Conservatives Have Stepped In It Again!

When searching for answers as to how we got here in America - here being a steadily accelerating march into Democratic Socialism - there is plenty of blame to go around. Personally, I don’t see an innocent individual in the lot.

Those who consider themselves to be the most politically astute people in America, conservatives, have once again been out-foxed by those they call ignorant. Forest Gump’s momma was right; stupid is as stupid does! Steeped in worthy principles, yes. Politically astute? You must be kidding…

America has exactly the mess of a government it deserves because it always has the government it elected. No matter which partisan group we claim our own, there is no escaping responsibility for where we are as a nation today. In reality, our messy government is a precise reflection of our very messy electorate.

But as a lifelong conservative myself, I want to focus on my conservative brethren in this column. I want to talk to my own peeps!

Before we can advance a conservative agenda in America, we will have to figure out how to advance a conservative agenda within our own party first. Conservatives are going to have to face some hard realities about how our agenda became only a fringe side-show in a nation where most of the population is actually far more conservative than the government it keeps electing.

So they keep losing and conservatives have once again positioned themselves, or allowed themselves to be positioned, to lose again in 2008. The fact is, they have done both.

Conservatives have proven themselves to be the most ineffective political constituency in America today. The track record can be summed up no other way. Although they represent the principles and values of more than 70 percent of Americans, they can’t seem to get their act together or lead that 70 percent of the country in a single direction. So, the better organized minority movement wins.

Unlike their opposition across the aisle, who not only find a way to give themselves several good socialist nominees to choose from, but find a way to hand pick their Republican opponent in each election cycle as well, conservatives can’t even figure out how to advance a conservative candidate within their own party.

Now, conservatives can uncharacteristically blame everyone else if they want, but if this doesn’t change, the conservative movement is indeed dead in America. If it’s not our fault, then it’s not within our power to fix it. I prefer to believe it is our fault for this reason alone.

Frustrated conservatives are right. Their party is currently controlled by liberal-lites running the RNC and it is very difficult to advance a conservative agenda in this environment. But they are wrong when they accept no individual responsibility for how that came to be. If they continue to accept no responsibility for the errors of the past, then they have no power to change those errors in the future. Such a move is equal to blind surrender.

To advance a conservative agenda in today’s Republican Party, we will have to advance it against the will of the current Republican National Committee leadership, which is clearly convinced that they must join Democratic Socialists in the pander war, just to compete with them on a national stage. Are they right?

Conservatives have stepped in this trap repeatedly over the last several election cycles and as of this writing, they still don’t recognize the trap, let alone how to avoid stepping in it again and again.

Conservatives are all about their principles, as they should be. They are also all about individuality. They seldom see a need to play well with others in pursuit of a common goal. They are the most independent minded folks on earth and they are always firm in their personal belief structures, so much so, that they will go down in flames before conceding a single issue, in the name of principle.

As a staunch conservative myself, I very much identify with the standard characteristics of the average American conservative. I too am very opinionated, principled and committed to my beliefs, sometimes to the ultimate detriment of those very principles.

But as a political analyst, I also see how these natural conservative characteristics are exploited in the political process, at the expense of the conservative movement at large.

In short, conservatives have been repeatedly triangulated on the issues by the opposition. They have been systematically set up in the primaries, to take the fall in the general election no matter which direction they turn. Time after time, the election is over for conservatives, before it even begins. Then conservatives fight to make themselves completely irrelevant.

Contrary to common claims made in the current infighting among conservatives, conservatives never fail to be conservative. They don’t know how to be anything else. What they fail to be is united in that effort.

Unlike conservatives, liberals are all about group think and group movement. Liberals are not independent minded nor are they individually responsible for anything. They think together and move as one, because they take the need to unite and their individual responsibility to play an active part in the group, very seriously. Conservatives oppose this very notion by nature of being conservative and divided, they fall, election after election.

The 2008 Republican primaries provide a vivid glimpse into just how true this is. Conservatives were very committed to their individual ideas of what conservative means, so much so that they remained completely divided between no less than eight primary candidates, each of them more conservative than John McCain. Divided among the eight, the liberal wing of the party was able to unite and advance the most liberal Republican candidate in the race, John McCain.

Once the RNC has a candidate who is almost as liberal as the Democratic Socialists running in the DNC, conservatives are caught in the very trap they were trying to avoid. No matter which direction they turn in the general election, they will be supporting another national shift to the left, even if they refuse to play any part at all.

If they vote for the RNC leftist who emerged from the RNC primaries with 35 percent of the Republican vote, they are voting for a shift to the left. If they stay home on Election Day, vote third party or write in some non-factor, they are allowing Democratic Socialists across the aisle to win by default, just as Clinton did in 1992 and 1996 with less than 50 percent of the popular vote.

If they cross over in protest and vote for a Democratic Socialist to teach the RNC a lesson, they have voted for a giant leap to the left and the only message they are sending the RNC is that the RNC must move even further left in the next election cycle to get back those votes that went Democrat in the last cycle.

Checkmate! No matter which direction conservatives move now, they are moving the nation left, at odds with all of the principles and values they hold dear. Stupid is as stupid does!

Like a pit viper backed into a corner, out come the fangs. Now cornered and pissed off, conservatives have their fangs out and they lash out at everything that moves. Anyone who failed to support their guy in the primaries is the enemy now. Anyone who sees the need to at least block a giant leap to the left in November is also an enemy.

Reality is, only about 35 percent of Republicans support John McCain. The other 65 percent who voted against McCain can never be accurately accused of supporting McCain, only opposing the greater opposition.

But more than 35 percent will indeed vote for McCain come November. Not because they have some new found love for John McCain or his many shortcomings, but because they will be NO part of sitting the First Family of Political Crime, Presidents Clinton, or the freshman cut-n-run Marxist from Illinois in the Oval Office.

Isn’t it funny how those who openly oppose Clinton and Obama are now seen by some conservatives as liberals, the enemy, when it is their vote or non-vote, of conservatives to angry to think straight, that will elect the most Socialist candidate running for office in the name of opposing McCain?

The infighting among conservatives has reached a deafening pitch. To see just how dangerous a cornered conservative can be to his movement, consider these postings at a well-known conservative discussion board Free Republic.

In reaction to my recent New Media Journal column titled “Why Conservatives Must Vote in 2008,” and some of the posters, hundreds of blogging conservatives lash out against their conservative brethren. So consumed by rage once cornered in the same old trap, they lose all perspective of who the real enemy is and cannibalize their own movement.

“This article was written by a self-important self-flagellating idiot. My conservative vote did not count for a whole lot in moving forward a conservative agenda whenever I voted for guys named George Bush. Now, this clown blames conservatives for being SO POWERFUL as to being blamed for allowing the Democrats to takeover congress. What I did at the polls in 2006 had NOTHING to do with the Republicans losing the congressional majorities. And if the Hillary the Republicans greatest hope for retaining the WH does not get the nomination, my conservative vote will have little to do with the 2008 election.” – Freeper by the screen name Biblebelter

“I think the RNC is going to be very surprised at the vote total for conservatives that do NOT coattail for McCain.” – Freeper, The Citizen Soldier

“If I vote my conscience, none of the current GOP or DEM candidates will get it. If I decide to hold my nose, McCain will get my vote. IF I decide to hold my nose. Your telling me that if I don't vote for McCain is voting for Hitlery or Obomba is not making me think of voting for McCain.” – Freeper, Just another Joe

“Just more McCainite fearmongering they think they can bully us with. Sorry, but my greater fear is we get another Arnold Schwarzenegger. A Hillary or Obama might give us a GOP majority in ‘10.” – Freeper, Free Vulcan

“At what point do you just realize it’s over. Nobody thinks the Rat party is going to go back to being a southern, agrarian, pro-slave party. The shift to a big government, elitist, urban party was incremental and permanent. The shift of the Republican Party BACK to a big government, elitist, country club party is permanent. The majority of the party is not in control in which case the majority should leave the system in which we get screwed.” – Freeper, demshateGod

These are but a few from hundreds of comments. Not all of them are self-defeating like these. The issue isn’t whether or not these posters have a valid point, but rather, what is the productive nature of their point? Can anything productive come from the massive infighting underway with the conservative base of the Republican Party? Anything positive for conservatives I mean?

“The McCattle have already surrendered and become democrats.”- Freeper, cripplecreek - This comment on the basis of opposing Obama and Clinton?

Have conservatives really lost sight of who the real enemy is here? Do they really accept no personal responsibility for how we got here, or what happens next? Are they really throwing in the towel, not just for the GOP, but for the nation, or are they simply having a momentary temper tantrum?

Most disturbing to me when reading comments on a conservative discussion board like Free Republic, is the fact that you will rarely read a comment based on a productive idea of how to change what every conservative is indeed upset about.

Hundreds of complainers and finger-pointers can be read at Free Republic and countless other conservative blogs. But for all the principled opposition to what is happening to our party and our country, where are the conservative ideas of what to do about it? These kinds of comments are suspiciously absent among conservatives at present.

Conservatives are supposed to be part of the solution, not a part of the problem. Yet they seem unable to move beyond their rage to a place where productive solutions can emerge. I expect this kind of emotionally charged hand wringing and indiscriminate lashing out from liberals, but from conservatives too now?

There is but one reason. Conservatives failed to unite to move their agenda forward. Divided, they have fallen. Continuing to divide will only worsen the problem, not provide a solution.

My grandfather was a WWI veteran and although he passed many years ago, he remains one of my heroes today. He repeated the following advice so many times as I was growing up, that there was no way to wash it from my memory.

He would say, “If you have nothing productive to add to the conversation, say nothing at all. That alone will be more productive.”

Conservatives are getting their ass handed to them by an anti-American minority and the best response they can come up with is to beat on each other in a fit of rage and further divide their foot soldiers? Well, they bicker and divide at their own demise…

1) McCain sucks! But one of three candidates will sit in the Oval Office for the next four years, McCain, Clinton or Obama. When faced with three dangerous attackers, and only two bullets left, shoot the two most dangerous attackers and go hand to hand with the least of the threats remaining. To address none of the three is certain suicide. 2) Most Americans are far more conservative than the governments they elect. The socialist minority will continue to win so long as conservatives fail to unite in productive measure. 3) Conservative principles are not welcome in any socialist country. So, stopping Democratic Socialists from sitting in the Oval Office at any cost is a must.

Or, we could spend the next seven months regurgitating all the well-known ways that John McCain is a horrible Republican alternative to the completely unacceptable Democratic Socialists he’s running against. It won’t change anything, but you can sound more conservative at cocktail parties by showing how smart you are to recognize this reality.

McCain was indeed a ten o’clock two. But he’s fast becoming a two o’clock ten! Unless conservatives want to go home and take a cold shower and wait another four years for a date, they will have to dance the least ugly girl at the party this time around.

Eliminating the two bigger threats and going hand to hand with the lesser McCain is the best they can do in 2008. But then they will have to do a better job of uniting on principle in 2010 and beyond.

Your hero, McShamnesty, is a traitor to just about everything the Founding Fathers established and my 5th great grandfather fought against when serving under then General Washington. My grandfather didn't become President either, but he's a HERO in my eyes, as well. As spy for General Washington, his actions helped during the Battle of Ticonderoga....quite an important battle, IIRC.

Indeed. I was fortunate to have been taught the heroism of Nathan Hale, the teenager who risked all--and forfeited same--regretting he had but one life to give for his country. Upon such true war heroes was our Republic founded.

My own great-to-the-fifth served (confirmed by a paysheet preserved by the Daughters of the Revolution) with Capt. Morgan's company at Ft. Pitt.

These men did not risk the perils of war, of capture and execution, of winter's hardship and impossible odds so the likes of McCain could play the modern King George, reserving for himself the fortunes of Soros; condemning his opponents to fine and imprisonment for daring exercise the rights their fathers down the generations fought to cement.

Buckley and National Review eschewed endorsement of Eisenhower and Nixon, holding out for Goldwater and Reagan.

It cannot be said Goldwater never won nationally if he threw himself on a grenade to get the Great Communicator into the Oval Office.

Again, passing on Spits-On-The-Bill-Of-Rights.

So? As the Republican party gets more liberal, they lose votes.

As they lose votes, they become irrelevant. If a political party becomes irrelevant, it dies. Or does anyone still vote for the Whig party?

I say that we let the Republican party go left. At least that way it can finally die off and a new party be founded in it’s ashes. And as conservatives are ‘problem-solvers’, we’ll most likely form a ‘conservative’ party as a replacement.

PS: obviously you’ve forgotten that the revolt of the conservatives in 1992 also led us to have Gingrich’s ‘Republican revolution’ in 1994.

but id does make you a helper for both Clinton and Obama.

I get it. Say what you mean, do not beat around the bush. Play McCain's only card. Play the traitor card. Anyone who does not support McCain against the evil Democrats is a traitor. You have spent hours and hours pimping for McCain because it makes you FEEL good and not only that it feeds into your delusion of moral superiority. Fine call me a low down dirty traitorous dog for not supporting McCain. That is what it is all about, you are so insecure that you are willing to spend hours and hours in cyberspace making arguments against those who you deem intellectually and morally inferior for not adopting your pragmatic embrace of McCain. If not voting for McCain, makes me a traitor and moron so be it.

You still don’t get it...

I can and will live with that. And I am certainly willing to suffer the likes of you and yours. I get it alright, your pragmatism makes you morally and intellectually superior to me, and your insecurities are appeased by going to extremes to show me how stupid and treacherous that I am, for not choosing the one of only two paths that you chose.

While I agree with much of his analysis, the following comment makes me laugh outloud with its dishonesty:

each of them more conservative than John McCain.

I'm sorry, but none of the "conservatives" trying to claim they were THE conservative to rally behind had remotely the track record of being staunch convservatives let alone more conservative than McCain. Thompson and McCain were virtual twins in their voting records and were buddy buddy the entire time Thompson was in the Senate. Huckabees record is compeletely driven by leftist policies, and Romney was no conservative, though he tried darn hard to buy enough PR to convince folks he was.

I agree conservatives shoot themselves in the foot, because they frankly act childish. Politics in a democratic system is inately a social activity.. you can't just say if you won't play the way I want I'm going to go home... You have to accept the realities that while you hold principle A dear to you, others may not, and while you are free to hold that principle to think that if you don't get your way on that, you witdraw completely means that principle will never every be addressed.

So what???? Is the National Right to Life Association not at the epicenter of the pro-Life movement? Are they not at least to some degree, the nationa standard for that movement? So what??? A 100% pro-life voting record is a so’what??? You are making yourself look silly...

The only one making themselves look silly is you.
NRTL has prostituted themselves during this election cycle and are no longer relevant and certainly can no longer be referred to as the torch bearer for the movement.

Fred DOES NOT have a 100% pro-life voting record. That was part of the revisionist Fred history and was consistently repeated and became truth for some folks.

Here is the quote from the endorsement of Fred:
"In making its endorsement, National Right to Life considered the position of candidates on the life issues, their records on the life issues and their ability to win."

The NRTL endorsed Fred Thompson. Fred’s track record on their own website show’s him with an average of 65.3% during his last 6 years in the senate. They should have scrubbed their website before making that glowing endorsement. Guess they were wrong on all counts...position, record and ability to win.

Now they endorse MeInsane??? His average for the same 6 years was 59%. They are batting 1000! Wonder if it has something to do with the lead up to that nasty McCain-Feingold-Thompson legislation where they were investigated by Fred's committee in 1996 along with the Clinton's?

If GOP conservatives bolted in ‘06, then why did moderates lose as bad or worse than conservative candidates? Your theory contradicts reality because you’re desperate to fit the facts into the McCainite ‘blame the GOP conservatives’ schtick.

A prime example is Jim Leach, who represented my district. My district is majority Dem, and Leach voted both against the war and was a pretty reliable fiscal hawk. He has a broad base of support in both parties and independents. The accusation that the GOP conservatives stayed home doesn’t fit with the numbers as to why he lost.

Same for Perot. It wasn’t just GOP conservatives bolting from Bush. Perot was a populist that pulled from both Clinton and Bush and from both parties and independents. If he didn’t Clinton would have gotten more than 50% of the vote. It’s obvious more than GOP conservatives split their vote.

The whole ‘it’s the GOP conservatives fault’ goes against your original premise anyway, which is a large majority of the country is conservative to some degree. That means when the GOP moves left, it loses conservative support regardless of degree or party affiliation. That’s what happened with Leach specifically and the ‘06 election generally, and what happened with Perot in ‘92.

Which brings us to the whole crux of the matter, and the major contradiction to your whole argument. Why, if the majority of the country is conservative as you say, WHY DOES THE GOP KEEP MOVING LEFT??!! Why do the keep moving to a minority position? Especially when we have the Reagan model of reaching out to conservatives of all degrees and party affiliation (Reagan Democrats)?

Which begs the question: who is leaving who? If the GOP keepings moving from the majority to the minority, who exactly is shooting themselves in the foot? Who is being the defiant rebel? Who is infighting against their own and going off the reservation? Who is turning the country over to far left socialists?

And that is the real problem. You Tammany hall country clubbers want to rule the GOP and dictate the direction it goes (i.e. LEFT). The problem is YOU are the minority and YOU are the one infighting, splitting off, and engaging in self-defeating behavior. You asked what the RNC has learned from this? Apparently nothing. The problem is you and they need to 180 your perspective and realize it is YOU who is in the MINORITY and needs to come around to us.

Until the RNC does that, it will keep losing. Meanwhile, I’ll put my effort into real conservative candidates and let the country clubbers die on the vine. And that is exactly where they are headed.

More to the point, why does the GOP seem to assume that the desirability of its candidate to a particular voter is a monotonic function of left/right distance? Oftentimes a "compromise" position is the least sensible.

For example, suppose a state is deciding whether to dig a tunnel through a particular hill. Proponents of the tunnel want to dig the tunnel and a cost of $10B. Opponents want to dig no tunnel, at a cost of $0. Even if it looked like the proponents of the tunnel were going to get it through the legislature, would it make any sense for tunnel opponents to propose digging a tunnel halfway through the hill for a cost of $6B? Even if the tunnel didn't make a whole lot of sense, and even if the alternative to "compromise" would be that $10B got spent digging the whole thing, I would suggest that would still be a better outcome than a $6B half tunnel.

Indeed, even if the tunnel were totally worthless, the $10B tunnel would probably still be better than the $6B half-tunnel. After all, once the $6B has been spent, can anyone who went along with the "compromise" reasonably argue against spending another $6B to complete the tunnel? Rather than saving money, the "compromisers" will end up costing an extra $2B.

As though that's not bad enough, consider what happens if, during the extra year required for construction (thanks to the compromisers) the people and businesses that were supposed to be served by the tunnel move so they can be served by other thoroughfares, with the net result that almost nobody uses the $12B tunnel. Who's going to be blamed for that boondoggle? The tunnel proponents? Unlikely. The compromisers? Maybe, though not as thoroughly as they should. Most likely, the tunnel opponents who never favored the tunnel in the first place will get blamed for the $12B boondoggle even though they did all in their power to prevent it.

A RINO is not a "lesser of two evils". In many cases, he'll end up being the worse.

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