secured or liberty cannot exist. John Adams)
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To: FairOpinion
I woke up this morning thinking about this. There are a lot of 'let 'em sink' so-called conservatives on this forum.

Each of us supposedly has, at most, 2 votes - one for a Senator, one for a congresscritter. Those are the only two votes we get. The primary is the place to express your rage at the lack of conservatism. If it is not there, why has the state/local party not coming up with conservatives that are willing to run?

Withholding money from the RNC is not the same thing as not voting.

119 posted on 05/23/2006 3:40:26 AM PDT by mathluv (Bushbot, Snowflake, Dittohead ---- Bring it on!!!)
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To: FairOpinion
I got this in an e-mail from a friend. I don't think I have even seen it onn FR.

Milberg Weiss gave top Democrats funding - 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060523/bs_nm/crime_milbergweiss_politics1_dc_1

120 posted on 05/23/2006 3:47:49 AM PDT by mathluv (Bushbot, Snowflake, Dittohead ---- Bring it on!!!)
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