Posted on 03/01/2010 9:48:23 AM PST by NormsRevenge
Reporting from Washington - With healthcare legislation mired in partisanship, "tea party" activists on the march and GOP leadership dominated by conservatives, Capitol Hill looks like a parched landscape for the withered moderate wing of the Republican Party.
But green shoots are sprouting in Washington and on the campaign trail. A small band of Republican moderates in the Senate broke a logjam on jobs legislation. They added to their ranks with the arrival of another New England Republican, Scott Brown. And several moderate Republicans are in a good position to win Senate seats in November.
Rep. Michael N. Castle, one of the most liberal Republicans in the House, is heavily favored to win an open Senate seat in Delaware.
Rep. Mark Steven Kirk, the GOP nominee for the U.S. Senate seat in Illinois, handily won the party's primary despite opposition from conservatives.
Other centrist Senate candidates -- such as former Reps. Tom Campbell in California and Rob Simmons in Connecticut, and Gov. Charlie Crist in Florida -- still face conservative opposition in primary contests that are seen as battles for the ideological soul of the party.
But more is at stake. Additional moderates in the Senate could provide a more durable foundation for breaking logjams than any White House summit or lecture on bipartisanship.
"Casting votes that are opposed by the party leadership is very difficult," said Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, one of five Republicans who voted with Democrats to end a filibuster on the jobs bill. "I'm very optimistic the elections this year are going to bring back a resurgence of the center."
That seems paradoxical as Democrats prepare to enact President Obama's healthcare bill without any Republican support. ..
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
quite a few on this list will survive and advance the next couple elections..
http://www.republicanmainstreet.org/index.php/ElectedMembers
follow the money ... and then ask the GoP why they support them.
Susan collins would'nt know "the center" if it jumped up and bit her on one of her HORNS..
I see this happening too. Conservatives are cheerleading Brown, The guy from Delaware, That Republican from California hoping to take Barabra’s seat, The governor from Texas. It is stunning, but I guess having RINOs is better than Democrats in conservatives’ minds. I am just not sure about that. I would rather 41 perfect conservatives than 20 conservatives and 40 RINOs. Yes even with a majority. We had the majority during Bush years and nothing got done. Yes tax cuts which were good, but they did the 50 vote majority just like the Democrats are planning. RINO’s are horrible!!!!
LA Times, that’s ALL you need to know about this BS article.
Look, pubbies in the northeast and other blue states are not, and can’t be, the same as real conservatives in other parts of the country. Brown, and some others, will be elected because independents are fed up with high taxes and high govt spending..social issues have nothing to do with it..
Norm Coleman voted
No on Drilling Anwr..
and we got FRanken as a result.
Stuck on Stupid.
You’re right about the majority, when they had power, they acted like a bunch of timid puppies
Be my guest and vote for all the Rinos you want.
California has more than a couple running..
You can clean up the mess too. ;-)
“...and GOP leadership dominated by conservatives...”
Street price of crack come down or something?
Nice try, doofus. You no longer influence events. Moderate Republicans ain't getting our attention.
video-Meg Whitman: Romney handpicked me and "I'm A Huge Fan Of Van Jones"
The remaining state primaries will hopefully thin the herd a bit..
How will this play with the media’s narrative that each Republican is more extreme than the next?
This article may technically be correct, but it misses the bigger picture. There will be more moderates because the nation is shifting to the right this election season. Therefore in districts that were once considered safe for liberals, moderates like Scott Brown are winning. What the article fails to note, is all the swing districts that elected democrats that ran as moderates in 2006-2008 are returning to conservative republicans in 2010.
One can only hope. I'm looking forward to saying goodbye to Walt Minnick (ID-1). If he's so conservative, why is he a Democrat?
LALAtimes spin.
“moderates” poised.
not conservatives.
the damage control has started.
The last thing that we need in this country is more centrist politicians. A centrist is a politician that has fuzzy moral values.
Great! More RINOs. Just what the doctor ordered. The demise of the stupidcans continues.
Hell no on Mark Kirk, Liberal- Illinois.
Minnick scored a 44 (or 56% liberal) rating from the ACU for 2009. That would make him a liberal Republican were he to switch parties, so he wouldn’t switch because he couldn’t win renomination. Funny thing is, the core voting bloc of the Democrats is so far to the left, Minnick scoring a 44 makes him the equivalent of Jesse Helms in the party, but he’s still left-of-center in the overall scheme of things.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.