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 ...
What I've envisioned is a sort of "working on the outside while being on the inside" type of approach. I would like to see a group which works outside the party apparatus in the sense that it's primary focus is appealing directly to conservative voters to mobilise them. Don't bother with the State or the federal committees.
One potential advantage is that through this direct approach, we would hopefully swing votes the way of conservative canddiates in the primaries - regardless of what the party nabobs tried to do about it. Let's face it, that's a lot of the problem with the GOP, you have a conservative candidate in the primary, but the national committee and other party apparati give tons of money to his or her RINO opponent, who ends up winning because the conservative guy can't do anything more than put up a few yardsigns. That's what happened with Toomey up in the PA Senate race - he was a solid conservative, but Bush and the national party leaders decided that Specter the RINO was their guy, he got all the party money, and Toomey went onto the ashheap. The idea here is to provide local and statewide candidates with a much larger base of "core" conservative voters who will vote for a candidate no matter what than they might otherwise have. Instead of starting with 10-20% of GOP voters in a primary who know who they are, know their stances, etc., they could start with 30-40% and have a much easier time expanding their support.
This all would take place outside the "official" party apparatus up until the point where conservatives could be placed to take back local and State parties. I agree that trying to work top-down through the RCC and RNC will not work at all. We need to undermine the base of support that these RINO-infested organisations rest upon. Part of that involves getting conservatives elected to office at all levels, to the point where conservative elected officials simply crowd out their RINO peers, or could otherwise exert influence against the liberals in the party.
Really!
Didn't we already do that! We just went through a period where we got ourselves:
The lesson to be learned here is that the Republican party has been using conservatives to get elected for thirty years, but once elected turns its back on us. Today, the nominee doesn't even feel it necessary to give us the lip service past candidates have.
The left, on the other hand, has worked to get its people elected, however, they didn't stop there. They continually exert pressure from outside of the party to keep those elected officials towing the line. I am all for electing Republicans, but I will never again trust them to do the right thing once elected.
You and I are on the same page. How do we get started?
“....one or two of their pet issues which aren’t really even that important overall and in the long term.”
Bull. Those issues are fundamental and our country has no chance if we don’t get those right.
Or are our numbers so low that we don't have political power anymore?
Oh, our numbers are still there. The way I figure it, the average American over the course of their life has 14-15 Presidential election cycles in which they will (theoretically) be able to vote (and 28-30 biyearly elections). This means that the same people who put Reagan in office in 1980 and 1984 (7 and 6 cycles ago, respectively) are still by and large around, and still probably have about the same political views they did back then. The generation that is dying off (and not to sound morbid here) is the Rooseveltian "government got us out of the Depression, so government can do anything we want" crowd, whose votes lean Democrat. We cannot begin to overestimate the effect Rush Limbaugh and other radio talking heads who appeal directly to the people without going through the MSM have had - we've all heard the testimonials time and time again on Limbaugh, Hannity, etc. about people who were liberal Democrats but who have been "Hannitised" and so forth. The younger generation that is coming up is, in many ways, very conservative, and are in a bit of a reaction against their Baby Boomer and Me-generation parents.
So yes, our numbers are still there - but we have to give them a reason to continue to vote for us (or come BACK to voting for us!), because as we all know, Republican does not equal conservative. Many conservatives don't see the GOP as conservative anymore, and so don't vote, or vote for Democrats based on economy issues, or waste themselves on a third party boondoggle. We need to change that, and bring back the Reagan coalition. It's still there, but needs a new standardbearer.
We could do it, it really wouldn't be that hard to mobilise large numbers of people. I mean, look at Huckabee. He went from being a 5% no-name to purt-near winning the nomination, all because his base of support realised who he was, got together, and got organised, while Thompson and Hunter slept. We could do that with conservatives - who are a much broader set of people and base of support than the people who specifically liked Huckabee.
Meanwhile, in my liberal town near Hartford CT our town budget was shot down again by voters. Same thing is occurring in neighboring towns.
People are fed up with bloated government, but will any leaders listen?
How do you even know which issue(s) I was referring to?
Well, we have a ready made base of conservatives (FR) to start with. Let's start putting together a list of movement conservatives who we know who are both ideologically reliable AND more active than the average bear wrt political action. People who head up pinglists, were major runners for various conservative candidates before and during the primaries, etc. I can also see about getting ready a bulk email list and some organisation for names, email addresses, etc.
This country has survived a devestating civil war, two world wars, and 4 years of Jimmah Carter. Get some historical perspective people, grow a spine, and be ready to put your money where your mouth is.
If you truly believe in the value of conservatism you'll understand the fight is not for you but for the future generations of this great nation.
You seem to contradict yourself. While I certainly agree with you that we are a bit spoiled as Americans, nonetheless, we feed the world, give away billions, and are always the first to provide aid in a crisis.
The point is should we sit back and accept the status quo so as not to appear spoiled, or do we go out and break a few eggs to try and make things better and expand freedom and liberty?
More and more of us are emotionally and literally dependent on the Feds.
I think this is the problem, and our first and main goal should be to create a massive WAR ROOM to educate the public again.
In economics, civics, history, politics, etc.
Pretty much nailed it.
Boy, are we in deep, deep trouble.
Most of them have never had an actual job in their lives & have no clue!!
Just wondering if the Pubs really just want to lose..or are just stupid & think they know better than anyone else. Hillary is at least pretending to be like one of the regular folks - which shows what a lying bi*ch she is - & folks are so desperate for anyone trying to understand them that they will fall for it.
The GOP is going the opposite way & running on the liberal platform that regular folks can't relate to..
Immigration motivates people only when they see the politicians trying to legalize the illegals. Once the immediate threat has passed, the issue is dead.
Except that those who opposed the anti-illegal movement, they won’t forget, because they still want amnesty. People who get what they want are complacent, people who lose are energized.
Our illegal immigration stance isn’t going to save the party in November. It didn’t save us in 2006. Bush was wrong on the policy, but doing what was right hurts us in the elections.
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