Cut and Run Republicans: Beware Unintended Consequences

For months now we have heard a small, but vocal, group of supposed conservatives railing on that they are going to teach the Republicans a lesson this year and either not vote, or vote Democratic. I believe the numbers of this group are small, but large enough to move an election. I also believe these people just do not completely understand the possible ramifications of this action.

The time for a protest vote (or non-vote) was during the primaries. I was a very strong anti-incumbent voice when it came to many of the Republicans in Congress. That was the time to be vocal about incumbent Republicans. Not now.

Let's look back at history, shall we boys and girls? Let's look back and see just what the consequences were for the last high profile protest/non vote.

In 1992 Republicans decided that Bush senior had to go because he went back on his word of "Read my lips, no new taxes". To be honest, I could see why many people were upset with him. So, many Republicans decided to teach the Republican party a lesson by either not voting, voting for Clinton, or what most did: Cast a protest vote for Ross Perot.

We all know what happened. Bill Clinton was elected POTUS with only about 44% of the vote. The protest Republicans were giddy. If only there was the Internet, blogs, bulletin boards back then. I could imagine the posts:

Little did they know what they had done. Because of the protest/non vote of 1992 we got what may have been the worst, most immoral, most corrupt presidency in the history of the United States. Think about the unintended consequences:

A President that seriously divided this country through the politics of personal destruction.

A President and an administration that actively worked to demonize anyone with Christian religious views.

Taxes were raised on everything, including social security. And even worse, the tax increase was made retro-active (which is what Nancy Pelosi has already said the Democrats would do).

The Clinton administration gave North Korea nuclear technology in exchange for a promise from a dictator. We are now paying a huge price for that blunder.

The attempt to nationalize our health care system. Fortunately this was one of their failures, thank God.

The Clinton administration pretty much eliminated all new crude oil drilling anywhere in the USA, including off shore.

The gutting of our military through severe budget cuts that dramatically undercut our military readiness.

The Gorelick Wall. For those who do not know their history, this is the policy formulated by Jamie Gorelick and put into effect by Bill Clinton that neutered our intelligence operations both domestically and internationally by not allowing the CIA, FBI and local law enforcement to exchange information. A direct result of this was the 9/11 attack.

The insane policy put into effect concerning CIA operatives! Do you remember? Let me refresh your memory. The CIA routinely used informants overseas to collect information. Most of these informants were not what you would consider nice people. But, they gave us valuable and needed information. What did the Clinton administration do? First, they prohibited the CIA from working with anyone with a questionable background. Now THAT was a real sharp move! But even worse, the Clinton administration changed the protocols on how CIA personel could collect covert information. Previous to their administration, CIA personel would receive okays from the field. After taking office, the Clinton administration changed that to getting the okay from the Washington bureaucracy, causing delays by days or weeks and effectively neutering our overseas intelligence operations!! This had HUGE ramifications.

The Clinton Administration gave highly sensitive top secret satellite information to the Communist Chinese through Loral.

The target practice in Serbia that was called a war. The Clinton administration bombed the crap out of Serbia, ala wag the dog, merely to deflect attention from his Monica Lewinsky problem. As an excuse they used the fabricated story of ethnic cleansing of Muslims by the Serbs, which we all know was not true.

No response from the Clinton Administration for the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Sure, we prosecuted a few islamofascists and threw them in jail. That really showed them!!

The Somalia fiasco which, if you do not remember, was handled like a Hollywood made for TV movie. Remember the film crews (with all their equipment and bright lights on the beaches watching the marines land?). Osama bin Laden has told us that our retreat from Somalia is what showed him that the USA was a paper tiger that could not take casualties. Thank you Bill Clinton.

No response from the Clinton Administration for the Kobar Towers terrorist attack in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 USA servicemen. This lack of retaliation further emboldened Osama bin Laden. Thank you Bill Clinton.

No serious response from the Clinton Administration for the bombing of the two USA Embassies in Africa, killing 258 and wounding over 5,000! Still further proof to Osama bin Laden that we were cowardly and weak. Thank you Bill Clinton!

The attack on the USS Cole, killing 17 servicemen. The response: We shot dozens of multi-million dollar cruise missiles into a factory in Sudan and a deserted terrorist camp in Afghanistan.

Speaking of Osama bin Laden, how about Clinton TURNING DOWN the offer from the Sudan to hand over Osama bin Laden? Clinton admitted this in a speech on Long Island. His excuse: He did not think he had any legal authority to hold OBL, even though OBL had already been named as possibly being complicit in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. And the Sudan offered up OBL at least TWICE!! Now think about that for a minute. Do you think that if Clinton had taken OBL that maybe 9/11 could have been avoided??

All of the above, and more, just because conservatives decided to "Teach the Republicans a lesson".

I could go on citing dozens and dozens more effects of the protest/non vote of Republicans. But, I hope you now see how the unintended consequences can be quite serious. In fact, they can mean the difference of life and death for thousands of Americans!

Now, of course, I can already hear the detractors: "Well, the Democrats may take over Congress, but Bush is still President and can veto anything".

Oh my, how naive. I will not even go into the various ways Congress can completely screw over this country, regardless of who is in the White House. But, I can tell you this: The War on Terror? Kiss the funding goodbye. The borders? What borders? And if you think we have had investigations out the wazoo so far, you really have no idea!

Let me be clear: President Bush and the Congressional Republicans have really let us down in a lot of areas. Well, actually it is more the Republican Senate that has hurt us more than the House, but let us ignore that for now.

Republicans have not done what we wanted. So, what to do? During a time of War, a time where a radical religion wants to convert or kill every single non Muslim in the world, during this time put in a party that we KNOW will do exactly 180 degrees of what we want no matter the situation. Now that makes a lot of sense.

I would rather see Republicans in power that we the peeples could possibly persuade to return to conservative values rather then Democrats in power that we will NEVER persuade to take one conservative view point.

So, you cut and run Republicans, what will it be? Put a party back in power that we might be able to 'guide', or put a party in power that we will never 'guide' and suffer the unintended consequences of that decision?

Mark Twain spoke of lies, damned lies and statistics, and I've been wont to talk of "Pollaganda", the deliberate use of polls, especially by the media, not to report views but more to shape them. The media and the Democrats have sniffed a possible opportunity since the spring, and in the wake of Foleygate, when the bottom fell out of GOP support in some races, it looked like there was a chance for even a change in control of Congress. "Polls dont lie" some will say, and the polls are telling us that the Democrats may well run Congress next term.

But I am skeptical. Why? First, because I know the liberal agenda-driven media would want this badly enough to hype in hopes it comes true. (Note the bizarre hype of a frosh do-nothing Senator who is not even on the ballot this year, in the midst of some of the most newsworthy and interesting campaigns in years! Why? Because ... they like him!)

What really has me skeptical is the abject un-necessity and superfluousness of the Democrats. Who needs them? They have no new ideas, and no good ideas; they only have old, broken, ideas that in stubbronness of ideological faith, they won't discard.

Consider the Republican record on economy: Unemployment at record lows (of 4.6%) and 6 million new jobs in the past 4 years ... A stock market, homeownership and minority homeownership at new highs ... Productivity that is higher than ever ... How did it happen? President Bush and the Republican-led Congress passed tax cuts for over 100 million taxpayers, reduced capital gains and dividend and income taxes, and those tax cuts helped fuel the current economic boom. Will the investor class ignore that?

So, I have to think, is it the national security issues where the GOP stumbled? Time and again the Republicans acted with determinination while the Democrats engaged in partisanship; this is the national security record: 1. On missile defense of America — Democrats voted against it. 2. On the Patriot Act — Democrats voted against it. 3. On tapping foreign terrorists' phone calls to the U.S. — Democrats voted against it. 4. On tracing terrorists' money flow between foreign banks — Democrats voted against it. 5. On building a border wall to control illegal immigration and stop dope — dealers, terrorists and criminals — Democrats voted against it. 6. On interrogating captured terrorists — 194 Democrats just voted against it.

Republicans did all of the above with varying levels of Democrat hostility and opposition. The Democrats were and are uninterested in fighting a more effective war on terror, their main focus has been bashing President Bush daily and bashing members of his administration (witness drumbeat against Rumsfeld these days).

Lost in the whole shuffle is the 'values' issues, a convenient one for pro-abortion, anti-defense-of-marriage, anti-God-in-pledge San Fran Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi to see sidelined for now while they hunt for opportunities in Red States..."A hyperpartisan obstructionist" doesnt want her game to be revealed too much.

It seems that by focussing the whole election on one issue Iraq and the related despairing negativity, and engaging in the lie that Iraq is *not* part of the greater war on terror (which it is), the Democrats have managed to make voters forget (1) The fact that Republican policies have helped produce jobs and helped make our economy strong and growing (2) The fact that Republicans are serious and correct in analyzing and fighting the war on islamo-fascist terrorism. (3) The fact that the Democrat leaders in the House are out of touch with mainstream American values.

Given these realities, it is hard to fathom a large-scale abandonment of the GOP for the obnoxiously partisan, ineffective, somewhat corrupt, and quite left-leaning Democrats in Congress. Unfortunately for the GOP, they have not been able to craft a consistent message to counter the Democrat-media combination. The media serves up daily dose of Iraqi violence and chaos, then puts the mike in front of GOP candidate - "Is it time for Rummy to resign?" (John Spencer had the best comeback when said Rumsfeld should go - "You're not President yet!")

With just two weeks to go, there is a basic clear choice for voters: Clear their heads and think clearly about how candidates are on ALL the issues; or unless the voters leave a hold of their senses and throw away much else that they believe in to make some statement on Iraq.

It surely explains Bush's machinations with Generals, his "Border Fence Bill" signing coming up.

But where are the ads that remind the voters of the wider success of the Republicans on the economy and national security? And an attack on the very real extremism of the Democrat left. Without a defense of the whole Republican record, it will easy for the voters to forget.

It's reality versus perception ... and right now, reality has an uphill climb.

I appreciate your post and do hope that unhappy conservatives will get the big picture and vote all R's. The problem we are facing on Free Republic is we have a lot of ego/pride driven people that insult these folks with taunts, terms like "Cut and Run" to shame them into voting.

That is not an effective strategy for all you get with insults and inuendo is making them even angrier and them just saying to H*ll with you I for sure am not voting.

What we need to do is to keep presenting the issue in a logical manner and with empathy for their feelings of betrayal and appeal to their higher sense of inner logic.

In a sense its an analogy to "Don't Shoot Your Wounded" for they are in a sense they do feel let down.

Reach out with your hand in friendship and stick to the moral higher ground of compassion understanding and still present your side of the case to win them over.

I too have issues with the Republicans but am still voting all R's (have already done by absentee ballot) and am winning a few dissaffected folk back to our camp with these tactics.

Its in a sense a sales job you don't want to shame them to your way you want to Sell them on your way and give them new logical perspectives to make the next right decision.

Freegards to all....DN

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