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 erred on the low side
;-)
When the number was 1 it was too many!
The problem with this great sounding program is the old problem that Conservatives are working people and don't really have time for organizing all those groups. The activist left mostly don't have real jobs but rather leech from the rest of us by living on tax money and grant money or on University tenure and some are just shiftless or live directly on the support of the grant and tax organizations that hustle them around the country. Some live large by blackmailing corporations who are only too happy to give in and give out. Conservatives just naturally don't live the sort of lifestyle that is regarded as superior and an inalienable Right for the left.
Of course it's no different, but guys like Vigueri want to disavow themselves from the very people who elected Reagan to two terms. That to me sounds like he wants to disavow himself from Reagan's vision of America and become totally irrelevant.
If that's his vision of Conservatism, I want no part in it.
The Republican establishment has done that pretty well by itself.
Actually that is a pretty good description of how the Democrat Left operates but Conservatives just can't live that way. It is part of being conservative. We work for our livings and for the leftist lifestyle, too. We are the ones who buy the products that support the foundations and other grant-givers and pay the taxes that the government funnels into the pockets of the Left.
I don't buy that the problem with the conservative message not getting out is the fault of the republican party. The conservatives need to bring their message into the 21st century. Sadly enough, the 80s are over.
I agree with you on both accounts.
....and we really need to "draft" Newt to be our spokesperson. He's the only one I can think of who can state our case with a degree of tact and eloquence that has been missing for the last 6 years. Regardless of his "baggage" he is by far the best person to be the "voice" of Conservatism.
So now we need to eagerly embrace and promote abortion and homosexualism, right? and ditto the Mexican invasion? and maybe it's time to confiscate all the guns? and turn over dismantling of the economy to Algore? Maybe we should turn over the ME to Iran? Then we would be oh, so modern and 21st century! and confine that so old-fashioned Christian religion to the home and require soundproofing so it won't interfere with multicultural muezzins or offend polygamists.
I know the math. I was asking you to clarify what you were saying. Do you believe it is false to claim that more have died in the American abortion holocaust than died in the German holocaust of the Thirties and Forties?
If that's his vision of Conservatism, I want no part in it.
But Viguerie was around in Reagan's days, too, and to me he sounds pretty much the same. Reagan's vision for America may be redefined these days, but back then, it was what Americans wanted. I can find nothing conflicting with Reagan's vision in what Viguierie says now. If you can find something core and specific, I would be interested in knowing.
Your definition of "conservative" must differ from mine and from that of Ronald Reagan as far as that goes.
You can't blame the Republican party for Conservatives whining and complaining of being "left out", "threatened", and "bullied" by those "big bad guys in the Republican party".
If these "true conservatives" want to affect change within the GOP that they believe they are an appendage of, they'd do well to actually show up on election day and participate in the public square of debate instead of staying home and stewing, bawling, and crying.
Too many of them did that in California during it's special election, bragged about "staying home" to everyone on FR, and they wonder why the state lurched leftward since then.
I'm tired of listless individuals.
Your interactions with me on FR have been such that I have to believe that you disavow much of what many of us consider to be "the vision for Conservatism."
For example, you and your crowd have made a bloodsport out of attacking Alan Keyes, one of the few consistent visionary proponents of constitutionalism in America these days.
So, it is very difficult for me to take you seriously when you talk about your "evangelism" for conservatism as you've described on this thread.
You believe what you want, I believe the claim is true.
Your bad attitude towards "true conservatives," as you call them, oozes out of every post. You can't help it.
Millions of conservatives worked their hearts out in the last election, and you smear them all. You, and too many of your friends on FR, continue to peddle the big lie that the loss of the Congress in the last election was the fault of conservatives, when nothing could be further from the truth.
Crying about not getting 100% of what you want in the shortest amount of time is not my idea of Conservatism. You want to wander aimlessly through the political desert another 40 years digging and looking at your navel, that's your business.
That's not what it sounded like in your original post. That's why I asked you to clarify. It sounded as if you were mocking those who compare the two holocausts.
You just have a hard time accepting reality.
You're the only one I see here "crying" about anything. "It's all the fault of those nasty 'true conservatives'!"
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