Posted on 03/13/2007 5:25:25 AM PDT by Ouderkirk
The] "Hustle" may have been a line dance we did back in the days of disco, but today it's what GOP leadership and a complicit media are trying to do to the voters responsible for the Republican Party's successes since Ronald Reagan.
Realistic chances of winning notwithstanding, there are no fewer than 13 Republicans in the contest for the 2008 presidential sweepstakes. But to hear party leadership and the media spin promote the candidates, one easily gets the impression that John McCain, Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney are not just the only candidates, but that McCain and Romney are the opening act for Giuliani as he awaits his coronation.
This is a ruse, a con, and in brief, an attempt to hustle the voters. GOP leadership is trying to "Bob Dole" us. They have, in effect, met in the smoke-filled back room of a private club and decided amongst themselves who they want in 2008. Their problem is how to deceive the voters into believing that said pick is of the voters' choosing.
Their solution: hand pick the candidate, truncate the primaries, shove the candidate down our collective throats vis-à-vis the media's promoting, interviewing and discussing (ad nauseum) McCain, Romney and Giuliani, but in such a way as to always have Giuliani shine brighter. Then, when he has garnered the nomination, we the voters will be told, "Yes, it is true he is a little more moderate than we may like," but if we don't vote for him, Hillary will win and hell will freeze over.
To which, allowing that same has no basis in theological truth, I respond, "If there be a hell on earth, and it freezes over because I vote my conscience and Hillary wins, I'll walk on ice until the party lets the voters truly have a say."
Now, my scenario may not be completely accurate, but you can bet I'm not far off base. One thing is for certain – of the 13 Republican candidates, only three of them are being touted – and don't tell me it's the fault of the other candidates, because a week ago this same media (Fox News included) was trying to convince us that the corpse of Anna Nicole Smith was newsworthy.
I watched as Republican pundits, Fox News, GOP talking heads, and other cable news shows all downplayed the tremendous success of presidential candidate Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., in the South Carolina straw poll. McCain finished two votes ahead of Giuliani, who in turn finished four votes ahead of candidate Hunter.
Even though Hunter finished in a statistical dead-heat with each, garnering 24 percent, of the vote, Giuliani was declared "the clear winner" and "the presumptive Republican presidential favorite." While these comments were without question a slap in the face to McCain, it was Hunter who they chose to disparage the most.
After all, went the reasoning on Fox News, Hunter had his son campaigning for him the entire week before the straw poll – to which Hunter, in classic fashion responded, "You know, I woke up to ... one of the commentators saying that the only reason that Hunter beat all those guys in South Carolina is because his Marine son has been there for a week. Well, I looked down at that army of consultants – everybody who was vertical in South Carolina was hired by the other guys – and I said, 'You know, that is a good match-up: One Marine versus 550 consultants.' We did have the advantage!" (From Hunter's speech given at Conservative Political Action Conference, Washington, D.C., March 3.)
My point is this: Giuliani is being touted as the "Nation's Mayor" and "the presumptive favorite" by the media and most of the GOP armada, but there are a dozen other candidates, and none more honestly conservative than Duncan Hunter.
But the armada and the media don't want you to know that. They want the voters to think there is a choice of one, and if we don't go along with said choice the sky will fall. They will tell us that our picks/choices can't win and we have to go with their guy.
It is not, however, about whether or not their choice can win – it is about whether or not their choice is fit to win. I've seen Rudy as a prosecutor, I've seen him as mayor, and I've seen him dressed up in his blond wig with heavy eye shadow and makeup, strutting about in drag (1997 mayoral spoof of Victor/Victoria).
Now, I'd like to see the media and the GOP armada of talking heads consistently acknowledge that there are a dozen other candidates, and only one of them a true conservative.
We will all (conservatives, Christians,etc)be better off if Mrs. Bill wins the election than if Giuliani wins it. If the Clinton becomes president we will have two years of hard left governance until the right takes over the House and possibly the Senate in 2010. If Giuliani wins then we will have hard left governance for so far as the eye can see with increasingly liberal Congresses. It will pretty much end social conservatism in the country as a political force.
You probably meant not instead of now, but the typo is what made your statement true.
Bob Dole is okay, but on his big nominee coming out broadcast he froze solid even more than Nixon ever did. What we need is another Eisenhower--tons of experience in doing and talking.
Nothing would please me more than to see the social right become somewhat more marginalized as a political force. But it won't because it is too well organized to give up. So as usual, the social base will whine until the nomination is locked up, and then quietly fall into line. Because deep down they know, as does most of America, that Rudy (if he is nominated) will support conservative values, though they likely will not not include social/moral issues important to the far right, but much less so to most Americans.
Great article, I was gonna post it and found it is up 3x, it is well worth the read
When the media ignores or downplays a candidate due to their ideology, which is matched by the President, one sees a pattern.
I wish the leftists here would all go to the Democrat party and at least raise the tone of the economic thinking over there a bit. But yall seem determined to convert the Republican party into a clone of the Democrats. Republicans lose elections and power that way. That is where we got 40 years of also-ran status in the Congress. Social liberals are not trustworthy on ANY subject because they have no moral base, no philosophical reason for anything.
Giuliani would do the same thing to us. If he followed through and appointed a judge, at any level, that fits what we normally think of as a strict constructionist rather than what a Northeastern leftist thinks of as a strict constructionist, that nominee will not get through the Congress and will be replaced on the second or third try with one compatible with the Left in Congress, or at the very best, one like Souter. With Mrs. Bill we get 2 years of hell followed by the insulation of a conservative House and possibly Senate. With Giuliani the situation will start bad and deteriorate long into the future. And the War is not even an argument for Giuliani. The Congress will continue to get worse on the war from now on until we get a conservative Congress back. With Mrs. Bill that is the year 2010. With Giuliani it will not happen so long as he is president and probably through the Democrat presidency that follows him because that one will probably not be Mrs. Bill.
I don't know who "y'all" is, nor do I know any leftists here. If you mean the effort to keep the Republican Party out of the hands of the social right, those are not leftists. Those are conservatives. Try and learn the difference.
Republicans lose elections and power that way.
Yes, sort of like we lost in 2006, because the independents said to hell with it and voted in the Democrats, since the Republicans could accomplish nothing but pandering to the social right.
That is where we got 40 years of also-ran status in the Congress. Social liberals are not trustworthy on ANY subject because they have no moral base, no philosophical reason for anything.
You might just give yourself a quick course in conservatism. The conservatives have a substantial philosophy that has been developed for over 200 years. And it does not include a host of quotations from the Bible, but strong, reliable principles that actually most of the Country supports. As for your moral base, you need to understand that personal morals are just that, personal. That comes under the jurisdiction of the people, who are responsible for the development of our culture. It is not the responsibility of government.
The social right has caused much damage to our Party, but with the current leadership recognizing its dangers, I feel confident that the Party will survive, grow, and prosper. It will do so by embracing all of America, not just the Christian Coalition or its successor groups. It will do so by addressing the real issues facing this Nation that most of America recognizes, even if the RR doesn't.
And if the social right can no longer tolerate conservatism, and decides to move on, I say, "Don't let the screen door hit you in the a$$"
Mr. G CANNOT get conservative judges confirmed. He will have much more determined as well as more numerous opposition in the Senate. He WILL, then, nominate "acceptable" judges, especially for USSC, because neither he nor any other Republican politician in prospect will simply let a USSC seat go unfilled. He may allow some Circuit Court seats to languish, but I rather doubt even that. He will, at best, find faceless judges to nominate as 2nd choices who the conservatives will not get too excited about and these faceless judges are faceless because they do not stand out on anything i.e. they tend to go along to get along and are subject to social influences more than others, i.e. Souters. We now have the best Supreme Court we are likely to have for a long, long time. It may be that Mr. G cannot get ANY judge confirmed to the SC if the remaining conservatives in the Senate block bad nominations, but the Republican history is one of allowing the president his choices without much fuss. The reaction to Meirs was heartening but did not have anything to do with Constitutional viewpoint, rather it was perceived competence.
Finally, something we can agree on. I don't want to banish Christians or those of any other faith from the Party. It's an organized agenda that is inconsistent with both conservatism and the interests of the American people I want to see minimized. There's a big difference.
The polity was founded on religiously derived values from several Christian sources and explicitly recognized the derivation of rights and authority from a Creator.
I see no mention of that in the Constitution, but the only mention of religion in the document prior to the enactment of the 1st Amendment was a clause ensuring that no religious test was permitted for office. That's pretty telling.
But I do recognize that the rights of man are supreme to any laws created by man. Whether they come from a Creator or from the nature of man is irrelevant. If we do not accept those rights as superior to any laws, they are meaningless. And Christianity did not perceive and ensure the guarantee of those rights, men who loved freedom did. Christianity is a wonderful religion and helps to instill a good moral base in its members. But as a governing authority, the Church has a less than stellar history going back two thousand years. Which is why the separation of Church and state is a tremendously important concept in this Nation. Religious freedom is guaranteed by our Constitution, but there is no guarantee that it's moral agenda be permitted to restrict the freedoms and rights of any Americans.
Real freemarket capitalism is not explicitly conservative though socialism is very much not conservative.
I disagree. A conservative cherishes the freedom to decide, and that can only be in a free market. Socialism is the antithesis of conservatism, and the basic economic philosophy of liberalism.
Most of our history has been full of protectionism and trustbusting and interference in the market though there has been a general assumption that people are free to do business with each other.
I agree that in general protectionism is not consistent with a free market, but I disagree wholeheartedly that trust-busting is anti-free market. In fact, the corporate market system, which, when it works is the best of all systems devised by man. But by its very nature, it has a tendency to want to consolidate into larger and larger groupings. At some point, if unchecked, it will reduce and eventually eliminate the freedom of choice, the very underpinning of our market system. The government has an obligation to ensure that our free market system remains so, and to that extent has enacted a series of rules to ensure that a relatively level playing field exists between producer/seller and buyer.
Pat Buchanan is a Conservative, though not a freemarket believer and has made some strange alliances.
Pat would like to continue calling himself a conservative, but I believe his conservative traits have taken a back seat to his radical ideas involving foreign policy, trade, prejudice and his social agenda.
If you manage to definitively take over the Republican party and ignore or force out the Christians, you will have a small regional party and the future is Demo-Socialist as far as the eye can see.
I don't want to drive the Christians out as I said before. They are the ones who are threatening to go 3d party, not me. Nor is it all Christians. Most understand very well that any Republican president is infinitely better than a Democrat. So look to those who are holding the Party hostage to an extremist agenda as the enemy of freedom and the Party. I want the Party to grow, to be a Party of all, and a Party that preserves its historical conservative philosophy, and which recognizes that personal morals are the responsibility of individuals, not of the government.
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