Posted on 01/31/2008 5:27:28 AM PST by pissant
With John McCain’s all-too-easy road to the nomination paved through Florida and now nearly complete one thing is clear: The Republican Party has been hijacked. Over the past month a new Axis of Evil has emerged -- not one based in Damascus, Tehran or Pyongyang -- but instead in Cedar Rapids, Charleston, South Carolina, Derry, New Hampshire and Boca Raton, Florida. It is the liberal and “independent” voters in these 4 states that have nearly completed a deed that makes Kim Jong Il envious -- the near crippling of the American Electoral System. These four states have combined their native liberal populism with an imported liberal electorate and have forced the GOP to accept a nominee so distasteful that in more than one poll -- the numbers of voters choosing not to vote and those choosing to vote third party actually exceed those who will hold their nose and vote for Maverick, War Hero, Amnesty Supporter, John McCain.
I can hear you saying, “surely you aren’t saying that South Carolina has gone liberal -- are you?” Are you kidding me? Drive through the Carolinas and count the number of license plates from NJ, NY and Pennsylvania. There is not much Dixie in the Carolinas; it’s more like Trenton and Long Island with fireworks. “But”, you protest, “New Hampshire, is Live Free or Die, it’s been a backbone of conservatism since the 1950’s.” No longer my friends -- NH has become an exurb of Boston, with Boston’s sensibilities and, ugh, their voting tastes. NH hasn’t been reliably conservative since Reagan’s first term. These voters would rather be loved by the Boston Globe, than respected by the Union Leader.
But the evidence continues, you say, “Iowa, that’s America, with small town values and homespun sensibilities.” Wrong again -- Iowa is just a state brimming with farmers on the federal dole, college students and ex hippie professors looking to con, libs in training at Grinnell.
And Florida? As my bubbies would say in Bay Ridge -- puhleeeez. It’s the 6th borough and has been since the mid 1960’s. Liberals have been sliding down the I-95 corridor since Kennedy was elected.
Sadly these 4 states have done more than set the tone for the other 46 -- they’ve dictated terms. Frankly I could extend the analogy to include Nevada, which is down to about 13% native -- but why beat a dead horse.
What we have is the sick and twisted dreams of Pinch Sulzberger, Don Imus, Maureen Dowd, Keith Olbermann and Chris Matthews come true: the GOP has been forced to choose a nominee designed to cause the base to retch, and thereby not vote. Guaranteeing 4 years of Clinton score settling or Obama socializing entire corporate sectors.
Its time to simultaneously bring back democracy to the GOP and defang the left and her Rockefeller accomplices in the new Axis of Evil. It’s time for the nuclear option -- its time for the GOP to front-load the whole freaking process into one date. Make every state vote on exactly the same day. Make every candidate compete in EVERY state at the exact same time and hold every single GOP primary and caucus on Super Tuesday. When NH and IOWA complain, take a page from the Democrats and refuse to seat their delegates, or better yet, declare renegade states as straw polls.
This would balance our nomination process out. There will be no more “Big Mo”, no more singular precincts in obscure Iowa towns setting the tone for the rest of the country. If liberals from Englewood Cliffs NJ want to vote liberal, it’s going to get cancelled out by conservatives in Chattanooga -- who might actually get to vote for Fred. Its time to let Nebraska count as much as New Hampshire. Let Texas matter as much as South Carolina, let Florida be canceled out by California -- as it should be. The only two groups who have benefit from the current process are the media flacks selling the drama and John McCain establishment hacks. Does anyone think Fred Thompson got a fair hearing? Or Duncan Hunter? John McCain does not speak for me…or frankly for any one else, I know.
Folks, we have let the liberals and RINOS set the agenda. Open Borders, Higher Taxes, and surrender to Kyoto-worshipping technocrats. This is the Republican Party? But hey, the McCainiacs counter, “John McCain is a war hero -- right?” Let me be the first to say it’s not about what you did in the 60’s sir -- it’s about what you will do to America in 2009 and beyond.
This is our party, not John McCain’s or Mel Martinez's, or Lindsay Graham’s. The Republican Party is THE conservative party dammit. Let’s admit it and take it back. RINOS and Liberals have taken the GOP plane hostage, and its time for us passengers to revolt…and do what has to be done -- Let’s Roll.
Whether intentionally engineered or not, the GOP was split into virtually every major faction of the party, with one candidate for each group and two for the limited-government conservatives. Limited-government conservatives went with Hunter and Fred, Evangelicals went with Huckabee, social-conservatives (and many fawning women) went with Romney, the old hawks went to McCain, and the rest went to media darling Rudy. Most ‘Pubbies simply will not switch candidates until “their man” bows out of the race.
As such, it became a simple “war of attrition”, and whoever stays vertical for the longest period will likely win. The MSM is doing their part to make sure that the remaining GOP candidates are “centrists” (to put it mildly). Well, they’ve been successful.
Imagine what the race would’ve been like if it was simply Romney, Keyes, Ron Paul, Rudy, Tancredo and Fred (without Huckabee or McCain). I’d dare say that Fred would get the majority of the McCain defense voters, a fair share of the Evangelicals, and enough of the rest to make him a statistical dead-heat with Romney.
Oh, well. So much for pipe dreams from a limited-government conservative.
I’ve long been fascinated by the differences between multi-member competitions that drop competitors one-at-a-time (like American Idol) and head-to-head tournaments (like the NCAA’s “Big Dance” basketball tournament). As we’ve all seen on American Idol, often the best performers get tossed out quite early, simply because the votes are so fractured among a larger number of competitors. Despite the fact that Singer X would beat the snot out of any other competitor head-to-head, they can easily lose in a multiple-person scenario... and often do.
Again, whether you think there was a conspiracy or not for the GOP primary race (where FReepers have long held that the real fight for conservatism exists), the field was exactly big enough and the factions were almost perfectly aligned so that anyone even remotely Federalist had no chance of winning whatsoever.
Amen! Amen! Amen!
Exactly.
I hear ya!
Does anyone know what it would take to get all the primaries done at the same time? Seems this would be the only way each candidate got a fair shake.
I think the RNC will pay dearly for this in the long run. I predict they will find it very difficult to raise the money needed to run competitive campaigns in the future when their traditional conservative voters stop giving them money.
I for one am done. They need to change the rules and only let registered Republicans vote or this will continue to happen because the primaries are front loaded with a number of small liberal states that let the RATs and independents cross over and muck up the process.
Ther is a difference between being pro National Defense (which rp is) and pro Nation Building. Especially when the nation you are build is an Islamic Republic. Giving Islamic Radicals the power to vote for a radical Islamic Republic does not improve our situation.
Have you looked at the history of the Prime Minister Maliki's Dawa party? They supported the Iranian Revolution. They bombed our embassies.
Creating a democracy of Islamists and terrorist supporters is not an improvement nor should it be a US military objective.
If you are not paying attention to what is taking place in Iraq and Afghanistan, it would be easy to make such speculation. Outside of US forces, the people killing the most jihadis in the world are Iraqi and Afghani soldiers.
Add me to your list. As another disenfranchised voter I've been saying this for years now. I haven't truly had a choice since I started voting over 30 years ago since my primary is in May.
And as for 'write in' candidates? Poo. My state don't allow that either. And if a candidate withdraws before May? Poo again, their name is removed from the ballot. I have always been given a choice of whomever is leftover which is usually only 'the annointed one' by the time May rolls around. Amen to this article.
The problem is that Huckabee and Paul brought nothing to the table but misdirection & packs of true (?) believers , that Hunter thought he'd be speaking to adlults and on somewhat equal grounds, and that Fred is apparently content to add "former candidaate" to his resume.
Oh, yeah, and that (defining today's moderate republican as "just like the other guys") moderates highjacked the party.
Yes he does have name recognition, and I agree that he would be the PERFECT conservative candidate...except that the reason he has national name recognition is because he fell afoul of the DNC media attack machine and was deliberately misquoted as saying nasty about gays, when he was trying to explain where Lawrence vs. Texas might lead. THEN he fell afoul of the "real conservatives", because he endorsed Specter since nobody knew who the other candidate was.
THAT draws a picture of what is wrong with this party.
Talk about feeling disenfrancished!!
Just a thought, but if we are CONSERVATIVES, why don”t we belong to the CONSERVATIVE PARTY? It exists in some places (New York of all places), why not take it national?
I think state-wide winner take all primaries should only be allowed after Super Tuesday. All the primaries prior to and on Super Tuesday should be either proportional or by district. In Texas, the rules are that only if a candidate gets an absolute majority of the vote in a congressional district does a candidate win all the delegates from that district. If the top candidate just has a plurality within a congressional district, then the delegates are apportioned proportionally to the vote in that district.
What the RNC is counting on is that we will forget what has happened and just vote for McCain to "keep Hillary out." I have heard that so many times it does not resonate anymore.
Frankly I think the bigwigs are due a shock. They are going to lose voters, not just in this election, but permanently. This is not the 1960's anymore and too many people are able to share information.
Rick Santorum hates McCain. That is why I love the guy.
Absolutely. NH is totally blue. It's probably just a matter of time before an income tax and some sort of sales tax is rammed through.
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