Avoid Social Issues, GOP Urged (Homosexualists, Pro-Aborts Co-opt Tea Party Movement)

Politico ^ | Sunday, November 14, 2010 | Ben Smith and Byron Tau

[kristinn]

A gay conservative group and some Tea Party leaders are campaigning to keep social issues off the Republican agenda.

In a letter to be released Monday, the group GOProud and leaders from groups like the Tea Party Patriots and the New American Patriots, will urge Republicans in the House and Senate to keep their focus on shrinking the government.

"On behalf of limited-government conservatives everywhere, we write to urge you and your colleagues in Washington to put forward a legislative agenda in the next Congress that reflects the principles of the Tea Party movement," they write to presumptive House Speaker John Boehner and Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell in an advance copy provided to POLITICO. "This election was not a mandate for the Republican Party, nor was it a mandate to act on any social issue."

The letter's signatories range from GOProud's co-founder and Chairman Christopher Barron — a member of a group encouraging Dick Cheney to run for president and who has been known to post images of his bare torso to Twitter — to Tea Party leaders with no particular interest in the gay rights movement.

As of Sunday evening, the letter had 17 signatories. They include tea party organizers, conservative activists and media personalities from across the country, including radio host Tammy Bruce, bloggers Bruce Carroll, Dan Blatt and Doug Welch, and various local coordinators for the Tea Party Patriots and other tea party groups.

"When they were out in the Boston Harbor, they weren't arguing about who was gay or who was having an abortion," said Ralph King, a letter signatory who is a Tea Party Patriots national leadership council member, as well as an Ohio co-coordinator.

King said he signed onto the letter because GOProud seemed to be genuine in pushing for fiscal conservatism and limited government.

"Am I going to be the best man at a same sex-marriage wedding? That's not something I necessarily believe in," said King. "I look at myself as pretty socially conservative. But that's not what we push through the Tea Party Patriots."

That indifference is essentially the point of the gay conservative group.

SNIP

TEXT OF LETTER

Dear Senator McConnell and Representative Boehner

On behalf of limited government conservatives everywhere we write to urge you and your colleagues in Washington to put forward a legislative agenda in the next Congress that reflects the principles of the Tea Party movement.

Poll after poll confirms that the Tea Party’s laser focus on issues of economic freedom and limited government resonated with the American people on Election Day. The Tea Party movement galvanized around a desire to return to constitutional government and against excessive spending, taxation and government intrusion into the lives of the American people.

The Tea Party movement is a non-partisan movement, focused on issues of economic freedom and limited government, and a movement that will be as vigilant with a Republican-controlled Congress as we were with a Democratic-controlled Congress.

This election was not a mandate for the Republican Party, nor was it a mandate to act on any social issue, nor should it be interpreted as a political blank check.

Already, there are Washington insiders and special interest groups that hope to co-opt the Tea Party’s message and use it to push their own agenda – particularly as it relates to social issues. We are disappointed but not surprised by this development. We recognize the importance of values but believe strongly that those values should be taught by families and our houses of worship and not legislated from Washington, D.C.

We urge you to stay focused on the issues that got you and your colleagues elected and to resist the urge to run down any social issue rabbit holes in order to appease the special interests.

The Tea Party movement is not going away and we intend to continue to hold Washington accountable. Sincerely,

Christopher R Barron
Chairman of the Board, GOProud

Andrew Ian Dodge
Coordinator, Maine Tea Party Patriots

Pam Stevenson
Coordinator, Arizona Tea Party Patriots

Dianna Greenwood
Executive Director, New American Patriots (Ashland, OH)

Jim Mason II
Chairman and State Coordinator, Nebraska’s Tea Party Patriots

Ralph King
Co-coordinator Cleveland Tea Party Patriots
Co-coordinator State of Ohio Tea Party Patriots

Jack Lien
Coordinator, Tea Party Patriots of Great Malls (Montana)

Tammy Bruce
National Radio Talk Show Host

JP Weber
Coordinator, Annapolis (Maryland) Tea Party

Doug Welch,
Blogger and member Southern Illinois Tea Party

Bruce Carroll
Conservative Activist and Blogger

Pam Stout
Coordinator, Sandpoint Idaho Tea Party Patriots

Dan Blatt
Conservative Activist and Blogger

Everett Wilkinson
Coordinator, Florida Tea Party

Jimmy LaSalvia
Executive Director, GOProud

Paul Crockett
President Santa Clara (California) Tea Party
David Thor Andreasen
Cumberland County (Maine) Tea Party

[EternalVigilance]

I fully support avoiding social issues. The standard reply should be: Let the states decide.

What a load of destructive nonsense.

What are called "social issues" are actually questions of whether or not unalienable, natural, God-given rights will be protected in America.

If states "can decide" them, they're no longer unalienable.

But, in fact, the raison d'etre of government in America, all government, including the national government, is to protect the unalienable rights of the people, all the people, equally.

[EternalVigilance]

You’ve got it exactly backwards. The loss of respect in law and practice for the core moral values of this country is the disease.

The money troubles, the problem with the rise of an overbearing all-powerful state, the loss of liberty, are a symptom of that disease.

[EBH]

Social issues kill Republicans.

Indeed they do. One of the astounding questions that came to mind as I read, "The 5,000 Year Leap," was how our founders pondered the question of if we were a moral enough people to have liberty.

I would suggest to those on this thread that social conservative issues should not be interjected in the political landscape.

It wasn't the politics that created a moral society worthy of liberty. Morals do not come from the government anymore than our Rights come from the elites in DC. Our morals and Rights come from God.

And if that is the premise with which one holds our sacred nation, then as a "social conservative" one understands the "social issue" is best dealt with by returning our hearts, minds, and souls BACK to God. Legislation regarding such issues...will not win their very souls from an eternal hell.

[mo]

Gods, Guns and Gays never wins a national election in the USA. Might in some local districts.

Constitutional Federal Government platforms always will win...unless diluted by ...too much God, Guns and Gays....

[EternalVigilance]

The issue should be solely on put our country back under the rule of the Constitution, reigning in spending, and lowering taxes.

The Constitution states as its ultimate purpose "the securing of the Blessings of Liberty to Posterity." It also repeatedly demands that "no person shall be deprived of life" without a fair trial on a capital offense.

[Altura Ct.]

It is exactly because we have lost our moral compass that we are in this fricken mess.

[EternalVigilance]

But the purpose of government, according to the founders, is to secure those rights.

If your party is going to continue to brush that primary self-evident truth aside it will die. And it will deserve to die.

[MayflowerMadam]

Two separate comments:

1. The Tea Pary is made up of a lot of libertarians. Keep government out of our personal lives.

2. Abortion and homosexuality are disgusting and immoral. The issues can be legislated/banned until the cows come home, but the only thing that will stop these things is a change in people’s hearts. If we can get back to the Constitution and permit Judeo-Christian ethics to be taught in schools again, bring back prayer, stop worshipping political correctness, etc., that will open the door for a revival. Revival = hearts changed = people doing the right thing.

[EternalVigilance]

Reading certain posts on this thread provides one more reminder that Ron Paul Libertarianism is a disease. One that is a severe threat to the body politic. Especially the conservative body politic.

[Jim Noble]

The very concept of America is at risk with this debt. If we cannot fix it

What nonsense!

The politics of debt, of gold and silver, of lender and borrower, was the #2 issue in American politics until 1865, and was #1 after that until 1913.

The debt is going to be renounced, and a new monetary unit created. Savings will be liquidated, and debts will be erased.

As long as people are allowed to vote, that outcome is foreordained. No other outcome is even possible any more.

This - the collapse of centrally regulated money systems - has happened before, many times.

It has happened in Germany, it has happened in France. It has happened in Italy.

It happens in shithole countries all the time.

It even happened in Richmond, VA in 1865.

It is remarkable to me how much rhetoric around here, including yours, ascribes "the end of the world", "the end of America" to this entirely predictable event. You say "social issues won't matter a whit" after the collapse of the dollar and the Fed, when in fact they will matter more, much more.

It is our fear of what is to come, what must come, that has led to "to big to fail", to TARP, to GM, and to the upcoming rescues of B of A and the other money center banks. F*** 'em.

We elect a Congress. That Congress has the power to coin money, and regulate its value.

The sooner the crisis reaches its apex, the sooner we can start over. "The concept of America" is only at risk if we keep trying to save what is already lost.

Burn, baby, burn.

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

Politico is a bunch of leftists...

Thanks for posting, I have to shower after visiting the site, so you saved me some water...

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

Politico is a bunch of leftists...

Thanks for posting, I have to shower after visiting the site, so you saved me some water...

[EternalVigilance]

That is a great post. Very insightful.

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

The election was not a mandate for Republicans to fold on social issues either...

None of those people represent me...

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

These guys are jerks. I think we need to keep an eye on them. It was good of them to give us a list.

The pretentious titles make them sound so official...

I don't care who they are, or what their threats are. If the Republicans listen to them, they are going to have a short lived majority.

I don't take Politico seriously, they are just another false front leftist hype group.

[Screaming_Gerbil]

Your post is an island of common sense and clear thought amid an ocean of yammering fools.

And counterpunch got banned for his comments here.

...The Right is on a roll. The people writing that letter don’t want to see us snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Big Queers and Big Abortion are not taking over the Tea Party simply because they don’t want the movement to get sidetracked or hijacked by social conservatives.

Don’t fight with them. That’s just what the left wants to see. Don’t turn the Tea Party into a social issues movement or you’ll take us all down with you. Our grip is fragile. If you start a fight within the TP over social issues by pushing our conservative social agenda, soon enough you’ll be fighting with Big Queers and Big Abortion over who gets to steer the Titanic.

It can just as easily be said that trying to draw conservatives into pushing their social agenda on the TP is a cynical tactic to suck in people who just want to restore fiscal sanity to this country and otherwise mind their own business which is what they want you and me to do.

Why the hell is it that the right can never let a good thing play out in their favor? Why is there always such a burning need to shoot themselves and the rest of us in the foot? Why must we always lose because you people have to have instant gratification? You have no patience. You have to get on your damn high horses and insist on everything you want RIGHT NOW and anybody who doesn’t agree with that tactic and your demands is a RINO/troll/fool/loser/gutless/whatever so you’re just going to pick up your marbles and go home, sulk and name-call like a petulant child. Stay home and don’t vote so we can end up with an asshole like zero to wreak havoc on the entire country and beyond for a minimum of four years. Brilliant.

Grow up, for crissakes. Gather some wisdom. Develop strategies from observations and shrewdness instead of emotional needs and some sense of “I’m right, I’m principled, so I’m just going to stand here in self-righteous indignation and show my entire hand to the opposition.” Get a clue (and this isn’t directed to you alone - there are plenty others here who think the same way).

Another poster here made the comparison of being attacked by two deadly snakes at once as an example of being forced to act on two fronts at once or the one you don't fight will kill you. So standing up for moral principles is important too.

But as to the exact way of going about things - For instance how to teach people and especially young impressionable kids that irresponsible sex is not a desirable thing - in this current cultural climate - is something I really would not know how to do.

Yes, the people who home school and watch over their children are doing it right, but that still leaves the majority of society that is quite content to send their kids to the government schools and let the tv be their babysitter.

In my opinion, the best course of action would be to focus on removing government funding for those programs that support the encouragement of (by removing the personal liabilities for) irresponsible and/or destructive behavior. Then I figure people will figure things out for themselves that maybe those social conservative types do have some pretty good ideas after all.

I do know that the other side is real big on getting funding from the federal and state governments, and also from big business. Fighting hate crimes and supporting diversity, don't you know. But they are really saying that some people are deserving of more protections than others and that being gay is just like being born black, etc.

Safe schools and anti-bullying programs have a lot of tolerance and acceptance of LGBT (Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender) lifestyles build into them - the people that designed these programs are smart - killing these programs is going to look like you are supporting bullying behavior against vulnerable kids, for instance.

But, in my opinion, killing the funding to these types of programs which sound good but have the effect of building up a new generation of activists for these causes is something that is clear cut and do-able and will be what hurts them and their ability to influence society and the political landscape the most.

Aside from all of that... Some issues and subjects evoke just too much emotion for any hope of a rational discussion to even bring up on Free Republic. Anything relating to the "Homosexual Agenda" seems to be at the top of that list.

So it is best not even to try to discuss it here. Too much risk of getting zotted by friendly fire...

[EternalVigilance]

The election was not a mandate for Republicans to fold on social issues either...

I'm sorry to inform you that most of them folded quite a long time ago. That's just the stark reality. Oh, they'll give you some lip service, occasionally, and even throw you bone once in awhile, but they have no intention of reining in the judicial oligarchs, or stopping the daily butchery of thousands of little babies, or of pushing the sodomites back out of the public square and the schools.

I'd love to be proved wrong, but I most certainly will not be holding my breath.

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

So what do you suggest Republicans do?

Ignore these irrelevant a**holes and their delusional, pretentious titles.

The Tea Party folks have repeatedly said in the campaign they don't represent anyone but themselves.

Now, these particular butt crumbs think they have some kind of mandate to hijack the movement and run the GOP as well.

"Isolate and deny entry" is the standard protocol in hazardous waste operations.

[montag813]

Dan Blatt
Conservative Activist and Blogger

Why doesn't he mention the actual name of his blog: 'Gay Patriot'? At least 12 people on this phony "tea party" list are gay actvists. This is a transparent attempt by the homosexual lobby to co-opt the movement. I guess since the Ann Coulter invite backfired on them, GOProud is trying a new gimmick. It won't work. We aren't that stupid.

[sausageseller]

Most of the Log Cabin “Republicans” voted for 0bastard.

Like Colin Powell and the rest McCain haters?