Posted on 09/13/2006 10:45:32 PM PDT by goldstategop
How did our country stray so far from the founding principles of limited government, states' rights, self-reliance and moral integrity?
Most Americans blame it on Congress.
Americans have little faith in members of Congress, but we keep re-electing our own congressman and senators, often with little or no serious thought on the matter.
In 1994, after 40 years in the political wilderness, Republicans assumed control of Congress with the promise that they would get back to those founding principles. A few tried. Fewer are still trying, but we are torpedoing their efforts.
Even if we are alert enough to know that one or more of our elected representatives ought to be ousted and we vote accordingly, we often support efforts to keep the status quo.
How many card-carrying Republicans would purposely write out a check to elect someone who supports higher taxes, multi-million dollar pork barrel projects like the "bridge to nowhere" in Alaska, price controls, subsidies, abortion on demand, amnesty for illegal aliens, the death tax, gay rights and onerous environmental regulations that rob property owners of the right to use their land?
When you dutifully write out checks to the Republican Party, the Republican Congressional Committee or the Republican Senatorial Committee, and the political action committees of leadership, you are– more often than not – doing just that. These entities are committed to this one thing: keeping anyone elected to office with an "R" next to his or her name in that office.
If Satan himself managed to get elected to office as a Republican, the Republican Party would fight to keep him there.
Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island is a case in point. (Any resemblance to the fictional candidate mentioned above is purely coincidental.) The Republican Senatorial Committee spent $1.2 million dollars to keep this man from being dumped in the party primary by Stephen Laffey, despite the fact that Chafee stands against virtually everything the party is pledged to support. The RSC even ran ugly attack adds against Laffey – a dedicated conservative – because he dared to enter the race.
It is next to impossible to unseat an incumbent in a primary, largely because the party is committed to keeping those incumbents in office.
Laffey's near miss shows just how fed up Republican voters in Rhode Island are with their party. Forty-six percent turned a deaf ear to party leaders who told them – in so many words – that a "real" Republican can't be elected in Rhode Island. They simply refused to support a phony one.
Laffey was elected and re-elected mayor of Cranston because he made the case for the principles Republicans are supposed to believe in. No wonder less than 15 percent of voters in Rhode Island are registered Republicans. They've never heard these principles clearly articulated in their state.
"Oh yes, please raise my taxes again. Yes, yes, please tax away my inheritance. Oh, please steal my property rights so you can protect the insects in that mud puddle in my backyard!" Can't you just hear all those voters in Rhode Island clamoring for bigger government?
This lesson from the Rhode Island primary must not be lost on conservative voters. Better to throw your money down a rat hole than to give it to the RNC, the RSC or the RCC, or one of the leadership PACs.
Most people don't have a lot of money to donate in an election, so they want to make sure they get the most bang for their bucks. That's why they simply write out a check to the party, sit back and wait and wait and wait for things to get better.
If you don't know which candidates to support, then support Political Action Committees you can trust. Club for Growth is the PAC largely responsible for Laffey's near miss. It is dedicated to electing economic conservatives. It's tripled in size in just two years and has pulled off a number of impressive wins in primary elections this year. Club for Growth and the National Taxpayers Union Campaign Fund helped unseat free spender Joe Schwartz in Michigan's 7th Congressional District.
Yes, Republicans are running scared – scared of losing their majority, but a majority of what? As the old saying goes, "If you don't stand for something, you fall for anything."
What is the worse thing that could happen if Republicans lose the Senate seat in Rhode Island? It would be held by a real Democrat.
What is the worse thing that could happen if Republicans lose control of the Senate and/or the House? They just might go back to fighting for the things they have pledged to support
I was just looking over his record and I was suprised to see how often he votes "GOP" on judges including voting to invoke loture.
Yes, he votes for cloture. That's about all he's good for. He's bad on everything else.
I guess I'd support him over Whitehouse because of that, but I really don't care who wins this race. If he were Arlen Specter, I'd be extatic that someone was moderate as that could get elected from a state as liberal as RI. But he's not even close.
Maybe you didn't know this, but Chafee's actions affect people in the other states. You act as though this is something new.
No, we don't "deserve to lose" in November just b/c a liberal won in R.I.
All politics is NATIONAL.
At least they can't trot out Jack Reed as the 'moderate Republican' who opposes virtually every issue that's important to the majority of the party.
On the War, on Taxes, on abortion, on school choice, on virtually everything of substance, Chafee and Reed vote the same. People often SAY that, but it's almost never true. In this case, it literally is.
I guess I'd support Chafee, I guess, just because he hasn't filibustered judges and because he's 'probably' a vote for majority leader (not for sure, he's threatened to bolt the party before, and openly encouraged Jeffords to leave), but he really is the definition of a RINO. The term RINO is thrown about FR haphazardly, and is rarely true if taken literally, and almost never true even if given it's taken as more a figure of speech. In this case, it literally is. He actually is a Republican in name ONLY. He literally holds no conservative principles. Not even one.
But yah, I'm not encouraging revolt against him or anything, like I said, I'd 'probably' vote for him, I'm just saying. I'm hardly a 'pure' conservative, I supported Specter over Toomey and I would again if the situation were the same. But Chafee really is a special case. I can't really argue with those who say there isn't any real differences.
Same here.
"Winning" is about winning a majority in Congress. That's what I mean when I say all politics is national.
The bigger and stronger the Republican majority, the more opportunity for conservative Republicans to marginalize the RINOs.
I saw this big-time in the Klintoon impeachment. We had a total RINO for a Congressman, yet his election led to a Republican majority, which in turn led to at least some action on Klintoon's crimes. Plus, it led to good men such as Henry Hyde being chair of the Judiciary Committee, etc.
Chafee voting with the Rats doesn't advance the conservative agenda.
Obviously!
But Chafee's R behind his name still contributes to the Republican majority, thereby giving conservatives the opportunity to be in positions of leadership and so on.
If a conservative can't be elected, what good does it do to elect a Rat and decrease the Republican majority? How does that help advance the conservative agenda?
Word!
Amen! Ideological "purity" has a place in theology, but not in politics. The name of the game is getting a Republican majority, then working to get the best conservative Republicans into leadership positions.
"Word!" ?
How do you explain that several states that voted for Bush overwhelmingly both times have two Democrat Senators, including ultraleftists? So, you are saying that a moderate Republican can't even get elected in a purple or blue state, yet a leftwinger can get elected in a very Republican state? Or is that that how the media tells you it's supposed to be?
I disagree that it was 46%. Clearly the rodents flooded the primary, so I'd say a majority of RI Republicans voted against the Hillary Clinton RINO clone.
Maybe it's time we went back to nominating our people at party caucuses.
You need to go back and read Jim Robinson's comments on NOT allowing this site to become a forum that helps to elect dims in the evil times in which we live (perhaps it is time for Jim to repost his salient message). We must save our Nation and way of life... and dims will destroy both in short order if they regain power. They can only do that if some of us have temper tantrums and waste our votes.
Destroying terrorists is Job Number 1. What dim would stand up and answer the call? What third party exists that could attain the power to do the job? None!
LLS
I find it difficult to get all worked up over whether a Liberal Republican or a Liberal Democrat gets elected in liberal RI. I just don't care, and Laffey had no chance to win, so the whole thing is just nothing to get too excited about. Rock, or hard place?
R.I. is the MOST BLUE STATE in the Union. THE MOST BLUE STATE IN THE UNION! To get a staunch Conservative elected there, would be tantamount to electing ted kennedy to the Senate as a Texan.
LLS
The RNC isn't concerned with electing conservatives.
They're job is to elect Republicans.
Even if that means Republicans In Name Only.
And even if that means more years of weak kneed Congressmen who repeatedly back down to the minority Dems.
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