Posted on 03/02/2007 4:16:56 AM PST by Jim Robinson
To have a successful future, it helps to understand the past.
First, let’s understand that conservatives and conservatism did not lose last November.
The election loss was a direct result of the Republican Party and its leadership in the White House and Congress moving left.
The Republicans became that which they beheld.
In the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, they beheld the corruption and abuse of power by the Democrats. But a few years after the voters threw the Democrats out of office, the Republicans became that which they beheld-the Republicans became corrupt and abused their power.
When most of the Congressional Republicans first ran for office, they ran against the sewer that Washington had become. But after a few years in Washington most of them act like they’ve discovered that Washington isn’t a sewer after all – it’s a hot tub.
In other words, the Republicans’ real message was: “We didn’t want the Democrats spending the money, but now that we are totally in charge, let’s blow the door off the bank vault, and let’s spend and spend and spend our children and grandchildren’s inheritance.”
ALL FOR THE SOLE IMMORAL, CORRUPT PURPOSE OF HOLDING ONTO POWER.
And how appropriate that it turned into ashes in their mouth.
In January 2001, for all intents and purposes, the Republicans in the White House and Congress adopted a one-word strategy to govern.
And that one word was BRIBERY.
In essence they said to the voters ‘you’ve got votes-we’ve got money-let’s talk - let’s deal.’
The illegal corruption of Duke Cunningham, Bob Ney, Jack Abramoff, and Mark Foley is not a serious problem for us, our children, or grandchildren’s lives.
They’ve been caught and punished.
But far worse crimes have been committed by the politicians who are still sitting in their Capitol Hill offices. I’m talking about the legalized theft of trillions of dollars these politicians have stolen from the children of tomorrow – in order to buy votes to stay in office today.
Therefore conservatives, our #1 need going forward is for new leaders.
Conservatives are like the Biblical Jews who had to wander through the desert for 40 years until that generation of immoral corrupt leaders had passed away.
As conservatives, we’re not going to get to the political Promised Land until we also get new, uncorrupt, principled leaders.
Dr. Phil, the TV psychiatrist, likes to say: “How’s that working for you?”
And I say: How’s that working for you conservatives – to be an appendage of the Republican Party?
The voters spoke in November, and what was the first thing the Republicans did? They kept in power all the leaders who had led them over the cliff!
Obviously the initials GOP now stands for Go On Partying. Or Give up (G) on (O) principles (P).
Well, the Republican party apparently has a death wish, but that doesn’t mean we conservatives have to go along with it.
My strong recommendation is for conservatives to stop being an arm of the Republican Party and become a 3rd Force, but not a 3rd Party.
The left has had enormous success by building strong 3rd force groups and coalitions.
The left has hundreds of environmental groups, consumer groups, civil rights groups, feminist groups, and homosexual groups, etc., etc.
And these groups have their own agenda, their own members, their own money, and most importantly they operate independent of the Democratic Party
Conservatives must do the same.
No longer think of yourself as a Republican, but as a Reagan conservative.
Let’s re-launch the conservative movement.
Let’s act independently of the Republican Party and their failed big government leadership.
Let’s focus on the conservative movement, not the GOP.
We need to greatly increase the size and number of principled conservative organizations.
Let’s launch a thousand new organizations reaching out to:
1. Small business owners, especially women, Hispanics, and Asians.
2. America’s youth, who know the current Social Security system just won’t be there for them.
3. Independent voters, most of who support a balanced budget, family values, and fiscal restraint.
4. Values voters, who agree with us on same sex marriage and the culture of life and promoting traditional moral values – not Hollywood values.
5. Young married couples, who care about child tax credits and better schools.
6. Senior citizens, who want to stop the politicians’ raid on the Social Security Trust Fund – and don’t trust them to manage their health care, either.
7. Doctors, who are already being hamstrung by red tape – and are scared to death of the prospect of socialized medicine.
8. And all the Americans in the “sensible center” who know deep-down that conservatives really are “right:” We’re right on illegal immigration, right on taxes, right on health care, right on the economy, right on terrorism – and right for America.
Let’s withhold support from all Republican National Committees because they spend our money in primaries to defeat conservatives.
Let’s withhold support from most Republican elected officials, supporting only those few principled conservatives
Let’s challenge in primaries all establishment big government Republicans and Democrats at the National, state, and local levels.
Let’s run principled conservatives for local, state, and national party offices.
I congratulate CPAC for not having the Chairman of the Republican National Committee at CPAC for the first time in memory.
And conservatives—this is important – for the time being, we should withhold our support from all of the top tier 2008 Presidential wannabees.
Not a one of them deserves our support today.
They all fail the Goldwater/Reagan test.
Goldwater became our hero when he and he alone in Washington stood up and criticized the Republicans for their big government policies.
On the floor of the Senate in 1960, he said President Eisenhower was running a dime store New Deal.
He spoke truth to power. Where is the Republican Presidential candidate that has stood up publicly to the big government Republican leaders in the last 6 years?
And if they haven’t stood up for conservative principles in the last 6 years, they won’t start if they become President.
And Reagan regularly criticized Presidents Nixon and Ford.
And the second test is, tell me who you walk with and I’ll tell you who you are.
Reagan walked with conservatives- long before he ran for President in 1976; he was at our meetings, our receptions, and our rallies.
And surrounding Reagan were conservative stars Lyn Nofziger, Marty Anderson, Dick Allen, Ed Meese, Judge Clark, Joe Coors, and many others.
If conservatives have not been around a Republican Presidential candidate before he began asking for our votes, I guarantee you conservatives will not be around him if he moves into the White House.
And I promise you; you will not have conservative policies or conservative programs without conservative personnel.
I don’t know about you, but I’m angry and I feel betrayed, but fortunately there are things we conservatives can do to become a governing majority in America.
However, it’s not likely to happen quickly, certainly not by 2008.
One of the strengths of the conservative movement is we’ve always approached politics as a marathon, not a sprint.
It may take 6-10 years for conservatives to be able to govern America.
But 1st conservatives have to follow the advice that Kevin Costner got in the baseball movie “Field of Dreams.”
If you build it, they will come.
We have to build a whole new conservative movement, independent of the two major parties.
And once we build a large, dynamic powerful conservative movement, the next Ronald Reagan will appear.
Remember the movie, “The Blues Brothers” with Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi. The idea in the movie was We’re putting the band back together And we’re on a mission from God
Well conservatives, We’re putting the conservative movement back together. And hopefully we’re on a mission from God.
--30-- NOTE to EDITORS: Richard A. Viguerie pioneered ideological and political direct mail and has been called “the funding father of the conservative movement” for his role in helping build dozens of conservative organizations. He is the author of the newly released Conservatives Betrayed: How George W. Bush and Other Big Government Republicans Hijacked the Conservative Cause (Bonus Books, 2006).
I don't like crybabies who continue to allow #3:
3. Conservatives should do this within the GOP, but not allow the GOP to bully usTo go unnoticed.
Number 3 is the most important in my view.
Follow through with that, and the other two become much easier to deal with.
The media has already engrained in the public perception that Conservatives are cold, heartless, right winged radicals. It's up to Conservatives to define who they are. Not liberals.
Done that. Great post!!
"My strong recommendation is to stop bitching and do something."
We're trying friend, however, right now we got our hands full just trying to convince so called "conservatives" here to realize that Rudy is not the conservative many people here think he is. As long as "conservatives" are going to promote candidates like Rudy it makes our job a lot harder. Regardless, we will continue to "do something" and yes, we will bitch along the way.
Let’s act independently of the Republican Party and their failed big government leadership.
Let’s focus on the conservative movement, not the GOP.
Fine by me.
Let’s withhold support from all Republican National Committees because they spend our money in primaries to defeat conservatives.
Let’s withhold support from most Republican elected officials, supporting only those few principled conservatives
Let’s challenge in primaries all establishment big government Republicans and Democrats at the National, state, and local levels.
Let’s run principled conservatives for local, state, and national party offices.
I congratulate CPAC for not having the Chairman of the Republican National Committee at CPAC for the first time in memory.
And conservatives—this is important – for the time being, we should withhold our support from all of the top tier 2008 Presidential wannabees.
Not a one of them deserves our support today.
A home run if you ask me.
L
Thank you for posting this.
I fear that there are far fewer of us than previously thought.
OK.
What's your theory about what changed between 1964 and 1980?
That's right on Jim, but sadly, many here think that getting a liberal republican elected is somehow going to help our conservative cause down the road. I say it's just going to make it that much harder to turn the tide back in our direction if we do that. Why is that so hard for some here to understand that?
L
Work harder. We got our work cut out for us. Conservatism is being defined by the liberal media once again.
I know that.
I'm not talking about what Reagan did, I want to know what you think about what the VOTERS did.
Do you seriously believe the message the voters sent in 1980 was ,"we made a mistake in 1964, send us more Goldwaters"?
Two reasons:
1. They think of politics as a game to be won or lost, not a long struggle to advance or maintain our principles
2. They lack confidence that conservative principles can be sold to the general public, quite possibly because they've not devoted the necessary time to consider why these principles are correct
The house will stand, but it'll be all one or all the other.
Preferably not the other.
Doesn't anyone have anything new to add, besides the old lack of values combined with big spending that costs Republicans their seats?
Too much subjective opinion from people who are mad and disillusioned because they lost control of something they never had--the GOP.
Great post -- and good ideas.
I don't believe Conservatism is monolithic. My definition of Conservatism is not the same as the next person's. I also don't believe we should just sit idly by while our sworn enemies define who we are.
Reagan wouldn't have won a landslide in 1984 by calling fellow Republican's that they were spineless, mealy-mouthed RINO's, or fellow American's in flyover space that they were toothless hayseed Bible-thumping hicks. Reagan wouldn't have won in a landslide believing in the all or nothing mentality. Reagan wouldn't have won as a third party type either for that matter.
There has to be some certain bit of compromise. Reagan demonstrated that well. Destroying the Republican party or each other won't get us anywhere fast, seems too many are hellbent on doing more of that instead of advancing Reagan's idea of Conservatism.
Conservatives seem to believe they had control of the GOP and somehow lost it thanks to "RINOs" in 2006. As long as they continue to misidentify the reasons why Republicans didn't win big, not much will change.
agree...bttt
More Americans killed by illegal aliens than Iraq war, study says
I'm with it.
Gonna be hard to avoid the third party thing, though, if the GOP becomes the Giuliani/Romney/Schwarzeneggar "post-partisan" Unprincipled Party.
Job One is to keep that from happening.
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