Posted on 05/14/2008 6:19:23 AM PDT by Obadiah
In a major blow to national Republicans, a Mississippi congressional seat that once voted for President Bush by a twenty-five point margin elected a Democrat on Tuesday. Prentiss County Chancery Clerk Travis Childers beat out Republican candidate Greg Davis, the mayor of Southaven, by a 54%-46% margin, a spread that several Republican strategists on Capitol Hill characterized as a startling wake-up call for a party in dire straits.
Voters cast ballots for the fourth time in three months for the seat, vacated when Republican Roger Wicker was appointed to fill the remainder of Senator Trent Lott's term. After winning the primary and the runoff election, Childers came within 410 votes of winning the first round of the special election against Davis on April 22, beating the Republican by a 49%-46% margin.
(Excerpt) Read more at realclearpolitics.com ...
I agree. Global warming is here. We might as well gear up companies in THIS contry to make money off of it instead of other countries developing the patents and R&D first.
BIG $$$$ Money will be made off of global warming.We might as well jump on the bandwagon
“The GOP is broken and as long as they continue the present course there will be a train wreck, and maybe that’s not such a bad thing.”
Agreed. Unfortunately, we’ll in all likelihood see a President Obambi in January, 2009, and he will complete the destruction of the United States. Sadly, it appears the United States must suffer destruction before it can be saved.
More precisely Childers ran as an anti-Iraq war conservative much like the winning Democrats in 2006.
As I have said here since 2006, this is now the winning combitation for winning elections. The easy wins of Ron Paul and Walter Jones in their primaries reinforces this point.
According to Childers' website, he "believes it is time to bring the troops home “honorably, safely and soon,” while providing them with material support until that happens. He recently told this newspaper ' s editorial board that it is time to bring the troops home and spend the money we are sending to Iraq on projects in the United States.
Politicians are the only people in the world who create problems and then campaign against them.
Have you ever wondered why, if both the Democrats and the Republicans are against deficits, we have deficits?
Have you ever wondered why, if all the politicians are against inflation and high taxes, we have inflation and high taxes?
You and I don’t propose a federal budget. The president does.
You and I don’t have the Constitutional authority to vote on
appropriations. The House of Representatives does.
You and I don’t write the tax code, Congress does.
You and I don’t set fiscal policy, Congress does.
You and I don’t control monetary policy, The Federal Reserve Bank does.
One hundred senators, 435 congressmen, one president and nine Supreme Court justices - 545 human beings out of the 300 million - are directly, legally, morally and individually responsible for the domestic problems that plague this country.
I excluded the members of the Federal Reserve Board because that problem was created by the Congress.
In 1913, Congress delegated its Constitutional duty to provide a sound currency to a federally chartered but private central bank.
I excluded all the special interests and lobbyists for a sound reason.
They have no legal authority.
They have no ability to coerce a senator, a congressman or a president to do one cotton-picking thing.
I don’t care if they offer a politician $1 million dollars in cash. The politician has the power to accept or reject it. No matter what the lobbyist promises, it is the legislator’s responsibility to determine how he votes.
Those 545 human beings spend much of their energy convincing you that what they did is not their fault. They cooperate in this common con regardless of party.
What separates a politician from a normal human being is an excessive amount of gall.
No normal human being would have the gall of a Speaker, who stood up and criticized the President for creating deficits.
The president can only propose a budget.
He cannot force the Congress to accept it.
The Constitution, which is the supreme law of the land, gives sole responsibility to the House of Representatives for originating and approving appropriations and taxes.
Who is the speaker of the House?
She is the leader of the majority party.
She and fellow House members, not the president, can approve any budget they want.
If the president vetoes it, they can pass it over his veto if they agree to.
It seems inconceivable to me that a nation of 300 million can not replace 545 people who stand convicted — by present facts - of incompetence and irresponsibility.
I can’t think of a single domestic problem that is not traceable directly to those 545 people.
When you fully grasp the plain truth that 545 people exercise the power of the federal government, then it must follow that what exists is what they want to exist.
If the tax code is unfair, it’s because they want it unfair.
If the budget is in the red, it’s because they want it in the red.
If the Marines are in Iraq , it’s because they want them in Iraq .
If they do not receive social security but are on an elite retirement plan not available to the people, it’s because they want it that way.
There are no insoluble government problems.
Do not let these 545 people shift the blame to bureaucrats, whom they hire and whose jobs they can abolish; to lobbyists, whose gifts and advice they can reject; to regulators, to whom they give the power to regulate and from whom they can take this power.
Above all, do not let them con you into the belief that there exists disembodied mystical forces like ‘the economy,’ ‘inflation’ or ‘politics’ that prevent them from doing what they take an oath to do.
Those 545 people, and they alone, are responsible.
They, and they alone, have the power.
They, and they alone, should be held accountable by the people who are their bosses - provided the voters have the gumption to manage their own employees.
We should vote all of them out of office and clean up their mess!
Charlie Reese is a former columnist
of the Orlando Sentinel Newspaper
Ditto. Add free trade to the mess. Small mill towns losing their factories to cheap overseas labor does not help.
“If the Republic and the Constitution don’t die between now and 2012...we may see a conservative comeback.”
And a good number of us will likely die along with them, if it comes to that, because it is far better to die fighting for one’s honor (a patriot) and future (a free and prosperous America) than living as, at best, a subject, or worse, as a slave.
“He is not a typical republican (maveric, rino, what ever you want to label him)”
I don’t understand. You seem to be saying what I’m saying then adding “it had nothing to do with RINO’s” at the end. RINO’s are the brand name. McCain is the chief RINO but he’s running against Obama and people aren’t nuanced enough to see there’s no winning in a choice between McCain and Obama, thus they’ll vote for him.
The GOP should think about embracing smaller, less intrusive government.
Notice in our Republican primary, the candidates in the race who actually produced, worked hard and reached a successful goals in their duties, got results, were criticized for not meeting our ever-growing long list of litmus tests.
Being accomplished men no longer matters in our Party.
It looks like November is going to be a bloodbath and the way both parties act I am starting to care even less
He didn't do well in Middle East strategy. He got us bogged down in a nation building operation in Iraq when we should have rolled on, taken out the Syrians and Iranians and then pulled out. We are waging a war with international Islam and should pick grounds and circumstances that benefit us.
He wasn't very conservative when he allowed the butchers of Fallujah to get away with what they did to those two contractors.
He hasn't directed a very conservative war effort in Iraq when he has laid down “rules of engagement” which are unsettlingly reminiscent of Viet Nam.
He hasn't been very conservative about stopping the spread of Islam here in the U.S. - allowing them to come here and conduct business as usual, recruiting in Jails, etc, frequently with Wahhbist money.
He hasn't been conservative at all over illegal aliens. He has pandered to the Mexican government, incarcerated American Border guards for protecting us against illegal drug smugglers, permitted a flood of illegals to swarm over our borders and refused to effectively take punitive measures against those who aid, abet, and hire these invaders.
He wasn't very conservative when he supported the Dubai Port Scam, or tried to foist Harriet Miers off on us as a SCOTUS Justice.
His appointments or those he left in office like Minetta, Gonzales, Tom Kean Senior (9-11 Committee Chairman) etc. left much to be desired.
He has done little or nothing about the transfer of American jobs and capital to one of our deadliest enemies - Red China, while allowing them to dump contaminated food, medicine and toys here.
Overall history will judge this President very harshly.
“The economy has slowed down, but is definitely NOT “in a shambles”. Also, inflation has grown slightly, but not dramatically.”
Tell that to the Americans who have lost or are in danger of losing their mortgages, have had to loose well paying jobs to outsourcing overseas, or people on limited incomes who face skyrocketing fuel and food costs. The worst part of this is there is no end in sight.
“I doubt the average American is embarrassed by this trip. Get real!”
They should be as embarrassed and angered over this as I am. This man and his secretary of State have continually attempted to treat the thugs and criminals running Palestinian territory as though they are a legitimate nation. He support spending millions of dollars in foreign aid to Africa and Myanmar but won;t lift a finger to help Americans stuck in mortgage troubles.
“The rest of your post is right on target. No use undermining your arguments with exaggerations and distortions.”
Thanks
OK, I keep seeing people (many whom I guess are GOP voters) here on FR pointing at the government stats and saying “The economy is OK! It is the press’ fault that people think otherwise!”
Bullcrap. Here’s why the GOP is losing:
Did you see the gender disparity stat published recently about how women are gaining jobs in the US economy while men are losing jobs? The BLS showed that from last November until April, men lost 700,000 jobs, while women gained 300,000 jobs.
Who votes in the majority for the GOP? Men. White married men are the core constituency of the GOP, hands down. And the BLS reports, taken over the last year, show that they’re getting hammered in this economy. Our usual cynical refrain “Women and children hardest hit” is not true this time ‘round. Women and children are making out like bandits this time ‘round.
The idiots at the BLS also keep reporting such idiotic nonsense that “inflation is contained” - while a breadwinner can look at the price of gas and diesel fuel going up every week, without let-up. They can see inflation coming through in food. Small business owners, another GOP constituency, are getting hammered with increasing input costs. At some point, the working stiff looks at what he sees all around him and decides that the clowns in power don’t know their pompous buttocks from a hole in the ground.
And that has now happened to the GOP. What is worse is that the GOP is blissfully ignorant of what is going on - they keep looking at these government stats, rather than go out into their districts and talking to people. Ever since the blow-up on immigration, it seems as tho the GOP doesn’t want to talk to, you know, actual voters. The GOP got such an earful they decided “Whoa - those voters sure are ugly people, and they called me names! I’m not going to talk to those smelly voters again if I can help it...”
Into this environment, the national GOP keeps coming through with a “What, me worry?” refrain from the Alfred E. Neuman School of Economics. People vote their pocketbooks. That’s all you need to know about elections in presidential years: people vote their pocketbooks.
“You better be willing to die for your convictions.”
I am. I’m also willing to live for them.
Are you?
Sure it does. Millions of us worked for years to bring about Republican control of the gov't, only to have the party turn into a bunch of RINO's and increase spending faster than the dems ever did. Now, what is there to work for? What is the dream? We've lost our momentum, and the people to blame are W, Hastert, Frist, and the rest of the bunch who called themselves conservative but in reality just wanted power.
Some economist did a study on government spending and found that the country actually did better when opposing parties had leadership positions. Essentially when the parties were at odds spending was held down because either one party was either using a veto or lowering spending in order to keep the other party from taking credit. When the House, Senate and White House were controlled by the same party you end up with a blank checkbook. For years the Republicans used to claim that if only they had total control fiscal conservatism would reign supreme. That myth, along with the Republican Party's reputation, has been shattered.
Well, if McCain will carry the district perhaps the next Republican can paint Childers with the Obama brush.
“Until we remove the Rhino face off of the GOP brand, our product will be in serious trouble.”
I like that you wrote Rhino. The old RINO acronym as no meaning anymore for two reasons A) it’s over used B) The Republican party has completely adopted the characteristics that used to classify someone as a RINO. We should start our own party and call it the Republican party and call their party the Rhinoceros Party.
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