Posted on 11/08/2006 4:50:12 PM PST by Aussie Dasher
Republicans lost control of the House, and perhaps the Senate, because they abandoned their conservative principles and in the end stood for nothing, Rush Limbaugh said today.
In his Wednesday broadcast, America’s top talker said that until Republicans begin asking themselves what’s wrong with themselves they are never going to fix their problems.
When things go wrong, Rush said, "you must look inward and ask first, ‘What did we do wrong? What could we have done better? What mistakes did we make?”
Commenting that although Republicans lost, "Conservatism did not lose, Republicanism lost last night. Republicanism, being a political party first, rather than an ideological movement, is what lost last night.”
The Democrats, he said "beat something last night with nothing. They advanced no agenda other than their usual anti-war position. They had no contract — they really never did get specific. Their message was one of ‘vote for us; the other guys have been in power too long.’”
Rush further admonished, "There was no dominating conservative message that came from the [Republican] top and filtered down throughout in this campaign.”
He added that if there was conservatism in the campaign, it was on the Democratic side: "There were conservative Democrats running for office in the House of Representatives and in a couple of Senate races won by Democrats yesterday.” He cited James Webb as an example.
He also said it was conservatism that won fairly big when it was tried yesterday, but it was Democrats who ran as conservatives and not their GOP rivals. He added that the Democratic leadership had gone out and recruited conservative candidates because they knew liberals could not win running against Republicans in red states.
Rush quoted Thomas Sowell as explaining that the latest example of election fraud is actually what the Democrats did — they nominated a bunch of moderate and conservative candidates for the express purpose of electing a far-left Democratic leadership.
"The Democrats could not have won the House, being liberals,” Rush said. "Liberalism didn’t win anything yesterday; Republicanism lost. Conservatism was nowhere to be found except on the Democratic side.”
The root of the problem, Rush said, is that "our side hungers for ideological leadership and we’re not getting it from the top. Conservatism was nowhere to be found in this campaign from the top. The Democrats beat something with nothing. They didn’t have to take a stand on anything other than their usual anti-war positions. They had no clear agenda and they didn’t dare offer one. Liberalism will still lose every time it’s offered.”
Republicans, Rush said, allowed themselves to be defined. "Without elected conservative leadership from the top Republicans in the House and Senate republicans are free to freelance and say the hell with party unity.”
That leads, Rush said, to the emergence of RINOs — Republicans in name only.
Republicans in Congress, Rush explained, were held captive by the party’s leadership in the White House. They were put into a position of having to endorse policies with which as conservatives they disagreed.
"The Democratic Party,” Rush went on to say, "is the party of entitlements; but the Republicans come up with this Medicare prescription drug plan that the polls said that the public didn’t want and was not interested in. That is not conservatism. Conservatives do not grow the government and offer entitlements as a means of buying votes. But that’s what the Republicans in Congress had to support in order to stay in line with the Party from the top.
"It is silly to blame the media; it is silly to blame the Democrats; it is silly to go out and try to find all these excuses,” Rush said. "We have proved that we can beat them … we have proved that we can withstand whatever we get from the drive-by media. Conservatism does that — conservatism properly applied, proudly, eagerly, with vigor and honesty will triumph over that nine times out of 10 in this current political and social environment. It just wasn’t utilized in this campaign.”
Rush also blamed the failure to embrace conservatism on Republican’s fear of being criticized from those in the so-called establishment. Republicans, he charged, go out of their way to avoid being criticized, fearing they will be characterized as extremists and kooks.
As a result conservatism gets watered down, and the GOP loses the support of the nation’s conservative majority Rush stated.
Anything can beat nothing, Rush concluded, "and it happened yesterday.”
See my #360.
I don't believe that any true family man can be a pacifist. Mike Dukakis agreeing to let a thug take out Kitty might be what Kitty deserves, but husbands/fathers will kill to protect their own lives or those of their kids. That is a microcosm of Just War at the national level.
Therefore, the notion that 3000 dead is some outrageous number is belied by too many facts in America, OP. There are some 40000 killed annually on the highways, tens of thousands to various types of murder, and staggering thousands to heart disease, cancer, etc.
Where are the pickets at General Motors? Instead they get to sponsor the Super Bowl.
The Al-Qaeda Super Bowl brought to you by Bin Laden Engineering, Frito-Lay, and Coors Light.
There was all kinds of slaying going on in the bible and some of it wasn't especially principled. It was done for survival and this is about survival.
In case no one had noticed.
Well I don't put it past the Clintons to use the divide and conquer strategy and there are certainly no shortage of useful idiots for them to puppeteer.
It is a new angle though that the split would come from the left of the party. Maybe a strong fiscal conservative candidate could stop that from happening. What disaffection is there in the more liberal wing of the Republican party that could bring about enough angst for them to give there vote to a 3rd party candidate? Other than the bloating budget I can't think of anything.
spew!!!
in your face!
They ignored their base the Christian Conservatives and other conservatives that give Bush his big second term boost, which they immediately slapped in the face with the Arlen Specter and never stopped slapping them.
Pushing this nightmare amnesty bill and kissing Mexico's Fox boots.
Getting soldiers killed in Iraq fighting terrorists in Iraq while a couple of hundred miles from where they are dying he's pressuring Israel to give up land for state and to arm the same damn people who are killing our soldiers while throwing Ramadan parties in the White House for the "Region of Peace" as he calls them. This is why this so called war on terror especially in Iraq is dragging on.
He can't take his own advice on the terrorists, he can't decide if he is "for them or against them." Also he can't decide if he is President of Mexico or the U.S. or if he is President of all Americans including the middle class or If he is just president of the Chamber of Commerce for Big Business who his justice department is letting price fix and price gouge the American public out of a lot more than that lousy six hundred dollar tax cut.
Then take a look at the debt he's dumping on our children and grandchildren not to fight a war with, they keep shrinking our military, look where the money really goes, to line the pockets of big business who are having to add more pockets to hold it.
He's not only stood by why his friends doubled our cost to get to work, our utility bills and groceries but he's doubled what Washington spends since he got there and he has gotten much help from them so called conservative Republicans in both houses.
This is why they were turned out in the street. We didn't stay at home, real conservatives vote we just fired the jerks that refused to listen to those that elected them and those that just whined and said they couldn't do nothing about it.
Well if you can't fight and do your job, get out! We don't need you.
Here's a word to the dumb ass democrats. You didn't win anything.
Keep your useless liberal crap up and we'll take it right back from you! You better listen to those democrats who run as conservatives.
Here's a tip for both. You had better not pass that insane amnesty bill or we will see you in two years!
LOL! Of course, I wasn't serious. Condi has not been effective in persuading the GOP faithful that she could be elected to any office yet.
One word: arrogance. Voters don't like arrogance.
I agree with you.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1735184/posts?page=373#373
(Condi Rice) "...has more shoes than Imelda Marcos."
LOL!
I'm not blaming myself. I'm part of the rational base who chooses to vote for a bad republican (or in Santorum's case - a good republican) over communism. Other "conservatives" would rather hurt themselves and everyone else by going with communism over "not perfect."
don't blame the conservatives, if any sat out there were few of them. It's the unaffiliated voter who decides every election, not the registered democrat and not the registered republican, it's those who swing year to year. You should know that. And, as i stated, the elected officials lost due to their lousy voting record.
http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=20139 they let down an excited conservative base and many of them sat home. Santorum was to cockey when he backed arlen specter and not toomey. His eyes were on the #2 spot in the Senate and not with his constituents.
LOL! Big enough for those boats that Maureen Dowd calls feet!
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