Posted on 03/21/2007 4:00:56 PM PDT by etlib
...
Instead, the party’s presidential front-runners represent its liberal or corporate wings. These factions may have advocates among the elite—Beltway lobby groups, policy institutes, business councils, magazine writers and newspaper editorialists—but their support among voters is thin. Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney have not caught fire with the Republican base for one simple reason: They are liberals masquerading as conservatives.
...
And this is precisely the problem not only with the GOP’s leading candidates, but with Republicans as a whole: They no longer believe in the core principles of the conservative movement. They long ago stopped caring about shrinking the size of government, securing the country’s borders, defending basic Judeo-Christian values, restoring civilized decency to our culture or winning the war in Iraq. They pay lip service to conservative principles. Yet they care only about power, perks and privileges.
...
The November midterm elections should have taught Republicans that they ignore these frustrated conservatives at their peril. If Savage urges his hard-core millions of listeners to stay home on Election Day, he can swing the ’08 election to the Democrats. By ignoring its conservative base, the GOP is on a one-way street to political defeat and permanent minority status. Lincoln, Goldwater and Reagan must be turning in their graves.
(Excerpt) Read more at insightmag.com ...
for later
We do care, about conservative issues, it is just every time we elect someone that says they will vote our way.
We are mislead and used just to get them elected.
We need a real champion.
Not these wanna a be's
Marking.
It wopuld be more helpful to have 5 million supporters go out for a real candidate like Hunter or Tancredo.
What about Fred?
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus
. Unless Republicans repair the growing breach, they will lose again in 2008. This time the cost to the country may very well be a Hillary presidency.
No No No, people are not "getting it", the reason "why" we are beign swamped by Rudy etc is because there isn't a dime's worth of difference between Either Rudy or Hilliary.
Does anyone serious think that a President Guiliani would be all that different from a President Hilliary?
The deck looks like it is stacked folks, instead of "repairing the breach" they merely are offering whitewash for the hole in the form of choose lib A or choose lib B or stay home allowing A or B to win the Oval Office.
ping. Though a lot of the article is about Michael Savage, some interesting nuggets on some of our faves.
"their support among voters is thin. Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney have not caught fire with the Republican base for one simple reason: They are liberals masquerading as conservatives."
...
A very long time ago. A lot of people made the same complaints about both George Bushes.
It can be hard to separate out what the public wants from what the elite wants. On some issues, like immigration, it's pretty clear, but big government conservatism wasn't something the elites thought up by themselves.
Years ago, Congressman and medical doctor Larry McDonald was working late in his Capitol Hill office when an old friend from medical school knocked on his door. Larry rose and greeted his guest and, after exchanging the usual pleasantries, looking a bit dejected, his friend slumped into a chair.
Larry asked him what was wrong.
With a little sigh, his friend said “Every few years, a group of us have to take time away from our practices and jobs and come all the way up here to meet with our representatives and senators to try to head off some new effort to trash the Constitution. And I often get the feeling that these guys up here just aren’t listening.”
Laughing, Larry offered, “You do know, don’t you, that there’s a better way?”
“What’s that, Larry?”
“You and your friends ought to get together at home and find a House candidates who shares your values and get behind him with support and resources and REPLACE those guys who aren’t listening. And if there is no candidate with those qualifications, go out and CREATE one – maybe even run yourself! And if, down the road, the new guy stops listening to you, work to replace HIM. The beauty of the House of Representatives is that the Founding Fathers designed it so that these folks have to come home every 24 months to get their tickets punched by the voters. And as we both know, the taxing and spending occur in the House. If the lower house refused to fund some liberty destroying or unconstitutional agency or program, it just won’t happen.”
“But, Larry, how do we convince the rest of the voters that the incumbent needs to be replaced?”
“That used to be a real challenge since poll after poll asking folks what they thought of congress usually got very negative answers. But when asked how they thought THEIR guys were doing up here got responses indicating that THEIR guys were doing a good job. There’s a new program called Tax Reform Immediately (TRIM) that uses only one yardstick for its quarterly rating of every member of congress – the United States Constitution.” (http://www.trimonline.org)
“Does it work, Larry?”
“One of my favorite stories about that is the 16 year-old paperboy out in the Midwest who every quarter paid to have 10,000 TRIM Bulletins printed and threw them on his route and in another 9,500 lawns in his district – FROM HIS BIKE! After 3 quarters of that, the incumbent was ousted for someone who more closely represented the views of the voters. On election night, the red-faced loser was interviewed on TV and, waving a TRIM Bulletin, sputtered that it was a right-wing plot to “get him.” It was GREAT TV.”
“A ‘plot’ by a 16 year-old paperboy.” Larry and his guest laughed.
“And it’s happening all over the country – even in my state, Georgia. My supporters down there are keeping the voters in the 7th informed about my votes up here. Since my only standard is the Constitution, they keep sending me back. So it works both ways: The good guys get reelected and the bad guys get sent home – or hang around as lobbyists.” Another chuckle.
“But what about the presidential election?”
“While important, if we had 300 or so decent representatives up here on the Hill, they’d take back much of the power they’ve shipped down to 1600 over the past years and the 4 year beauty contest would become far less important than it now is. A metaphor for these elections for president, representatives and senate is a 3 card Monte game: While everyone is focused on the card marked with the “P,” the “R” and “S” cards are largely ignored.”
Larry’s friend returned home, got his friends and neighbors up to speed with TRIM – and within a year, had a new and improved representative.
Is that why we have so many great representatives now?
No, it's because the dumb masses (say it fast for maximum effect) -- depending on their economic station -- won't turn off ET/VHI/MTV, American Idol or come off the golf course or off the boat to BECOME INVOLVED in the process scores of thousands died to TRY to leave us.
Larry also often told us that if this country COULD be saved, it would be saved by truck drivers and waitresses 'cause the folks who have the MOST to lose -- who have benefitted most from the system being dismantled before our very eyes -- typically do the least because their equally foolish and jaded friends would think them not "cool."
It's simple: our leaders and our base are like members of a basketball team that are not on speaking terms. HOW CAN WE WIN THE GAME IF WE DONT PLAY TOGETHER WELL?
Forget about blaming one side or the other side ...
- if Michael Savage and other mouthpieces start bashing the leaders
- if our leaders dont deliver on the positions we care about
- if the grassroots activists go 3rd party
etc.
Acts of divisiveness create division. Division creates a smaller number and a nonfunctional team. if all that happens how can we expect to win in 2008? A smaller number creates a losing team. Democrats win. WE LOSE.
I have come to some conclusions:
#1) BASHING PRESIDENT BUSH IS COTNERPRODUCTIVE AND FUTILE. Don't join that game. He needs our support and going along with the Bush-haters now is just an invitation to say "President Hillary Clinton"
DONT ATTACK THE PERSON. IF YOU DISAGREE WITH A POLICY, FIND THE PERSON AND POLICY THAT YOU *DO* SUPPORT AND FOCUS ON HIGHLIGHTING THAT.
#2) STOP TELLING ME WHAT YOU ARE AGAINST, TELL ME WHAT YOU ARE *FOR*! We have let ourselves get into a reactionary rut because our own leaders lack vision. Screw that. Tell me what you are for, get a positive agenda and positive energy out there about what we should be doing.
#3) ALIGN YOUR THOUGHTS, ACTIONS, VOICE AND VOTE. The 4-fold path to save America - Think right, act right, speak right, vote right!
#4) THE MEDIA REMAINS THE REAL ENEMY/CHALLENGE. Change media bias and we can change the calculus of our culture and politics. Fight media bias!
You can defend conservative values without tearing down Republican leaders (and thereby doing what the democrat liberals want to see - a 'divide-and-conquer' strategy to destroy the Republican coalition; note for example that some 'fiscal conservatives' have bought the liberal koolaid about social conservatives being the enemy of fiscal conservatives; hogwash but some believe it.)
And they were absolutely correct.
bumping that
One more problem there.
It is not the truck drivers and waitresses watching ET/VH1/MTV. They are juggling extra hours and probably have another job to handle the bills.
The ones that benefitted from the system have the lobbying money.
We are out dollared.
And being "out dollared" is a REAL part of the problem.
Now that the state has the ability to create all the "dollars" they need without even asking US, they have no reason to ask our opinion.
See below for more that you ever wanted to know about how bad things REALLY are and why some of the Founding Fathers would be in the streets with guns were they still here.
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