Fact of life: this is a two-party country. People have started conservative third parties, and they’ve gone nowhere. Case in point: The Constitution Party.
Consider the case of Rep. Ron Paul who tried to mount a run for the White House as the Libertarian Party candidate and had to come back to the GOP, where he has been more successful promoting his libertarian agenda and keeps getting re-elected in his Texas Congressional district.
I’m a member of The National Federation of Republican Assemblies, an organization made up of movement conservatives working within the GOP to rebuild the Republican Party from the grassroots up. We are organized into state chapters, and we’re having quite an impact at the local and state levels in rebuilding the Republican infrastucture along conservative linees.
The Republican Assembly movement started in California, where Ronald Reagan called us “the conscience of the Republican Party.” We call ourselves “the Republican Wing of the Republican Party.”
Each of our state organizations has its own website. Here’s the url for the Narional unbrella: www.gopwing.org
Why did the Reagan Revolution wither on the vine after Reagan died and Goldwater became a senile libertarian? Reagan made one mistake of omission: He never groomed a successor.
Newt Gingrich tried to take the reigns, but he’s too much of an academic. He can articulate conservative ideals and strategies to the faithful all day long, but he’s never been able to sell conservatism to moderates, independents and Reagan Democrats. This came naturally to Reagan, the Great Communicator. He never even had to think about it.
There have been others: Brownback, Santorum, Hunter, etc. But each has his flaws, and there’s not a Great Communicator in the lot.
George Allen seemed for a while to be the logical heir to Reagan, but George stepped in his own macacca, and now he’s out of a job and in no position to lay claim to Reagan’s throne. I often wonder what Reagan would have done had he been in Allen’s shoes at the time and place of the macacca flap. I don’t know exactly what he would have said, if he would have said anything at all, but it would have made everyone at the event laugh, including the opposition’s camera guy, and Reagan’s remark would have been considered non-offensive to everyone in America.
That’s the difference between a communicator and a Great Communicator. Many conservatives believe, like me, that Fred Thompson has the potential to be a Great Communicator in the Reagan tradition. Only time will tell. He certainly has all the momentum right now.
Bear in mind that even though more Americans consider themselves conservative than liberal, neither side can win a national election without the swing vote. That all-conservative third party you’re so eager to desert the GOP for, even if it could attract all of the conservatives in America as members (improbable), would still have to convince a sufficient number of moderates, independents and Reagan Democrats to buy what you’re selling to sway a national election. And you, my friend, don’t seem to be able to make a compelling argument for your own case to conservatives. How are you going to convince swing voters?
And why walk away from all that research, all the voter lists, all the financial backers, the organizers, the volunteers who faithfully pound the sidewalks and knock on doors every election? You want to re-invent the wheel. In politics, that’s pure suicidal foolishness. Al Gore didn’t re-invent government; he just played a shell game with the numbers. Government doesn’t need re-inventing. What it needs is to be put on a diet, put inside a security fence, taught not to poop in people’s yards and made to wear a leash and collar. Likewise, the Republican Party doesn’t need to be re-invented. It needs a good flea and tick treatment to get rid of all the parasites that are sapping its strength and making it weaker.
The bottom line is that the Grand Old party is still the best vehicle available for conservatives to get their candidates for all levels of government office elected.
Join the Assembly movement! Take back the GOP and make what the founders, Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan worked so hard to build become what it can and should be.